Riding In The Body Positive

I don't have the body I had when I was 22.

At that age, my gender affirmation surgery was nearly three decades in my future.  (I didn't know I had a future!)  But that's not the only way in which my form has shifted over the years.

Of course, everybody's body changes over the years.  Some people mourn that:  They wish for the "ideal" body they had when they were young--whether or not they ever fit such an image.

While some segments of society are beginning to recognize that few, if any, of us remain at size four (I'm talking dress, not jersey, sizes!) in our fourth, fifth or sixth decades, acknowledgement has come that some people never mirrored the images presented to us in fashion magazines--or bike ads--even in their youth, through no fault of their own, has  been slower in coming.

The notion that cyclists, dancers and other athletes and performing artists have to conform to a particular body types discourages some from performing such activities.  It also triggers eating disorders and other mental health issues in some participants.

That is something Olivia Ray is trying to address.  The 22-year-old professional cyclist from New Zealand has volunteered to be part of a discussion of mental health awareness hosted by Rally Health, a sponsor of her team (Rally Cycling). "I think we get stuck on an ideal image, the holy grail of a particular body type," she says.  "Finding what makes us happy and what makes us feel most empowered by what we look like is, I think, the biggest thing," she explains.

From ages 3 to 16, she was enrolled in ballet, tap and jazz dance programs.  So she has experienced, in several venues, the pressure to conform to a particular body type.  While she concedes that in some instances, such as riding up a hill, it makes sense to carry less weight, "there is a fine line between what's beneficial to performance and harming yourself."  Obsession with weight can also cause reproductive health problems and other health issues for women, she points out.

One solution, she believes, would be to focus more on nutrition.  "If you're not giving yourself enough energy" during the ride or "enough fuel post-ride," she explains, "you will feel bad, you will feel like crap, and you won't want to keep riding"--no matter how well you fit the image of cyclists perpetrated in popular media.

 

You Should Wear A Helmet Because....

The other day, I wrote about Tessa Hull's lecture on female-identified cyclists during the first "bike boom" of the late 19th and early 20th Century.

I didn't attend the lecture:  It was on the other side of the continent.  But I did read the promotional material for the lecture, and a bit about Ms. Hull.  She laments the fact that, in some ways, female-identified cyclists of today are second-class citizens to a greater degree than they were 120 years ago, when advertisements showed women riding on the front of tandems and in packs.

So, wouldn't you know it?, yesterday I came across this:

It's part of a German cycling safety campaign.  The other photos, while they show men who aren't wearing much more than the women, are notable for their complete lack of bicycles.

Now, I'm sure that whoever created that campaign understands that some people won't wear helmets because, well, they're not sexy. (Of course, that depends on what you're into!;-)) Still, you have to wonder what is accomplished with a campaign that looks more like one created for safe sex (Yes, sex really is safer with a helmet. Don't ask how I know!) or, in the first photo, something to get "bros" to buy something that will make them feel more like men.

One thing that really surprises me is that the campaign was started in Germany.  If any country in the world should know about female empowerment, it should be Germany.  I don't agree with much of her politics, but you have to admit that Angela Merkel being, arguably, the most powerful person in Europe is testament to the fact that we don't have to take our clothes off to get people to do what we want them to do.

Oh, and she can't stand Donald Trump, and the feeling is mutual. That must count for something.  That alone is reason, I believe, why someone in Germany can, and should, come up with a more enlightened bicycle safety campaign than this one--or any I've seen in the US!