The Revolution was too hard and scary

For years, there's been this cocky slogan, "The Revolution Will Not Be Motorized," with various graphics of pedal powered conveyances attached. I suppose they still sell well in some places. Here's a sample:

Most people are not revolutionaries. Some of them may be unattractive, but most of them are not revolting.

Bikes seemed rebellious and free in the '60s part of the '70s. Even into the early 1980s, road riding was gaining ground. To those of us with an eye on corporate dominance of our lives, the bike was a way to live on the fringes while we advocated for a social system that valued individual lives and shared efforts more than the pure pursuit of wealth and power. It offered -- and still offers -- a little slice of personal freedom in the course of a normal day.

As hard as it was then, several decades of infrastructure evolution and social conditioning have made it even harder to live without a motor vehicle in most parts of the country. Even revolting people like myself have grown up a little and noticed more and more occupations that contribute value and require more cruising range and cargo capacity than anything powered by meat alone. And the revolutionaries are few, fighting our little skirmishes against armored cavalry in a losing battle for the hearts and minds of the citizens.

Most cycling is just an expensive hobby. Traffic fear has been a huge boon to mountain biking, as fear gets the better of more and more riders who are scared of motor vehicles, but aren't quite ready to relegate themselves to a sedate bike trail and a comfort bike. Aside from the occasional cougar, mountain bikers have nothing to fear but themselves. Don't feel like a brush with death? Take that easier trail. Don't try that particular jump. It's all more protected than the mean streets.

The United States of today is what lies at the end of about 40 years on the path of least resistance. The only thing that could slow an American down was a bad credit score. A shiny bubble was always more popular than a solid foundation.

The revolution was over by the mid 1980s. People might ride bikes for transportation and pleasure, but without the underlying subversiveness. When mountain biking hit, the rowdy image was just that: an image. It was wild and fun, but it also got cyclists off the road.

I don't enjoy riding among motor vehicles. I merely put up with it, because I don't want to be chased off into the rapidly developing system of purely recreational closed courses that serve the off-road rider. A trail builder I know is sure that there is money to be made on such places. He envisions what are essentially country clubs for cyclists where, for a few hundred dollars a year, a group of riders can build and maintain a trail system that has just what they want. Hard lines, easy lines, place your orders. Trails will be built to suit. Cycling is the new golf indeed. Pay to play.

Cycling is becoming a luxury.

Bikes are very adaptable and still widely available. People will ride the roads because they have to. Some of us will ride the roads because we also want to, and because it should be not only our right but an encouraged behavior with far reaching social benefits.

Revolutions fail. The American Revolution is failing now, as the corporate power that led Thomas Jefferson to state, "I hope that we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country" has completely taken over that government. It was a long, back and forth series of battles from the late 18th Century until the Citizens United decision in 2010.

In a way, America was just the economic Petri dish in which this long experiment was turned loose to fester while the rest of the world watched. It's crawling over the sides now, and surrounding nations are starting to worry about the slime. Many of us mired in the culture are just trying to survive. It doesn't look dramatic unless it's your school that got shot up this week, or your medical bills that suddenly billow out of control. A lot of lives go on, teetering on the top rail of a rotten fence. But we're too divided to revolt. We're too afraid even to ride a bike. Get a gun. Get a bunch of guns, and a big truck.

It doesn't matter whether your truck has a big Confederate battle flag, or Old Glory, or a Gadsden snake  trailing in the wind. If you've paid for all that, you've bought in.

The revolution will not be.