kyle mckinley wrote:
It seems to me that what needs to be interjected into this conversation is questions of class. Sure, if there are no paid staff at a bike project, there is a perception of equality. But who is it that has time to 'give' to a project? I'm not, by any means, saying that if you volunteer your time, you aren't working class, but I think that a cursory examination of community bike shops reveals that they are mostly operated by young white men. At the very least, I think that we can agree that this is a group that possesses certain other privileges in this society, privileges that might make it easier to 'donate' a lot of time to a project you love. Many projects have found that paying a living wage has increased gender equity in their shop, and I would guess that it will increase the proportion of non-white core members as well. Both of these factors make the shop more friendly/ accessible to exactly the portions of our communities that probably have the most trouble getting bike help via traditional routes (bro-ing out with the mechanic dude down at the legit bike shop).
I've got a follow-up question to this for all of the shops out there.
I've always been skeptical about how paid staff would affect our shop.
We have always been all-volunteer. The one advantage I saw in it was
the possibility of redressing class or race imbalances in the way you
mention. On the other hand, my impression of most shops with hired
staff, even the ones who use class and race as an explicit justification
for it, is that they seem to be no more diverse along race and class
lines than our shop, usually less. My impression may totally be wrong,
so I'd love to hear from other places about this. Does your experience
with hired staff show an improvement in class/racial diversity?
As an aside, I might sometimes seem the grumpy naysayer, but I should mention that I love this list (and Bike!Bike!) for giving a space for critical, thoughtful, and constructive discussion to happen around race/class/gender/antioppression/etc in the bike world. Thanks everyone.
macho