Cycling Matters

So You’ve Just Bought an E-Bike — Again!

What’s wrong with ebikes — explained

A few months ago, I wrote a piece entitled

So You’ve Just Bought an E-Bike— Why?

I argued that while e-bikes were useful for some — mainly older people. Most of us, shouldn’t be so lazy!

It drew some lively debate and criticism, most of which I agreed with. The main argument being that e-bikes encourage people to take up cycling. Alluding to the fact that while cycling on the flat is fine, for many the problem arises when confronted by HILLS.

I like cycling up hills, and enjoy the challenge of a hard ascent. But it’s not for everyone. Cycling up an Alpine pass with no traffic is quite pleasant. In a hilly city, with roaring traffic on either side, in the cold and rain, it can be utterly shit. I get it, I’ve done it.

So if an e-bike can alleviate that pain — and saves you getting in a car. I’m all for it!

BUT!

There is an element to what I said in my article that is true. Which is that there is a preconception that everything ‘E’ will save the planet. E-bikes, e-car, e-scooter, e-lawnmower…[insert e-gadget here].

If it’s electric, it’ll save the planet. It won’t. What will save the planet is using less, making less and travelling less. END OF STORY!

Just because you have an e-car doesn’t mean you can drive as much as before without any damage. If you want to save the planet, get an e-car for sure, but use it when you absolutely need to. The rest of the time walk, or cycle. And don’t fly!

I know a fair few people, who’ve done better than me financially in life (not hard). That was their choice and I accept it. I don’t agree with how they accumulated such wealth, but I stayed friends with them because we’ve known each other since childhood.

In short, they were nasty capitalist bastards who made shitloads of money from other people’s misery. They worked in THE CITY. They had the big house, the cars, the coke habit, the endless foreign holidays. They trashed the planet and didn’t give a fuck.

Yet now, in their early fifties, they’ve jumped on the eco-bandwagon. They have the his and hers TESLAS, the solar panels, the heat pumps, (one’s even got a geo-thermal well!). They invest in GREEN energies (even though it was coal-fired power stations in Albania a decade ago), they buy organic, they wear hemp shirts, and have a selection of e-bikes of every make and model under the burning sun.

Now they’re telling ME about the environment.

‘We have to do something about the environment, Phil,’ one such friend told me on a short — if slightly excruciating — visit I made to his (still) big house in Surrey near London a few months ago.

‘We’re getting to the point of no return,’ he prattled on. ‘And now our kids are having children, we have to do something.’

NO SHIT!!!

I’ve been saying this for years. DO you remember the time I had long hair in the 90s and went on marches? That Anti-WAR rally in London before that illegal war in Iraq that was all about OIL. Oil you were investing in! Where were you? I didn’t see you!

Or on Newbury Bypass, protesting against putting a road through an ancient woodland. So in twenty years time, you could drive your TESLA through it. I didn’t see you. Where were you?

I’ll tell you: You were in Canary fucking Wharf nose-bagging cocaine, drinking Martinis and making loads of money.

I didn’t say all of this, because I’m too nice, and I like to preserve old friendships, however little we have in common. But it pisses me off that there’s so much bullshit around, and the e-car and e-bike ‘revolution’ embodies this hypocrisy.

What’s more galling, is that the folk who initially bought e-bikes and e-cars, because they genuinely had an interest in saving the planet, were regarded as freaks. Fuddy-duddies who wore hemp shirts, used fennel toothpaste, and bought organic food. The same people who were harangued by my friends in The City.

Not any more. Now it’s mainstream. Now you can even buy an electric Porsche! How pathetic is that. Yet my friend said he’s thinking of getting one. So maybe it’s time to cut these ludicrous friendships off.

It’s all a fad, of course. When the price of oil comes crashing down (which it will!) and gasoline is once again cheaper than subsidised Spanish red wine, we’ll be pumping it back into our cars.

When organic food is no longer available because climate change has made crops almost impossible to grow without pesticides, we’ll be back on chicken nuggets instead of organic loganberries.

When people get tired of maintaining their e-bikes and replacing the worn-out batteries, they’ll be back on their ten-speed racers.

Perhaps, I’m being dramatic, but I’ve seen more crazes come and go in my life to see it’s all crap. We’re still driving, we’re still flying, we’re still dumping shit in the oceans, we’re still burying our junk.

E-bikes might be useful, they might be trendy, but they won’t save the planet. Just like an e-car won’t. The only thing that’ll save us, is our conscience. And if we don’t have that, we may as well not bother.

Thanks for reading. And thanks for contributing to the last debate. David Todd McCarty, David Asch, Dave Wesely, Tessa Schlesinger - Stoic. Published 60 years., Steven Anthony, Johnnie Burger, Mark Suroviec, M.Ed., Uvebruce, Rafidanziger, Andrew Daws, Carolan Ross, Nicki J, Steven Salgo, Tim Sekac, Geomann1, Auntiegrav, Tom Wiersma, Nick Harmer, Christina Kinsey, Paul Mekala, Max Rottersman, Jordan Chandler, Danijel Crncec, Daibidgh B, Grimsby Hackney, Sailing Spark, Michael McGrath, Margherita, Michelle Teheux, Bob Koure, Ben Roberts, Rodrigo S-C, Natasha MH, Peggy Jones, Rachel A Fefer, Geo Snelling, Arluke, llouise.

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