Raven’s Rides
Raven's Rides Motorcycle Blog

I hear about “the biker chick image.” I wonder what it is, really, since I don’t wear leathers (I used to, but I don’t fit into them any more). So I thought I’d rattle on a little bit about stereotypes.

To me, the term “biker chick” used to conjure an image of the girl who sits on the rear of bikes wearing tiny little shorts and high heels. She makes me wince because, while she’s cute now, she certainly won’t be when she falls off and all her skin disappears. She is also a variant of the buxom wenches who get in the way of a perfectly good motorcycle picture in a certain special kind of magazine or calendar.

But the more I think about it, the more I realize that she’s not a biker chick–she’s an accessory, perpetuating a stupid image.

Then there’s the hardcore leather-clad woman with messy hair who wrenches on her own bike. She takes no guff from anybody and she’s independent and strong. You might want to stand upwind of her.

The trouble is, I don’t know a single female motorcyclist who isn’t independent and strong. You can’t not be independent and strong when you’re girl-handling several hundred pounds of metal over roads where the vast majority of people, while not particularly out to get you, just plain don’t see you. “Spirit” goes with the terrain.

And these women that I know, these spirited, strong, women, wear everything from the all-American leather chaps and leather to armored jeans to day-glo yellow synthetic jackets.

So what is a biker chick?

What makes us “biker chicks” is our individuality, our skill, and the happy glint in our eyes. It is the bugs in our teeth and the satisfaction of successfully changing a brake pad or engine, or of delivering a mess of turkeys to the local food bank at Thanksgiving.

So when you refer to me as a “Biker Chick” I guess it’s true…if you mean it as a compliment. I’m a biker, and by nature of my gender I guess I’m a chick. But know that I’m one of a kind, too, that I take showers and comb my hair occasionally, and that I never, ever wear shorts on a motorcycle.

The term doesn’t offend me, but when you use it, please make sure you’re not pigeon-holing me. Because I’m proud to be a biker chick…and if my buttocks showed, I’d be absolutely mortified. ;)

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