Co-op Board Discrimination

As most of you know, I’ve been in the process of buying a co-op for the past couple months. Yesterday was my board hearing to see if I would be approved or disapproved to buy the unit. I’ve heard horror stories of people being discriminated against at these meetings for things as trivial as having inherited money instead of having worked for it. So it was of no surprise, for me to feel a bit nervous when I finally sat amongst these board members, as they had the power to ruin what I’d been working towards for so long.

As I went over several scenarios in my head of what to expect I came to agreement with myself that I would not mention the fact that I own motorcycles. There’s just something about people that don’t own bikes that haven’t got a clue of what WE are all about. I stress “we” because every single person I ride with has a view of motorcycling that is not of the stereotypical squidly rider. I make it a point to only ride with people who respect the sport and have made it a lifestyle, not a weekend ride to the local hangout place.

So as the meeting progressed I felt everything going rather smoothly. At one point, for some reason or other, the president made a sign at one of the members and said “this guy can talk to you all night about motorcycles”. My face lit up as I felt great about the fact that one of them was like one of “WE”. I quickly jumped at the opportunity to tell him that I am an avid biker and currently own 3 bikes. I felt at ease. It’s quite comforting to know that the place where you’re going to call home has such a diverse group of people. Out of the 5 board members there were 2 Afro-Americans, 1 Latina and 1 Whiteboy (hehehe…sorry, had to throw that one in there) and best of all, the Whiteboy was a Biker! (Side note for those of you that can count: one board member was absent.)

Everything seemed just right. Until he asked me what kind of bikes I owned. I said, this, this and that. His face turned and then he said, “Oh, you’re an organ donor.” …(silence)…My jaw dropped.

Of all responses from all people. Who would’ve expected to hear that from him? I couldn’t believe it. As I tried to explain (in vein) that I am a responsible rider and I wear all my gear ALL the time ….nothing. It made no difference. To this guy I was just a young kid with late model crotch rockets and no matter what I said I was an “organ donor”. He went on to tell me that he owned 2 old BMW’s and he knew nothing about new bikes and didn’t care for them at all. To make matters worse, I told him that we usually ride upstate where there are better roads to which he answered with an almost elitist air “I’ve been cross country.”

At this point I decided to shut up and just say “great”.

The rest of the meeting went well but I still couldn’t get this incident out of my head. So as I sit here and write this I still can’t believe some people would be so narrow-minded and be so prejudice toward people who have motorcycles. I’m glad that owning “organ donor machines” only bothers one board member and not 5 though. I was approved and will be moving into my apartment in approximately 2 weeks.