Category: Surfing
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Monsanto vs. Surf Activists
At the end of March, Monsanto was taken to task by Kelly Slater (who recently left his longtime sponsor, and Monsanto-linked, Quiksilver), Cyrus Sutton and Kyle Thiermann on the company’s newly created Instagram account. In this conversation, Kelly Slater brings up GM cotton: “I will say that certain cottons, for instance, are proven to need…
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Kelly Slater’s Ethical Choice to Leave Quiksilver
Kelly Slater has exited a brand that has seen its fair share of dramatic push-back over the last year, from the uproar around the Roxy Biarritz Pro Trailer to the link I discovered between Quiksilver and Monsanto. Many are wondering why KS made such a drastic move. In my post, A Year in Review, 2013,…
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And what of the current state of women’s pro surfing?
“It’s time to take women’s competitive surfing to the next level.” These words have been echoing through the halls of women’s surfing since pro surfing began in earnest in 1976. Then, only 20% of the total prize purse for competitions was allocated to female competitive surfers. With the exponential growth in participation and interest in…
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The Privilege of Following Your Dreams
I have found that in (nearly) every conversations about and within surfing, the hierarchy of power and privilege is the single most often overlooked underlying assumption to each of these conversations. But I also believe that this open door, this obvious omission, allows the exact rupture needed for intense analysis and change to permeate the…
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Of Two Minds
Being a spectator of and a commentator on the symptoms of a surf industry in a toilet bowl spiral is something akin to (I imagine) how Jerry Stahl’s Lloyd feels about his job wording the side effects of prescription drug use in Happy Mutant Baby Pills. That is, Lloyd has all the information about the…
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The Year in Review, 2013
This was a monster of a year for discovery and activism in surf culture. For this reason, I think it would be beneficial to highlight and revisit those topics covered this year that have been most salient, before we enter a new year. Please feel free to add to this list in the comment section…
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Eddie Would Go. Maya Ought to Think Twice?: How we are progressing past sexism in our culture.
Sexist sentiments that one might expect to find around Maya Gabeira’s surviving a botched rescue attempt after tackling one of the largest waves (if not the largest) ever attempted by a female in a tow-in scenario, I found written by a woman on Surfer Magazine’s website and in comments by industry stalwarts, viz. a couple…
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Step up your game, Roxy. (video)
Watch Ted Endo deftly express what so many of us feel about Roxy’s statement regarding the response to the Official Roxy Biarritz Pro Trailer:
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Selling Sex in Surfing: Opinion and Fact Collide
Beyond the opinions of whether sex sells or not, and all the attendant questions often overlooked in this simple cliché (e.g. What does sex sell, exactly? Does sex effectively sell every product/service? How does this marketing strategy impact society? Are men and women equally drawn to the sexualization of human bodies? Are men and women…
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Roxy’s Official Statement
We have been waiting for Roxy to comment on the official trailer as a response to over 22,000 people who have voiced their disapproval of the portrayal of a 5-time world champion that was “made on behalf of the brand” for the Roxy Biarritz Pro for some time now. They finally have… ? Amidst a…
