Abstract
Motorcycle Menace:
Media Genres and the Construction of a Deviant Culture

Outlaw motorcycle clubs have long been meaningful symbols of what is wrong with society. Their members have been the not–a–citizen, symbols of sexual, social and criminal deviance.

        Over time the outlaw myth grew to encompass more than a one–dimensional stereotype. It is varied in its message and, depending on the context, can represent an attitude and lifestyle to be admired, despised, feared or emulated by both men and women. As uniquely qualified non–conformists, bikers were made to order for the media’s penchant for addressing the various definitions of deviance and communicating at any given time just where the line is between obeying the law and stepping out of bounds.
 
       Media response to the outlaw motorcycle clubs suggests a comparative analysis of select genres. Using bikers and motorcycle clubs as concrete examples of outlaw behavior allows analysis, across genres, of the variations in their definitions of deviance and responses to rule–breaking behavior.

        The study considers how, and to what extent, the media act as instruments of social control, and how changes in definitions of deviance reflect changes in the media’s perceptions of deviant behavior and the outlaw myth. It is an opportunity to examine larger aspects of America’s perceptions of deviance and the myth of the motorcycle outlaw. The research questions addressed are:

        •How do the genres described here construct and use the biker myth and images of outlaw clubs?

        •What do the images reveal about the genre’s relationship to social boundaries, deviance and the status quo?

        •What differences in methods and freedom from the strictures of the status quo exist among media genres?

        Genres analyzed include mainstream newspapers, national news magazines, situation comedies, literary non–fiction and biography, masculinist fiction, comic books, biker movies and biker magazines.

        Representative texts from each genre reveal their visions of reality and how they communicate that reality to an audience. The research is not an exhaustive analysis of every representation of bikers. Rather it is concerned with providing a flavor for the variety of myths and images used to portray a subculture.

Introduction...