RealSurf Surfers' Forum

steve shearer wrote: ↑

Sat Oct 27, 2018 4:05 pm

Very hard to not have aggressive behaviours play out in front of witnesses on tbe east coast of Australia.

And i still feel very squeamish about having this issue directly conflated with domestic violence.

Violence, aggression and territoriality in surfing have been present for a long time, maybe since its inception. Whether and to what extent gender plays a role in any incidents should be treated with great care.

So are you saying that the incidents reported in nick’s article aren’t gender related? If so, would you mind showing your workings please

Thats not what I said or implied Godsave.

It’s odd. Nicks random poll seems to have a 95% hit rate of abuse and threats, while a lot of people who have spent a shitload of hours in the surf over decades, myself included, have never seen such a thing

There we are then, never happened. Well done sunbird for exposing these evil feminist lies

I don't think anyone is being particularly defensive. I do think it's a follow up story to an incident that may not have the legs, for one reason or another.

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I was wondering if Nick has experienced any harassment while researching these issues.

No I haven't. The research has nothing to do with my surfing experience. The blunt fact is that there are many many thousands of people surfing in Australia who are having an entirely undocumented experience of the thing, and who are entirely unknown to anyone on this website. Increasingly these thousands include women. The research (it is ongoing) was triggered by the upcoming court case resulting from the Lennox incident between Mark and Jodie but is not related to it directly at all.

I don't doubt it's true. I've recently been deciding that in the contemporary urban surf environment all hard core surfers just make up a minority that thinks it deserves more respect than it gets from the majority of recreational surfers. This may make some people act out their misoginistic attitudes in the surf. Obviously this only gets acted out in the sort of conditions the majority of surfers surf.

jeezus Beany

Nick Carroll wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 28, 2018 8:40 pm

No I haven't. The research has nothing to do with my surfing experience. The blunt fact is that there are many many thousands of people surfing in Australia who are having an entirely undocumented experience of the thing, and who are entirely unknown to anyone on this website. Increasingly these thousands include women. The research (it is ongoing) was triggered by the upcoming court case resulting from the Lennox incident between Mark and Jodie but is not related to it directly at all.

Yeah there are stacks of videos showing blokes having all manner of surfing related dustups.
Similarly, cellphone vids have exposed widespread egregious police malfeasance.
Can you find one example of female surf abuse we can see Nick? It really should be available.
Despite the " blunt fact of the thousands and thousands of incidents " you refer to regardless of gender, if anything, guys go out of their way to give girls a break. They smell better, they look better.

Have you ever given a chick the dreaded Carroll stinkeye before the famous Carroll Newport drop in?
Loofy's the only person known in the history of surfing to be able to stand up to that.

There are three separate video recordings of the incident involving Mark and Jodie at Lennox, they'll come before the court and I'm sure they will be widely seen following the hearing.

If you read my reply to Beanpole above, you will see that I did not write "thousands and thousands of incidents". I wrote the following: "The blunt fact is that there are many many thousands of people surfing in Australia who are having an entirely undocumented experience of the thing" etc. By "the thing" I mean surfing. What I'm trying to get at there is that we really don't get to see much of surfing at all, we're just surfing in relatively small groups at a small range of spots here and there through the day, and really don't know much about the vast majority of other people's surfing experiences. We THINK what we see is the whole picture, but it isn't, it's just a tiny bit.

So you have your take on what's going on here, but honestly, it's only a small take, especially when it's compared with the actual accounts of these women's experiences. It's good you're nice to people in the water offshore1, we all should be, you know #notallmen etc, but unless you'd rather just disbelieve the women who've spoken to me or subsequently write or contacted me, clearly #somemen.

Re stink eyeing women, for sure I have. No doubt. My own surfing experience, fcuk, I started surfing in 1971/2 and almost immediately was bullied by older surfers, that went on for years until I got too big and good to be bullied, so then I became a bully myself of course. My friends used to hit people or fully threaten and intimidate them, while I perfected the art of silent hostility, you know, the paddle-down on the way out, the death stare, occasionally going a bit further. The girls who surfed with us at Newport we really accepted into the gang so to speak, but I'm sure I wasn't nice to some visitor girls and there will be a few girl pros from the '80s who won't remember me kindly -- many of the boys at the time would just take waves off them in free surfs, drop in, whatever, they were seen as easy prey. My behaviour had a sort of reverse effect when I travelled, especially to Hawaii, I kind of expected the same in return and thus was very respectful and careful to earn my place in various lineups over time. But none of what I did was really OK or necessary, I don't cut myself up about it but it was not cool at all, and I don't behave that way now -- though I still feel the urge to, like a habit, I have to be conscious and rein myself in at times.

There's no doubt that there's a certain type of surfer who will exploit what they perceive to be weakness. That notion of weakness takes different forms - kids, kooks, race, age and gender - (as well as a combination) - and different surfers will exploit them in different ways, often informed by their existing biases.

Kids and kooks can move beyond their perceived weakness. Older surfers have, mostly, enjoyed their privilege when they were younger. Gender and race have far more sinister backgrounds that inform the reaction of the surfer experiencing the aggression. So, while the surfer who is asserting his perceived rights - as a local or because of experience - may think that all surfers are equal and that his threats are similarly so, he is either willfully ignorant of these other factors at play, or worse, exploiting them.

I very much doubt the women surfers in this area would be comfortable with a man telling them their experience of being female in the surf has a "sinister background".

with respect AJ, thats a nonsense attitude that belongs in the 60's.

steve shearer wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 29, 2018 11:34 am

I very much doubt the women surfers in this area would be comfortable with a man telling them their experience of being female in the surf has a "sinister background".

with respect AJ, thats a nonsense attitude that belongs in the 60's.

Beginning a sentence 'with respect' always implies the exact opposite. Look beyond the use of that single word, whether or not you agree with it, otherwise, and with no respect whatsoever, you are simply picking an argument, as is your wont.

I would suggest that people who are subjected to either sexism or racism would not be comfortable with a white middle-aged man, telling them that the background is NOT sinister. Oh, and in case you misunderstood, I am talking in a broad and historic sense, not just surfing.

Not picking an argument, I genuinely believe what you are saying is nonsense. I think you don't know what the fcuk you are talking about and are using language that is so broad as to be meaningless and conflating concepts and creating an impression that is hideously inaccurate. And I do say that with sincere respect.

Not dissing Nicks' excellent article either, or trying to dismiss the horrific accounts contained within it.
I've shared it with a lot of people and asked for their reaction, most of them women.

I think it's a vital contribution to starting a conversation about what is going on here and how are women being treated in the surf.

Men need to do this. The problem, whether it has a sexist element or not, is overwhelmingly male violence, intimidation, threat.

It is important to discuss your own situation and what you see.......are they your mates, is it you?

As I said before though, I'm very squeamish about having the Lennox incident being used as a way to conflate this issue with domestic violence, or other current issues.

I was there that day, I know the protagonists, I know the background, the context.

This may end ups being a classic surf rage incident on a very crowded day....nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that the complainant is female.

That may be the case for some of the incidents detailed in Nicks story. Not all, but some.

That doesn't mean soul searching and conversation isn't in order.........just that I am very wary about jumping to huge conclusions.

Personally, I'm much more inclined to give a girl an even break....call her into one.That seems chivalrous to me, it might seem condescending
to a certain girl. My wife, and lot of her friends, hate any kind of mansplaining in the lineup. They just want to catch their waves and have fun without some toe-rag telling them how do it.

I admit this winter the crowd here took on an entirely different dimension.......lots and lots of euros and South Americans in the line-up, guys and girls, of varying abilities, some with very different ideas about surf etiquette to a settled Australian line-up.Or no idea. That meant I was often in a pack competing -hard- with both guys and girls.

There was a lot of tension in the line-up here this winter.
That seemed to explode into violence on a few occasions and it's possible that this incident was directly related to that.

Mate, you exhaust me.

Instead of playing the man, why not play the ball AJ.\\


What are your experiences in the line-up?
What have you seen, heard etc etc?

Is there a strong female presence in the surf you ride?