Mission Statement: We are a traditional motorcycle club dedicated to sharing a common love of motorcycling and motorcycle culture, to building and supporting brotherhood, primarily among Jewish men, but welcoming of all good men, and to protecting and defending the People of Klal Israel, and all men and women everywhere, by standing up against antisemitism and all forms of hate.
We are not a religious club, you won’t be praying or doing any religious practices with us. For us all Jews are Jews, we don’t discriminate or differentiate. And you sure as hell don’t have to be Jewish to join us. Just appreciate where we come from.
History
LVMC started as a group of Jewish bikers in SoCal that were getting together to ride around 2016-2018. Most of us were solo, independent bikers, but a few of us were with various clubs. It was just a random get together that slowly evolved. In 2019 we decided we wanted to do something more, we were guided by our love of biker culture so we wanted to do it right and maintain the traditions and ‘old-school’ values that we loved so much and had found in other clubs but some of us found it difficult to be who we were where we were. After some serious discussions we started Los Vengadores MC.
We wanted to be more than just a riding club, or a social club, mainly because of how much we truly did love this lifestyle. But we set ourselves some hard and fast ground rules. For example: no back patches until we were large enough and well established (even then they would only ever be one-piece patches; no MC cubes or state, city, territory patches; an emphasis on teaching pack riding skills to men who had never been in a club; an emphasis on teaching protocol and MC history so our men would know where we (as a community) come from and how to properly interact with other men in other clubs; an authentic prospecting period; and so on. It’s our goal to grow ourselves slowly and properly and avoid the issues that tend to plague so many other start-up clubs who want to jump into the scene fully-formed and then crash and burn.
One of the big things that really shaped our vision of who we are were a rash of antisemitic attacks against Jews and synagogues during our formation period. We all realized early on that we needed to be willing to stand up for ourselves, and consequently for other people. Two of our founders had been through antisemitic shootings, most of us had experienced some form of hate or another, and as we all know, the biker community has more than its share of racism and racist clubs, so it was important to us to be a shield and safe-haven from that kind of hate. We quickly came to understand that it isn’t just Jews that feel this type of hate, but Christians and Muslims can experience it, all religions and the non-religious can be victims of hate so one of our founding concepts quickly became the club motto: NEVER AGAIN. A reference originally to the Holocaust during World War 2, but also a reference to any form of genocide or hate-based attacks.
Our Name
Los Vengadores Motorcycle Club – it just doesn’t sound like a Jewish club does it? Which is something we did on purpose very early on. The name is a tribute to our various cultures and influences.
First, we chose Spanish for a reason that may surprise most non-Jews in this country. The oldest continuously operating synagogue in the United States is the Spanish and Portugese Synagouge, Congregation Shearith Israel, in New York. The Temple was founded in 1654. And most of the earliest Jewish settlers in the United States were Sephardic Jews whose primary languages were not English but rather Spanish, Portugese, Ladino, and other related languages. In addition, Southern California’s laid back culture (both biker and civilian) is heavily influenced by the Chicano, Mexican, and Central and South American cultures. So we chose to name our club in Spanish rather than English or Hebrew in order to pay joint tribute to those influences.
Los Vengadores is Spanish for The Avengers. That name was taken from a Jewish paramilitary organizaton called Nakam. The Nakam were a group of Holocaust survivers who wanted to take revenge against the German people for the murder of six million Jews during World War 2. While several plots and attempts were attributed to the group, perhaps fortunately, they never really acheived any of their goals. But we honor the drive and the desire to stand up for their people that Nakam represented and it is from them that we take the name of our club.
Membership
We welcome everyone, men and women, families and children, to hang out with us and to support us. Our public events are always family friendly and safe environments.
Formal membership happens in a couple of stages. Any man over the age of 18 can approach us and ask to pursue membership. We call these men hang-arounds. There is little expectation of the hang-around other than taking the time to actually get to know the other men in this club and to occasionally ride with us. The hang-around wears a Club support patch on the front of the vest, but no other club patches. There is no time limit, there are no dues or other requirements to be a hang-around – just a formal request from the individual who is interested.
The second stage of membership happens by invitation only. This is the Prospecting period of membership and lasts a bare minimum of six months, but can go as long as we want it to. The Prospect will wear a prospect bar on the front of their vest, will pay dues, and be expected to abide by all of the rules of the Club. It’s an intense period meant to help a man develop good pack riding skills, knowledge of MC culture and protocol, and for everyone to know one another on a deeper level than simply conventional friendship. We are building brotherhood and fraternity and the Prospect has to earn the trust and respect of our Club.
The final stage is full membership in the Club. This is the full-patch who has earned the right to wear our Club patch and to call themselves a member of Los Vengadores and a brother to the other patches in the Club.
We do have a few membership requirements:
- No active, sworn. law-enforcement officers (understand, we are a law-abiding club and do not tolerate illegal activity among our members, but we spend time with other clubs and visit their club houses and events where police are not welcome).
- Must have a legal motorcycle license at all times. Loss will constitute suspension from the Club.
- Must own an American brand motorcycle: Harley, Indian, or similar. Abso-fucking-lutely no rice burners.
- No one who has been convicted of any kind of sexual assault, abuse of a minor, spousal abuse, or anything similar, is eligible for membership.
- No dual memberships in other Motorcycle Clubs.
- No dicks!
