Posted by: fartymarty
More thinking on tribalism - one that I don't understand (living in the UK for now 22 years as an ex pat Kiwi) is football and the near religious following of. People talk about their teams as "we" albeit the team is made up of generally foreign players with a generally foreign coach who have no allegiance to the club or area where the club is based (their allegiance is based on the hundreds of thousands of £s they make each week). Anyone who does not support their team is an outsider - not to mention rival local teams.
At least with bikes there are people who work at the company and are passionate about bikes in general and the products they make. I don't think we have it so bad. I'm not going to start hating in Specialized or Santa Cruz owners (2 random examples) in the carpark or on the trails.
Football Hooliganism is its own activity. It dates back to at least the late 18th century, so I’d say they’ve had a head start.
I think it’s an apt comparison though if we move beyond the ‘Starling’ Fallacy, which is specifically talking about a suspension design to bike brand fanboys in general.
I don't frequent the MTBR forums but even so I’ve see some amazing examples of fanboys being incredibly shitty to other owners of a brands’ bikes over things like legitimate frame alignment issues, failures from obvious manufacturing issues, incredibly shitty customer service, or total lack of customer service, you name it. And if I’ve come across all that, I can’t imagine how much of it there must actually be.
And here’s the thing. Most these brands do not manufacture their own frames. Some don’t even design their own frames. Some that do design their own frames have such obvious oversights to water ingress, ease of service, or such obvious cost cutting choices that I almost feel like I’m being trolled (on the internet or in real life) when I talk to fans of the bikes.
Is it just that spending that much money on a toy you ride in the forest requires a justification beyond what’s on paper? You’re not just buying a bike, you’re buying a religion?
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I’ve read some pretty shitty things about myself on the internet excusing Starling from their plagiarism. What is that other than toxic fanboy behaviour? As you demonstrate, you can be really passionate about something and recognize that people and product aren’t perfect. As with your soccer example, that doesn’t reflect on Joe (seems nice) or Starling. The fanboyism is a separate activity from the mountain biking and a separate organization (loose) from the manufacturer.
I’m totally onboard on connecting with people who make products you love. But here’s a great example. It’s totally cool to think Paul (Paul components) is an awesome dude, who makes awesome parts, and loves his awesome staff, and owns an awesome dune buggy. Great. When you go out and aggressively rail against people who have the nerve to think cable actuated disc brakes (specifically Paul brakes) aren’t as good as hydraulic systems for aggressive mountain biking applications then you’ve lost the plot. And it’s crazy how aggressive some folks get about ‘their’ bicycle brands when they lose the plot.
