Help: I am the victim of a vicious and sustained online bullying campaign!

Chas Smith

By

The horror. The horror.

I have been aware of online bullying as a cultural phenomenon for five or six years, maybe a little more, and must tell you the truth; I was unimpressed by, even callous to, the plight of the victims. I understood that it must not be very fun but unlike real bullying, a boy or girl can disappear from online without a trace, no? Snapchats can be deleted, email addresses changed, Facebooks made very private and, like that, the tormentors pushed into outer darkness.

No?

No.

For yesterday I tasted the sharp, pointy stick of an online bully and it will likely take some therapy for me to open my inbox without wincing in fear for years to come. Allow me to tell you the story.

It was a day like any other though more stormy than usual with gusty winds and threatening clouds. I woke with the first light, went downstairs to make some coffee and my kindergarten-age’d daughter breakfast and flipped open my computer screen. First I read news from the exciting world of wave pools then I scooted over to [email protected] to see what the morning might hold.

Things seemed normal initially. Emails from Derek Rielly, emails from our exciting new filmers, emails from the World Surf League announcing a longboarding event in Taiwan but then a shiver ran up my spine.

What’s this?

The Inertia Fam: Subscription Confirmed

Every sinew in my hands revolted but conditioning won the match and I clicked.

The Inertia Fam
Your subscription to our list has been confirmed.

For your records, here is a copy of the information you submitted to us…

If at any time you wish to stop receiving our emails, you can UNSUBSCRIBE HERE

I mashed the button until blood oozed from my littlest finger. My daughter asked, “What’s wrong, Daddy?” in between bites of pasture raised egg yolk and Eggo waffle and shrieked when I looked up to respond. My face, I realized, was a frozen mask of horror. A twisted and dark visage.

The Inertia Fam? I honestly hate trendy words, like “fam” and hate them worst when they are very clearly 3 years past their pull-by date, vaguely urban and used exclusively by white people. Fam. “Hey, fam!” “What up, fam?” “Yo, fam!”

Ugh.

The Inertia Fam. An online bully had made me part of The Inertia Fam even if only for a few seconds.

After I dropped my daughter off at school, I came home and took an extra long shower trying to wash The Inertia Fam off but no matter how vigorously I scrubbed, I could still feel it on me. Like an ugly pair of OluKai flip flops. Like a smarmy, meaningless smile.

It took much pacing and more vodka for me to return to my computer as the sun was dipping into the cloud wreathed sea. A wasted day, work-wise, but I couldn’t be chased from my domain. I had to master once again so back to [email protected] and my eyes, like magnets, fell upon the subject line This week in SUP: 11/30/18. The sender?

SUP Magazine.

I haven’t slept a wink and am planning on calling Ms. Melania Trump neé Knavs, who heads up an anti-cyberbullying task force, to beg for help once I find my voice.

From the I-Love-The-WSL dept: The reinvigoration of a jaded surf fan!

surf ads

By

Man falls back in love with pro surfing after difficult year.

It’s been a rough year for us surf fans.

We’ve wandered through our crumbling empire like the armies of the late Romulus Augustus, the last Caesar of Rome, watching as Germanic tribes armed with backward-finned surfboards and content marketing strategies seek to tear down everything we hold sacred.

Our once dominant legion, founded on the basis of surfing’s unbottled magic and unfiltered irreverence, has been worn down to a reactionary, reclusive rump. The wolves of progress bay for blood at the door. The end has grown closer and our voices fainter. We ready our ships for the final exile.

(I’m calling Salina Cruz and would also consider the South Australian Desert. Hit me up.)

But then it comes.

I don’t care how you butter your bread. Seeing an eleven-foot board knifed up and under a thirty-foot Pe’ahi bowl in real time makes me want to go and grab random strangers on the street and yell “Oi, cunt, THIS is fucken surfing! This is IT! Why would you wanna watch anything else!?”

A raw north-west swell flying out of the Pacific’s crown like a God Damn rearguard cavalry charge. All of a sudden the horns of Rome are sounding again.

First of all, Jaws.

I don’t care how you butter your bread. Seeing an eleven-foot board knifed up and under a thirty-foot Pe’ahi bowl in real time makes me want to go and grab random strangers on the street and yell “Oi, cunt, THIS is fucken surfing! This is IT! Why would you wanna watch anything else!?”

Say what you will about the wait between sets. That highlight reel, even in the “windy, small, average Pe’ahi“, should get a run on every sports show across the globe.

“Well Chuck, those lunatics over in Hawaii are at it again. Both men and women competitors took to giant waves at *news anchor squints* Pee…Ha… in Maui…”

Surfing’s best broadcast to billions.

“Oi WSL cunts,” I want to scream.

Here’s a tip for free.

Use the big wave tour as your Joe Public hook. Do a YouTube vlog following somebody like Billy or Kai or Keala around for a year, documenting the training and prep they go to. Sell it to Discovery Channel. Market Big Wave Dave-style surfer dolls that grommets world-wide can throw into shore breaks, up storm drains, down bath tubs. Make millions.

(Just don’t mention the crystal meth.)

Then you can keep the ‘CT to the core. Premium waves. Competitive fairy tales. Expert analysis.

Warrior women drawing brutal yet beautiful lines down that dreamscape Maui wowee. I could watch well-surfed Honolua all day long. All year long. Forever. Keep it coming.

Beachweave? Didn’t even rate a mention. Queen Steph carries so much gravitas she could make the Costco Texas Tanker Wave Cup classy.

Well done, WSL cunts.

Sure, we might disagree on a few things. My eyes might still be in the rearview mirror while you have the accelerator planted firmly to the floor. But when it comes down to it you still have enough lineage pumping through your veins to know what makes a good show.

Running two comps at once (and even offering split screen!) through the website and a vastly improved Facebook stream was a solid effort. Real solid.

It’s a simple formula. Good waves. Good surfing. Easy access. Keep it that way.

Oh, and the men’s title race is still to come.

I can hardly keep my sword in its sheath. Long live Rome!

Steve Sherman/@tsherms/WSL

From The only-the-good-die-young Dept: Kelly Slater says he’ll retire after surfing in the Olympics!

Chas Smith

By

...if he makes the team. If not? 4 more years!

Any time Kelly Slater gives an interview it’s stop the presses news. Oh you take them for granted now. You even get angry, inside, thinking, “Enough already…” but there is going to be a day, and that day gets closer with each that passes, when he is no longer here. Of course he’s never going to die but… he’ll theoretically retire and when he does I can’t imagine many more interviews.

So savor when he sits down and talks, cherish when Sports Illustrated asks:

You co-founded your sustainable fashion label, Outerknown. How would you describe your style? What does fashion mean to you?

And when he answers…

Growing up, fashion wasn’t much of anything to me. I was talking recently on my social media about how I didn’t have socks as a teenager. When I was kid, we really didn’t have much money or anything, so if I got a new t-shirt I was happy. At this point, to be able to create and co-found my own brand with Outerknown, and have other people who see that vision and that idea is great.

The poorest people in the entire world have socks, if they want them, so I don’t what Kelly’s on about there but relish.

I mean, “I didn’t have socks as a teenager?” What the hell?

Moving on…

What are your plans Tokyo 2020? With it being the first time surfing is including in the summer games, do you feel a need to compete?

And yeah, Kelly. Do you feel a need to compete?

I haven’t made an official statement but I have said that if I were to make the Olympic team in 2020 I would surf. I would probably make that my official retirement after that.

There we go. A probable retirement announcement!

Dry those tears. Dry them now and enjoy these next two years.

Read the rest here!

Introducing: The world’s first exclusively wave pool surf magazine!

Chas Smith

By

Come get kinky!

We live in wonderful times, wondrous times when any itch can be scratched, where no kink is too obscure. I don’t need to tell you that there are online clubs for dendrophilists, those sexually attracted to trees, and agalmatophilists, those sexually attracted to statues. Hell, there is a whole website for incels who happen to be outdoor enthusiasts. What there hasn’t been, though, is an online portal exclusively and only documenting wave pools and wave pool cultures.

Ask and ye shall receive!

The great Bryan Dickerson, of SurfersVillage fame, has embarked on a new journey of discovery called WavePoolMag.com “I started the website because the thought of going for a pre-work surf in good waves every other day would be an incredible way to supplement ocean time…” Bryan says. ” I love surfing and riding waves and the thought of more and better surfing time makes me very happy. Hopefully WavePoolMag will be a resource to this end.”

Let’s ask him some questions!

Chas: Which tanks have you surfed?
Bryan: None! We have contributors like Matt Warshaw and Scott Bass write about their experiences. Would you like to contribute Chas?

C: Yes! I can write about the very real dangers of wave pools. How scary they are, how they wish to rip arms out of sockets. Which tanks you wanna surf?

B: Kelly’s looks too perfect, if that makes sense. You Chas, hurt yourself there. What was THAT like? BSR Surf Ranch looks really fun but I’d probably get stuck behind the bowl and could probably only go left on the advance setting. But the Wavegarden Cove and Surf Lakes setups look the delicious. What’s your take on those?

C: I’m a Surf Lakes man. They seem to be the only ones taking the apocalypse seriously, design-wise. Are you partial to one technology over another?

B: The current trend is to boast about your tech’s wave count. Because at this stage it’s the wave pool makers like Surf Lakes, attracting the investors and park builders. They need to do this. The more waves per hour they produce, the more paying customers a park developer can allow entry. And better ROI. So it’s weird, the fine details of the wave’s shape and thickness is becoming almost secondary in a lot of the publicity send outs, We still haven’t heard from Webber Wave Pools and Thomas J. Lochtfeld. I think they will offer up game changers in the coming year. So, when you ask about preferred tech, at this point in the wave pool character arc, best tech could still be yet to come.

C: Do you think wave pools will breed a culture that is distinct from beach surf culture?

B: Yes! This is more interesting than the wave technology. There are some wave pools planned as urban redevelopment and others as a country club centerpiece. On one hand you could have disadvantaged kids from a Parisian banlieue who build a whole scene around their neighbourhood public wave pool (think of parkour!) and on the other you’d have, well, rich golfers who want to be surfers. At some point they could meet in a wave pool surfing competition! I would see this movie. But in between those two extremes it’ll probably be a lot like wakeboarding, since wakeboarding cable parks are the closest comparison we have right now to wave pools. So, I’d put my money on wake boarders. What is wakeboarding culture? Here, I pulled a (totally unedited) quote off of Unleashed Wakeboarding Magazine: “Being a rider not only take his board , ride it, making some moves and turns. Being a rider is sharing this spirit that connect all of us to that sport, and having fun with his friends who share the same passion”

Amen. Visit here now!

Bruce Irons: “Driving without a license isn’t a good thing! Innocent until proven guilty!”

Chas Smith

By

Beloved Hawaiian surfer denies recent DUI allegations!

As you read right here two-ish days ago, Bruce Irons was arrested on Thanksgiving morning in Newport Beach, California for DUI drugs, possession of a controlled substance without a prescription and driving without a valid driver’s license. A bummer turn for the one-time most exciting surfer in the world. TMZ released more information this morning, adding, “Law enforcement tells TMZ Sports Irons was found passed out behind the wheel of a running car at a gas station. Cops responded, found Irons, woke him up and determined he was under the influence of drugs. He was arrested without incident.”

All fine and good except just hours ago the world’s most famous celeb gossip website caught up with Bruce at Los Angeles International Airport, just outside the Hawaiian Airlines counter, and got his side of the story!

The cameraman asks, “Just wanted to see how you were holding up. News broke this morning that you got into a little trouble in Newport last week. Your fans were concerned. Do you have a message for them?” to which Bruce responds, “Yeah it’s all good, you know, just a little hiccup. Nothing I can’t get past.”

The cameraman presses, “What happened in Newport?”

Bruce says, “Nothing that my legal team can’t handle. It’s just an unfortunate couple of events in a row, you know what I mean. There will be things cleared up here… you know what someone writes is one thing and, that’s what he read but, uh, once my lawyers and stuff find… uh… innocent until proven guilty right? The cops weren’t too… I mean, I did the sobriety test and I was fine. It’s just a little… Oh I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine, it’s just you know driving without a license isn’t a good thing, you know, but I’m in the process of getting… my license is expired and it was just the little gap between getting the new one and stuff. It expired in Hawaii on November 16 and I was going back there to renew it, you know.”

The cameraman then wants to know if he is taking some time off but Bruce? Of course not! He’s headed back to Hawaii for the Eddie Aikau opening ceremony… and to get his license.

I must say, I completely understand. My license is also currently expired and I tried to make an appointment but the DMV messed it up somehow and now I’m just totally stuck and if I get tired at a gas station and fall asleep then I’ll be more than stuck. I’ll be fucked.

So yeah. I get it.

Photo: Steve Sherman/@tsherms
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