Pirate Critical Mass

May has traditionally been the Pirate themed Critical Mass ride. Let's revive that tradition! Dress up as a pirate and ride your bike. Yell ARRRRRR!!!! a lot in public.

An old pirate ride flyer with some graphics ideas:
vancouvercm.blogspot.ca/2005/05/may-27-pirate-ride-poster.html

Also, I've recently learned that over the winter CM died off a bit, some very small rides (just like the good ol' days) Then the April ride was a bit of a shitshow because people weren't sticking together or remembering the traditions so cars got in the middle of the mass. No need to feel bad about that, it happens. But clearly a bit more education and communication is in order.

It's great that new generations of CM are taking over. It's important to remember that the point of CM is to stick together and ride together in a safer way than riding alone. CM is not really a protest in itself, it is it's own direct action means and ending.

Here is a whole bunch of info on ride "rules" from yesteryear:
vancouvercm.blogspot.ca/2006/06/mass-30-mass-order-chaos.html

A few key points:

• Do not rely on the police to cork for you. It is important for us to be self sufficient. Police have a different agenda than Critical Mass. It's not worthwhile to be antagonistic to police but neither is it to ask them to do our job for us.
• Corking and sticking together is about keeping the ride positive and safe for everyone. Some idiots think staying together through red lights is to flout the law. The point is not that. Enraging car drivers is not helpful to Critical Mass, we all use cars at some point in our lives. Corking and sticking together is for safety and to speed flow. Though road ragers may be blind to it, we disrupt traffic less when we stick together.
• We ARE traffic, so we ride in a positive way demonstrating the change we want to see in the world. Protest movements come and go and ride along with the mass, but just riding together is radical and enough.
• Watch each others back - especially more vulnerable riders (kids, elderly, pedestrian, etc...)

Enjoy it! ;-)

PS Critical Mass is democratic in the most true sense of the word. So if past "rules" need to be changed then change them. Please communicate the change to the other mass riders and keep everyone together with that.