Roller Skating Community
While the physical and mental benefits of Roller skating are more obvious to the outside observer, the true healing power of roller skating comes from its local and national skating community. In our skate communities, we have a special term we use to describe ourselves as a group. We refer to ourselves as a “Skate Family”.
With so much division and strife in today’s world, people are often found looking for a safe place. And our skate community provides just that, a safe place for people to belong, interact, develop, and just be themselves. No matter the age, nationality, race, sexual orientation, political belief, religious adherence, or economic status, we are all bonded together through the love of roller skating. United by this common love, everyday social constructs and barriers are quickly dissolved. In our community, the color or gender of a person becomes irrelevant, as these extrinsic identifiers are immediately replaced by intrinsic values.
Major motion pictures like “Roll Bounce” and “ATL” portray the real-world struggles of inner-city individuals and communities and showcase how they come together to overcome their every-day difficulties, through the shared love of roller skating.
Real life examples of these stories can be seen in the nine-time award winning documentary “United Skates”, produced by twelve-time Grammy Award winner John Legend. As depicted in this documentary, many skaters will attest how roller skating has saved their lives, not only physically, but mentally as well.
Roller skating is one of the few activities that possesses the power to create lifelong bonds of true friendship and love between people originating from an infinite array of diverse backgrounds. The skating community, this Skate Family, many times acts as a surrogate family for people who feel lost or lack the security that comes from having a sense of belonging in their lives.
But don't take our word for it, watch the following video as skaters from our local skate community express to you how important roller skating, and the skating community is in their lives, and “Why They Skate”.