toxic bike

someone sent me these articles and even after this window popped on my screen with a radio shack add when i clicked on the link i decided to read them.

Nobody Bikes in L.A.
But they'd be a lot happier if they did
By Andy Bowers

The Bicycle Diaries
Is it possible to live in America without a car? Uh, sort of.
By Bill Gifford

you know, high gas prices, and the character decides in a heroical act of defiance to try and ride a bicycle and comes up with all this remarcable experiences that, why not, could make a great article, a little extra cash and a good excuse to the editor for showing up all sweaty once in a while. there seems to be a good intention in them. the idea that it is possible to ride a bike is permeating greater media. but they end with bitter commentaries that return happily to the confort of the car, after the picturesque adventure of the bicycle. pretty much in the fashion of the serialized tale where things go back to their normal state at the end of the episode.

these articles are cathartic tales in the sense that they release emotional tension (about driving your car, about paying so much for gas, about your long commute)but then lay down the reader in the unchanged shores of the real world (where there is nothing to do, unless you take the path of the deviated). i believe this format diminishes the power of the subject , marking it more as something in the world out there and less as something to incorporate to your life. bikes are presented in a prophylactic fashion. sorrounded by the bubble of the freakish.
their radical toxicity fogged by a quiet condescending chuckle.