[Jeff Higgins]

To be fair, when Sonny started his chapter of the HA in Oakland in the late '50's and early '60's, they were just a bunch of young tough guys out for a good time. Working stiffs who couldn't even afford a car, so they rode bikes. They found one another and connected, building a deep and lasting camaraderie. "Brothers" in the truest essence of the word, fiercely faithful to the club and one another.

Then they found drugs, and the money to be made by dealing in them. Many, many of them actually left the club because they simply could not support this new found direction. Honest, hard working guys, family men, who wanted nothing to do with it. The face of the biker club changed entirely when they became organized criminal, for profit enterprises.

The whole thing had gone to schitt by the time I got involved in the late '70's. I had been attracted by the mythos surrounding the whole thing which, by the time I was old enough to actually ride with them, was largely a thing of the past. By the time I got involved, one was expected to participate in these "club activities". All I wanted was guys to ride with, carouse with, drink with, raise some hell with. They wanted foot soldiers...

Today, the clubs have been divided between the "haves" and the "have nots". Lots of b.s. about "brotherhood". What that means is when the drug dealing, pimping, racketeering, illicit gambling clique gets busted, everyone else is expected to "help out". Guys who do not share in the profits of these illegal enterprises suddenly find themselves expected to mortgage their homes, sell their vehicles, raid their children' college funds, or whatever it takes to provide for the bail and legal expenses of their "brothers". Who never shared the largess of whatever it was that got them busted...

That, and the "freak show" that much of it has become. Rather than seeking out good, honest people who value the camaraderie, they tend to attract exceedingly violent psychopaths. The more flamboyantly violent the better. Huge, 'roided out violent psychopaths who dearly love to hurt people, as a hobby. The more intimidating the better. And everyone else is bound, by the "brotherhood", to cover for these guys no matter how unhinged they are.

And Sonny made bank on this. As most of the guys who started the whole thing with him left in disgust, he nurtured it and grew it. He was the consummate sociopath. He didn't give a schitt about anyone but himself - one of his most infamous sayings in club circles was "I burn all of my bridges". "Brotherhood" to him was loyalty to him - a one-way street. He consistently broke all of his own rules, the very "code" under which everyone else was supposed to live, under threat of reprisal from him. He tried to portray himself as an honorable man, with honor above all else. He was anything but, and everyone knew it. The guys sucking up to him pretended he was, all right, but those were the kinds he surrounded himself with. The rest knew better and left. When they did, the entire face of the "outlaw biker" culture changed, and not for the better. I knew some great guys in the clubs. They all left 40 years ago.