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Notes -
Even before the 60s, see the Marlon Brando movie The Wild One from 1953, based on a story allegedly based on a true incident. See the famous quote from the movie.
So post-Second World War veterans returned home, more disposable income and better conditions in the 50s, a rise in interest in all kinds of communal activities, leading to a lot of guys getting interested in motorbikes as a hobby and club activity, along with a bunch of guys who would always be the type to be rule-breakers involved in motorbiking, and the tension between 'back to normie society and its rules after living in a different environment during wartime' and 'sliding into involvement with criminality' leading to, as you say, the romantic view of the guys living outside strict rules of conventional society in their own replacement culture as modern-day pioneers.
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