It’s funny to think that a community which is built around heavily “feminine” candied cars has socially been exclusively masculine. Low riding has often been thought of as solely a male activity, not only from the eyes of male lowrider owners but also from the outside world. This probably roots from car club rules that typically have highlighted that club members are males only. Then of course there’s the highly sexualized women placed to model alongside these cars. They do attract the male view right?
Yet, what’s forgotten are the women counterparts within the car clubs. Mostly wives, girlfriends, daughters, nieces, etc. that do all the behind the scenes work. Putting together events, doing paperwork, helping with the upkeep of the cars and so on. These women love lowriding just as much as the men within the community. Some love it so much that they have challenged the social norm of “males only” and taken on the project of having their own lowrider.
The reason that I have chosen to pour myself into a series highlighting these women is because I didn’t know what I would be facing when my boyfriend handed me the keys to my 75 Cadillac ElDorado. If I’m being honest I had never imagined owning my own lowrider. I loved my partners car (‘84 El Camino), even when it was a complete bucket with primer spots and a gutted interior. I savored cruising down the Blvd in it. Driving it made me feel like I was floating. So when I became an owner I knew that I would devote everything I had into my car. Because it was mine, my pink “Playgirl”. And then reality hit, men always thought the car was my boyfriends. “Your boyfriend has a nice car.” “Oh he owns two lowriders now!” “You let her drive your car?” NEVER did they assume or believe that this massive car could belong to a woman.
Yet here I am, in the processing of taking my car down to bare metal to help my boyfriend bring my dream lowrider to life. I go into the paint store with my boyfriend. They know me. They now know it’s my car. They’re still surprised that I’m there on a Saturday morning picking up supplies with my partner to go and work on MY lowrider. I spend hours working on my “Playgirl”. I want her to be pristine.
All the women I have encountered throughout this series have only highlighted this issue. They detail how men feel intimated or brush them off as car owners. Some men think, “She just has that car because of her boyfriend or her dad.” Not, “Damn your ride is sick! Good to see a woman holding it down.” Even as these women and myself continue to break this social norm we still are not always met with the respect granted to our male counterparts. That’s not to say that there hasn’t been changes. Some car clubs are now accepting female club members. Some of these women even hold positions within the club. Some women are creating their own car clubs with all female drivers. We’re still here. We’re still working on and driving our own cars. Even if you don’t believe it haha. Anyways there’s much more to say about this issue but at a later time. I will be keeping you guys up to date with interviews about my subjects experiences. And I’ll be showing you the progress I make on my own car. Lets make these men do a double take when we cruise by in our glistening cars.