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Transcript:
Oh no, a new danger is terrorizing my community! According to a local paper, the Bay Area Telegraph, “Local Trauma Medics Share Concerning Update on Serious E-Bike Injuries.” This is doubly concerning to me because not only do I live here in the Bay Area, walking around just enjoying not being injured, but I also own and ride an e-bike.
The article references a press release from John Muir Health in Walnut Creek, California, in which the Executive Director of the Trauma/Acute Care Surgery reports, “Over the past year, our Trauma Team has treated double the number of injuries to e-bike and e-scooter riders, as well as pedestrians hit by them, compared to the previous year. This is an alarming trend.”
I guess that’s it. Party’s over. I have to get rid of this e-bike. I can’t sell it because then the danger would persist. The only solution is to slowly lower it into a vat of molten steel.
Okay, so I already know I’m going to get a lot of angry comments from a variety of directions for this video: cyclists who hate e-bikes because they think they’re “cheating.” Drivers and pedestrians who hate e-bikes because they think they encourage annoying and unsafe behavior. And teenage boys who love e-bikes because they’re annoying and unsafe cheaters.
The surgeons at John Muir aren’t alone in sounding the alarm over the dangers of “e-bikes”. Earlier this year, the American College of Surgeons released a statement affirming that:
Over 20,000 people are injured while riding electric bicycles annually with approximately 3,000 individuals requiring hospitalization, and this is likely underreported.
The rate of electric bicycle injuries is increasing annually.
Electric bicycle injuries are more severe than their manual bicycle counterparts.
Head injuries occur most frequently, and only a third of injured patients are reported to wear helmets.
They call for federal legislation that would establish laws and safety regulations that don’t vary by state and can adequately protect everyone, especially the teenagers and other kids who seem to be the most at risk.
I agree with all of that…sort of. What I don’t agree with is the continued use of the word “e-bike.” Because the many of these injuries are not caused by e-bikes. They’re often caused by electric motorcycles. And every time the press or regulatory bodies or cops or doctors call them “e-bikes” they make us all less safe and less healthy.
So yes, I have an e-bike. I got one when I moved here to the Oakland hills and found that I could no longer simply bike to the grocery store when I needed something, because I couldn’t get home dragging panniers full of food up a mile of 20-degree hills. I had to drive, which seemed silly and wasteful. So, when I found a cheap e-bike on sale, I snagged it, thinking that if I actually used it I would eventually upgrade to something better. I didn’t just use it–I loved it. First I just used it to tool around the hills a bit, because back then I wasn’t a good enough climber even when I didn’t have groceries. And once I got my legs back, I was able to tool around the hills on my regular bike.
After that, the e-bike was used mostly for replacing the car: the grocery store, the post office, and even getting my dog to trailheads a few miles away to go for hikes. He rides in a backpack. He loves it as much as I do (possibly more). And my husband, who doesn’t ride a bike as often as I do, uses it sometimes to accompany me on rides that he wouldn’t be able to handle without the battery.
When I get home, I charge it using my solar panels, setting a timer so it turns off when it’s powered.
You can see why I’m not really swayed when “serious” cyclists tell me e-bikes are for lazy people who don’t want to put in the work. I am now a serious cyclist, and I don’t know that I would be, if I hadn’t been able to start with the e-bike. And now the e-bike doesn’t replace my regular bike. It replaces my car.
Thanks to the advocacy group PeopleForBikes, there are three official categories of e-bike:
CLASS 1: Bicycle equipped with a motor that provides assistance only when the rider is pedaling, and that ceases to provide assistance when the electric bicycle reaches 20mph.
CLASS 2: Bicycle equipped with a throttle-actuated motor, that ceases to provide assistance when the electric bicycle reaches 20mph.
CLASS 3: Bicycle equipped with a motor that provides assistance only when the rider is pedaling, and that ceases to provide assistance when the electric bicycle reaches 28mph.
My bike is class 2. A lot of people think that the biggest problem with e-bikes is the throttle, because it does allow someone to ride around without pedaling at all. Personally, I love the throttle because it allows me to start pedaling after I’ve stopped facing up a steep hill without doing a u-turn, and it also gives me a jump when I’m stopped with cars and a red light turns green. A lot of injuries happen to cyclists when drivers don’t see them or get frustrated at intersections like that, so I genuinely think it’s a helpful safety feature, as someone who regularly rides in traffic.
But I do get it: if a person ONLY uses a throttle, that’s not really a bicycle, is it? And that brings us to e-motos.
The real problem, in my opinion and the opinion of PeopleForBikes, is that e-motos are lumped in with Class 1-3 e-bikes, but they are wildly different. Manufacturers know they can make money by selling motorcycles that LOOK like e-bikes, so buyers, usually younger men and teen boys, can get away with riding them without proper licensing or other regulations. E-motos can hit much higher speeds, like up to highway speeds, but because the manufacturer slaps some fake pedals on them, they look like bikes. Sometimes. Like, if you actually ride a bike you can see an e-moto from a thousand miles away, but somehow the authorities and general public remain confused.
The worst part is that some manufacturers make and sell something that is technically an e-bike, but offer easy mods for a buyer to increase the power and remove any speed limit. Some of them are even sold as having different modes: bike or motorcycle, which is very much not legal. Again, if you know what you’re looking at, it’s pretty easy to spot one of these when they’re in motion but if you don’t, well, you don’t. And so you see a gang of teen boys rampaging down the sidewalk at 40 to 60 miles per hour on something kinda quiet and with pedals and when they hit an old lady and send her to the hospital, well, that becomes another statistic against “e-bikes.”
And that’s bad! Because we desperately need solid federal regulations about e-motos: the manufacturers, importers, and sellers of these mopeds are lying to consumers, convincing teens and preteens that it’s a cool toy to play with and convincing parents that it’s safe and normal. I actually see a lot of overlap with car manufacturers. I recently watched an excellent video from the channel Not Just Bikes that describes why giant SUVs have taken over US and Canadian roadways, and the simplified answer is “because car companies wanted to avoid regulations on emissions and safety.” SUVs are considered “light trucks,” which have lower standards to meet on both of those metrics, and so the result has been that we are all in more danger of being killed by ridiculously oversized vehicles that no one actually needs.
On a personal note, my husband and I share a 20-year old Honda Civic and have been wanting to buy a good electric car. When Rivian debuted, their marketing was perfect for us: we go camping! We would like to bring our bikes and surfboards and SCUBA gear to places! And then we looked at what they were offering and it was a giant fucking child-murdering SUV. Then they introduced a giant truck. Then they announced a slightly smaller SUV, and teased that their next car after that, some time in the next five years, would be something the size that normal people would want. I may be in a bit of a bubble but everyone I saw talking about it online completely melted down over the idea of that one. The smallest one. But we have to wait a million years. I assumed it was because the larger market out there wants the child-smasher 4,000, but after watching Not Just Bikes’ video, I realized that maybe it’s more insidious than that. Maybe it’s because the Child Smasher 4000 doesn’t need to show that it won’t smash a child in a crash test. Or in a crosswalk. I don’t know, but it fucking sucks.
Anyway, car manufacturers ruined cars and made our roads less safe because they knew they’d make more money by avoiding regulations and selling idiots a fantasy about how cool they’ll look driving a tank around the suburbs. And now, motorcycle manufacturers are doing the exact same thing. Motorcycles are dangerous enough as it is, but the people who ride them are usually expected to pass tests demonstrating their knowledge of the law and their ability to safely handle the machine. That’s a huge barrier to entry, especially for teens and preteens who think they’re indestructible and just want to go zoom zoom now. So these completely unethical manufacturers are using a loophole to print money, and they don’t give a shit about who gets killed because of it.
As much as I want those manufacturers stopped, I don’t want their lack of ethics to negatively impact the growing industry selling actual e-bikes. I’ve already described how I use my e-bike to replace my car–it’s actually an even greater impact than what I’ve described, though, considering that when my husband and I moved to a neighborhood surrounded by steep hills with no sidewalks or bike lanes we had to sit down and figure out if we could make one car work between us, especially when he had to return to the office. Sure, there are grocery runs and whatnot, but you can schedule those for the weekend. What about an emergency? What about a wildfire or a mudslide? Not only is the e-bike ready and waiting (along with Indy’s backpack), but I’d be way less worried about needing to get through heavy traffic on our tiny, curvy streets, or to even go off-road to cut through parks. It’s honestly a perfect vehicle for a ton of situations.
And I’m not alone. Loads of people would bike to work instead of driving if they could do it without sweating too much. Loads of people have disabilities or limitations that make riding a regular bike impossible, but they’d get their freedom and the joy of riding a bike back with an e-bike. And so I don’t want to see these awesome, efficient, super fun car replacers vilified every time some jackass crashes a motorcycle with glued-on pedals.
So please, make sure you distinguish between e-bikes and e-motos, support common sense legislation like that proposed by groups like PeopleForBikes, and for god’s sake, don’t buy children motorcycles from Instagram ads. Oh, and wear a god damn helmet!
On that note, this seems like a good time to announce that despite always wearing a helmet, I have lost my actual mind and signed up for another Climate Ride. In May of 2026, I’ll be riding my regular, non-electric bicycle from San Francisco all the way to Los Angeles to raise money for Bike East Bay. If you have some extra cash lying around, I’ve linked to my fundraising page in the transcript. If you don’t have extra cash, that’s fine! Just leave me occasional YouTube comments telling me that I can do it. I can bike 473 miles in six days. Yeah, I almost died doing a century last year but that was last year. This is this year. Hoo boy. What have I done.
This post contains a video, which you can also view here. To support more videos like this, head to patreon.com/rebecca!
Transcript:
Are you familiar with Stephen Miller? He’s Donald Trump’s Deputy Chief of Staff in title, but in reality a lot of people have good reason to believe that he’s the source of Trump’s fascist policies. Not only does he look and act weird and unsettling, but he does things like crib from Nazi speeches to try to convince people to violently attack people on the Left because Charlie Kirk died.
Anyway, you might wonder who would possibly want to marry such a vile, hateful little bigot, and the answer is ANOTHER vile, hateful little bigot. His wife is Katie Miller, who previously worked as Mike Pence’s Communications Director and currently is possibly boning Elon Musk, as well as being a spreader of racist misinformation on social media. Recently, on Xitter, she Xitted, “Per capita, Somali immigrants receive the largest share of government benefits.
70% of Somali households in the US receive OUR taxpayer dollars.” To prove her point, she included this helpful chart showing the percentage of Somali families who receive some kind of welfare, compared to “native” households.
This wasn’t quite racist enough, so General Michael Flynn re-Xitted her and added “I say we prosecute the Somalis who ripped us off, along with their political cohorts AND we send @BarackObama back to Africa whence he came since he allowed all of the Somalis into America in the first place.
Who’s with me?”
I’ll take these two disinformation Xits in reverse order. First of all, Barack Obama was born in Hawaii. Hawaii is one of the 50 states that make up the United States of America. It shouldn’t be, but that’s a topic for a different day.
Secondly, Obama did not “allow all of the Somalis into America in the first place.” Like the claims of Obama actually being born in Africa, this is an ancient rightwing talking point that has been thoroughly debunked. In fact, Somali migration to the United States began in earnest in the 1990s, with about 43,000 immigrants (half the current population) entering by 2003, when George W. Bush was president. According to sociologists at Bowling Green State University, many of them were highly skilled, and able to successfully integrate into American life.
And let me just add this: good! George W. Bush didn’t just randomly decide to import a bunch of Somalis. They came here because they were experiencing extreme violence and poverty following a civil war, and this is a country founded by immigrants looking for a better life, and that should be our ENTIRE THING. It’s on the fucking plaque on the giant statue greeting immigrants. I don’t care if they were highly skilled, if they spoke English, if they were healthy, or if they were educated. I’m glad we welcomed them to the US, and set them up with jobs and a life and a community, because they’re humans and that’s the right thing for humans to do for each other. Wild Leftist take, I know. Anyway.
I also don’t care if they ever paid taxes, but guess what? They fucking did. Which brings me to Katie Miller’s racist disinformation: “OUR” taxpayer dollars? Ours?
Study after study shows that immigrants contribute positively to the economy of the United States. Yes, first generation refugees fleeing violence are more likely to require help, and again, we should give it to them whether we get paid back or not. But WE DO GET PAID BACK. In 2017, the National Bureau of Economic Research found that refugees who entered the country as adults will, “After 6 years in the country..work at higher rates than natives but…never attain the earning levels of U.S.-born respondents. Using the NBER TAXSIM program, we estimate that refugees pay $21,000 more in taxes than they receive in benefits over their first 20 years in the U.S.”
Refugees pay MORE IN TAXES than they receive in benefits.
The American Immigration Council performed an analysis that found that immigrants in general “generated about $1.7 trillion in economic activity in 2023” and “paid roughly $652 billion in local, state, and federal taxes,” as summarized by the Council on Foreign Relations. They go on to point out that immigrants participate in the labor market at a higher rate compared to the native born population.
So, what about Katie Miller’s little chart showing that a higher percentage of Somali households get assistance compared to native-born households? Well again, and not to belabor this point too much, but who gives a shit?
But secondly, that chart comes from CIS.org, which is the website for the Center for Immigration Studies, which is an anti-immigrant hate group known for flooding the media with reports that are eventually debunked by ultra progressive biased hippies like, um, the Immigration Policy Center and the libertarian think tank, the CATO Institute. They helped popularize ideas like “anchor babies” and even “terror babies.” If the Center for Immigration Studies says that my eyes are blue, I’m running to the mirror to check.
When FactCheck.org reached out to CIS recently to ask if they knew why Donald Trump was claiming “like 88%” of Somalis receive “welfare” benefits,” they ignored the site until after the piece was published, at which point CIS published the little graph that the racists are now sharing. A week later, FactCheck was able to confirm that “84% of individuals reporting Somali ancestry in Minnesota — not just Somali immigrants — benefited from specific public assistance programs, mostly Medicaid.”
And, gosh, I hate to be a broken record, here, but…GOOD. GET THOSE PEOPLE HEALTHCARE. Get them food stamps and stuff, too, but YES HEALTHCARE IS GOOD. Treating people for their illnesses benefits EVERYONE. I don’t even care that this is hyper-focused on the Somali community in Minnesota (where about a third of all Somali-Americans live). Get them all healthcare. Get them all food stamps. Helping each other is good, actually.
So no, Somalis aren’t ripping us off. They are merely the latest population of immigrants to be hated by rightwing bigots, following in the footsteps of the Mexicans and Italians and Irish before them. And like those populations, they will continue to improve our country–not just economically, but by introducing us to good food, and fun cultural celebrations, and new ways to view and describe the world. So don’t fall for the propaganda.
