PORTLAND, Ore. — On Saturday night, Portland witnessed several thousand people pedaling through the streets of town — without clothing.
For the people on the 2022 World Naked Bike Ride, Saturday was a return to normal.
The event kicked off after 9 p.m. It's framed as a protest of oil dependency, while also calling attention to cyclist vulnerability. Organizer Evan Ross said in the past, 10,000 people have showed up to ride through Portland in the nude.
"Our goal has never been to make the ride as big as it can be, but more to promote the message," he said, "On a day like this when we’re experiencing a heatwave, it's a perfect day to protest oil dependency because we think that the combustion of fossil fuels is ... making our weather hotter.
"Other messages of the ride are anti-body shaming ... Everybody is welcome here and nobody should be sexualizing anybody or putting anybody down because of their body."
Christian Studebaker told KGW this is his fifth time at the ride.
"It's a lot of fun," he said, "I ride my bike around to school and to work, wherever I can really, so it’s a really good opportunity to come out and show with force how many people in Portland are ... more pro-commuter, pro-green life."
"I find that the camaraderie and the communal spirit is really powerful," said rider Nathaniel "Rabbit" Atterbury. "A lot of us have a message that we carry with us, and seeing that there’s a lot of people around us that speak with that same voice - it’s really empowering."