No one talks about this, it’s sort of just assumed that the biker ex-offender should work at regaining the trust of their community like it’s their fault they lost it in the first place, now depending on the person or what they have done that may be true, but let’s take a look at stigma from a different angle, I am going to use some psychology so bare with me.
The first time I experienced stigma in the community was in my 20s. I had more than a few biker friends at this point, and the ones on the estate used to check on me daily. One day, I was walking with a then friend of mine to go pick my daughter up, when we turned the corner one of the boys asked if I was okay, and when I answered yes, he asked me if I was sure as I didn’t look okay. I assured him I was fine. I’d noticed my friend widening the gap between me and her, and as we turned out of the estate she turned to me and said:
“What the hell was that about,”
I was surprised so simply replied,
“Oh, he’s a friend of mine,”
“Uh-huh,” she responded.
Now people had often mentioned he was a scary-looking dude, but I had the biggest crush on him so never saw it. The mind sees what it wants. In my friend’s defense I mean he was an outlaw biker who looked a bit like one of the demon bikers from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Next thing I knew, my friend of 11 years, we’d lived next door to each other, gone through school and clubbing and babysitting each other’s kids now refused to visit me or be seen publicly with me, I visited her in secrecy her home a few times before the friendship fizzled out. That gap had widened until I was simply no longer in it and it hit me like a ton of bricks, what I realized is stigma isn’t relatable to what is going on, it’s based on beliefs.
The human mind doesn’t distinguish between fact and fiction, it believes whatever you give it, the thing is that our brains are constantly absorbing information because our brains are designed to ensure our survival, they are hardwired to survive that’s why it’s capable of such miraculous feats. Okay here comes the psychology bit.
How Our Brains Work
Our brains constantly take in information through our senses and then assess that information for an emotional reaction, a positive emotion allows the information to be stored in the memory without a reaction, and a negative reaction prompts our flight or fight reflex because your brain is trying to measure the threat and neutralize it. In this process, it also shuts down our genius zone in the top of the brain where we do our best brainstorming and start acting like chat GPT scanning our brain for information to use to form a response to deal with the threat. The problem is all the information you have taken in from TV shows and films, music, life experience, books, etc is stored there, and as mentioned our brain does not separate fact from fiction so yep all that Sons of Anarchy you binge-watched is scanned too. It’s also why they tell you to be careful what you consume. So your brain is busy scanning for the solution to make this problem go away. Now if it can’t this is where suicide comes in. It was once explained to me as the brain’s ultimate solution. It’s the final default setting because everything ends in death, the dead have no problems. I see reoffending the same way, it’s a default setting when your brain can’t solve your biggest problem. It defaults to committing a crime and getting arrested. We didn’t have to worry about this when we were inside.
To further compound the problem, stigma is based on beliefs, and a belief is just a thought repeated, but we don’t outperform our beliefs, we have to change them. So take this situation (fictional)
When you’re crossing a village square you see a lady struggling, so you dismount your bike and approach her thinking I could help and I should help you see a positive situation so your brain isn’t scanning anything. The lady however maybe read one too many articles around biker thugs terrorizing small villages (cos the media love those narratives) so begins to fear you as you approach her brain starts scanning and her thought is reinforced by the fact that everyone moves differently in biker gear so it comes off in a way that is either attractive and exciting or intimating, depending on the person’s perspective, in this case, it’s intimidating so the lady becomes hostile you try to diffuse the situation but soon become hostile too because you don’t understand her reaction after all you were just trying to help, then others see or she retells the encounter, and all of a sudden through no fault of your own you become the biker terrorizing the village square that she’d read about factual or otherwise.
Now we have community stigma because the locals begin to believe there is a biker problem without any evidence of such. The assumption at this point that biker ex-offenders can re-earn the trust is taking the tough maybe impossible road because the village has formed a belief so now it’s about changing the belief which is becoming ingrained.
Tips for the Biker Ex-offender
- You can only control your thoughts, actions, and intentions – don’t waste your time trying to control someone else’s, but be aware that they may have different beliefs that lead them to perceive you in a way you hadn’t intended.
- Emotional Intelligence – having control over your emotional reactions is the best way to secure your mental health and avoid unnecessary reactions.
- Do regular dopamine detoxes to refocus your brain and be careful what you are feeding it. This simply means having a period of time, a few hours, a day, or a weekend, where we do not input anything into our brains: no TV, no films, no books, no reading. Going for a nice scenic ride somewhere helps with this as it can get boring. You can write things down.
- Be hyper-aware and think about how the other person might perceive what you’re about to do.
We need a united approach to tackling stigma in the community because the only way to change beliefs is to replace them with new beliefs. This can be a personal journey if those beliefs have become attached to our sense of identity. But a one-sided approach is a bit like treating the symptom and not the cause.