Sydney press release

World Naked Bike Ride, Sydney 2008, Press Release

MEDIA RELEASE 19/02/08
Written by: Mei Qi Tan
email: meiqitan(at)gmail(dot)com

Gear up for gear off for the environment / Get your gear off for the environment / Strip down and switch off this March

Strip down and ride on for the environment this March. The next World Naked Bike Ride (WNBR) in Australia will commence at high noon in Sydney’s Hyde Park on Saturday the 8th of March 2008.

The ride will also be coinciding with the Earth Hour campaign within the same month of March.

The WNBR is an annual clothing-optional protest ride for Naturism, environmentalism, peace and the rights of cyclists to use the road safely.

Along with Earth Hour, both campaigns focus on the promotion of environmental consciousness at the level of every individual.

The ride is not a race and goes at an easy recreational pace. The only competition is how creatively bizarre participants can get with decorating their bodies using paint, slogans and bits of costume.

Though the dress code for the ride is “Go as bare as you dare!”, nudity is not compulsory. It is not a ride promoting overtly sexual behaviour in public.

Many people still struggle to distinguish between concepts of non-sexual nudity and pornography. The WNBR encourages society’s need for a body-positive mentality, and protests against environmental damage caused by motorised vehicles.

Excessive burning of fossil fuels has instigated environmental damage in the forms of climate change, air pollution, acid rain and water pollution.

From the onset of pollution and cancer, to obesity – the burning of fossil fuels and car-addicted lifestyles are causing serious health problems, many of which are affecting humans on a widespread scale.

Violence stemming from wars fought over oil and road rage results in the deaths and injuries to innocent civilians from the former, and pedestrians and cyclists from the latter.

The WNBR is an active social movement for a peaceful and gentler world, which includes our roads.

“We face automobile traffic with our naked bodies as the best way of defending our dignity and exposing the unique dangers faced by cyclists and pedestrians plus all the negative effects of oil, cars, war, consumerism and non-renewable energy”, reads the WNBR mission statement.

The WNBR group was created by Conrad Schmidt (of Vancouver, Canada) in 2004 to help coordinate a large international naked bike ride between many different activist groups across the World. Since then, the WNBR has spread to over 50 cites in about 20 countries with the participation of thousands of riders.

For more information, please contact Marte Kinder at [email protected]

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