"Unfair Genetic Advantage"

[Trek420]

Since you asked, yes. But, I disagree with the basic premise, because:
........

I cannot change the past, I can only observe and be a catalyst of change in the present

I believe that NOTHING is accomplished by focusing on the past...we have to acknowledge it, but we have to constantly do gut checks in the present to assure that we are fair in the HERE and NOW.

I feel to know where you are going you must know where you've been.

I love the past, reading about it, studying it. In history I learn about righteous men and women with access to every advantage (yes, rich white dudes ) and at times when it was not easy, back in the day when one did not blog your way to rights but risked their lives. .... they did the right thing because it's as damaging to ones soul to be an oppressor as it is to be oppressed. At least that's what I was told growing up and that one should be able to live a life in which you are neither.

I love history, studying it, learning it because I learn about those who overcame tremendous obstacles that stopped others yet they were able to overcome.

They remind me when I face a wall I can't go around, under, over, break through that "Look what s/he did!!! You can achieve your goal"

It does not mean those who did not rise above discrimination are any less than those who do, or "Anyone can do _______, s/he did!" who knows what inner strength lets some rise above what another person can't break through. But I love learning about them.

That's just me.

But back somehow to cycling. Where I roll, supposedly the most liberal of urban areas, the most diverse. For example we have more Chinese than just about anywhere other than uhm ... well... China and every other group too and yet I have friends who say they don't do group rides because they don't feel welcome and say they have been snubbed, they don't go to bike shops because they don't get treated well (that's not at MY favorite shop!!).

I look around me at events and in shops and well it's an upper middle class white sport. I think as a sport we need to own that, open up, and create a cycling culture that is diverse.

But that's just me.