A battle five days in the making!
You have now read the accounting of the physical altercation that happened today in bucolic San Clemente, California (click here). A town that is not known for violence, by the way, but rather happiness and open goodwill. A town that mirrors icons Richard M. Nixon and Christopher Ward. And now here is the podcast. I haven’t listened yet but from memory the salient bits, in no particular order, are:
1. Ashton saying two things at once. “I love/am inspired by/enjoy…” while also completely denigrating whatever it is that he’s talking about.
2. The abject paternalism Stab feels toward its readership.
3. (I would imagine) The hideously ugly tone of my rage-choked voice.
4. Ashton explaining what Stab means to him in gorgeously rococo language.
5. Me telling Ashton that I like Stab in the Dark.
6. Ashton telling me that Stab has broken every single story since he arrived.
6. Ashton saying there is no official policy at Stab not to talk about BeachGrit before saying there is an official policy at Stab not to talk about BeachGrit.
7. The 15-year-olds at Stab who get protected from vile commenter speech.
8. Ashton trying to parse surf media and claim that BeachGrit, Stab, Surfline etc. are all completely separate things that cannot be grouped together.
But take a few minutes and listen. More importantly tell me what you think. Am I borderline retarded chimp or is it not even borderline?
Did Ashton’s ridiculously mealy mouth sound worse in person or does it pour through the radio too?
Hahahah, surf writing vs. surf writing. Fighting about writing. Take it easy girls.
This is gold
Chas is trying to come across as some noble defender of honesty and integrity in journalism. What a sad joke. A (moderately) nimble mind that chooses to hector and divide. Fostering hatred, anger, jealousy and rage. Classic symptoms of deep insecurity.
Shitting on people and admitting it doesn’t vindicate him. It make him look like a self righteous prick.
Im not sure what his motive is though.
If he really believes he’s the flag bearer for journalistic integrity he’s deluded and needs to get those therapy sessions booked.
Or maybe he’s just machiavellian.
Pandering to the lowest common denominator.
I’d hate to be anal, but if all You can bring to the table is a one word insult spelt wrong, I’m going to have to delete it.
Aiming for conversations here mate…
https://www.urbandictionary…
The Urban dictionary aye… thanks but I’m going to stick with the Queen and the rest of the English speaking World on this one Dandaman.
It’s nobody’s fucking business how you earn your money or how much money you earn. Don’t feel obligated to offer any explanation. It is also nobody’s business how you choose to spend your time with your wife, children etc. I find this whole debate extremely entertaining.
Just listened to this podcast. Man, Chas you sound like such a stuffed up, conceited loser. Your book “hell” was painful but I actually enjoyed some of your stuff on surf splendor. Puke. I would hate to be your wife….Oh shnap, I better run cause you’re probably gonna try to kick my ass now. Nah, everyone knows you couldn’t beat your own hammer. LATE
But some confuse telling the truth with saying whatever dumb shit pops into their head.
Confirmed. Anyone named Ashton is an insufferable douche.
Ashton’s go to argument, “Give me a break….” was levied eight times before Chas tried to wring his neck. Chas appears to have given Ashton what he wanted. Now I have to go take a shower because I feel dirty for having taken the time to go back and count.
@beachgrit:disqus Derek, just a note regarding Chas’s claims around analytics and your low bounce rate. You have some javascript which is doing some fairly complicated things as a user scrolls down your reading list. There’s a particularly clever function that triggers a new page view as a user arrives at the next article. However, it’s going a bit haywire, as it must be establishing the bounds of an article before its comments load, as scrolling to the comments section triggers a page view for the next article. This will be skewing your analytics, particularly your page visits and bounce rate. A particularly bad example is the “I tried to wring Ashton’s neck” article, which if you get to the bottom of the 200+ pro Chas ra-ra he’s for the people comments, has triggered five new page views. If you correct this, you may see your bounce rate significantly increase and your page views drop. Don’t developers particularly love using the word particular. Also, somewhat ironically, these javascript events are often called Modifiers.
Bingo. But it does explain the site layout and navigation that would otherwise be completely indefensible.
When the journalist becomes the story they are no longer the journalist.
Fair point of view but history disagrees with you.
And that’s what’s broken in journalism today. Never become the story, report about the story. When CNN/FOX is getting more attention than the actual stories we live in a shitty world.
Where is the guy from Fla. Sean something or other has he gone to Stab? You know he has a good grasp on this situation!
chas, you can dish it out but can’t take it. And all the interrupting was bad. You had nothing to say and Ashton really proved himself the better man and owner of a better far more impressive site. What a petty old bitchass you sounded like. So what he says you have a sugar momma getting violent was such a bad look. He wasn’t insulting your fam he was insulting you. And David scales poorly moderated this – the questions were good but the interruptions were not. You are too soft for this whole insult genre thing. I love your book Welcome to Paradise and your podcast when your not insulting websites but debate is not your thing bro. For shame you made that weak photog in Oregon look like a stud.
Are you the same, energetic man who wrote on Stab, “Fuck you, whites are dirty and evil in life and everywhere else.”
lol energetic. Yes. It was in response to someone who said the same thing in re “Brazzos” to show him how it felt. I still love you bro
Wow. Chas you should have pounded that punk! What a little bitch. Talking about someone’s wife? Ridiculous.
What can I say, very entertaining. Classic meltdown moment by Chaz which was such a ridiculous reaction to the W word. Definately Advantage Stab, I think Ashton answered most stuff honestly and with much more composure. Chaz why didnt you just reply with the informative response that you gave later on in the interview? it only got super personal for you because you made it so with your reaction. The response that you gave later was all that was required, and would have put you on top of the debate at that time. I thought that you were thicker skinned than that. You did come across as a dick, but we have all had our meltdown moment- it just depends if this meltdown reflects who you really are.
I would say that Ashton generally won the debate by a big margin. Although the hate towards Stab is quite entertaining at times and interesting to read, I think sometimes maybe you are spending a bit too much energy on it. I regularly look a beachgrit.com and I think what beachgrit stands for is great, but Im not interested in personal feuds, I want substance and information from a neutral angle (free from advertising influence) which is the backbone of what beachgrit stands for? some beachgrit articles although well written dont provide me with any information and can be just a waffle about a general subject. Like the article about your surfboard is made in cambodia, what about providing info on what brands are making boards in Cambodia, Thailand etc etc- More Substance!
At the same time Stab is making some great content, the Stab in the Dark series is one of the most interesting things that has been released in recent years, and that takes (presumably) a large budget and filming editing team to produce. But as we all know the articles could be written with biased advertising interest.
Beachgrit and Stab both have their niche.
Keep true to the cause, dont let the personal stuff get in the way of good journalism, although it can be entertaining i have a feeling that it will only benefit very short term rather than the long term.
I cant believe that I have bothered to write all this.
Ashton comes across as a dickbag. It’s hard to see how that is a win.
00:33:15 ” Do not talk about my wife”
Gold!
Fuck this Bitchgrunt website. You kooks never post anything surf related worth reading about. I don’t care how feel or what ever else you want to sook about. Your articles read like Cleo magazine. Harden up you fairy pussies.
Do long words confuse you and make you angry?
Pipe down princess
Hold my beer while I adjust my tiara.
Haha. Touchè
Great podcast! Chas had every right to tell Ashton to stfu about making assumptions on his life/work and family. He didn’t listen like.. 5 times.. it really is on now. Good for us, good on Chas for stirring it up. Surfing is fun after all.
Longtime reader, first time commenting. In the debate there were no winners, Ashton came off as a passive aggressive d bag disingenuously spewing false positivity, while Chas came off as a smug, self righteous d bag. On 2nd thought I will give Chas the win for the choke attempt.
clear victor
The job they seems better fit for is working here… http://www.summerseve.com/
unevolved and shameful behaviour. There is no winner and no one deserves a pat on the back for that display.