And did you see the Jason Statham, Rainn Wilson
vehicle The
Meg? I watched the first thirty or so minutes on
a flight to Copenhagen. From what I gathered scientists were doing
sciencey things in a state of the art oceanographic research center
when they stumbled upon a 75-foot shark thought to be extinct. I
switched over to the Elle Fanning masterpiece Teen Spirit
which brought me to tears and didn’t return to The Meg so
don’t know how it ended but fear I may find out in real life for it
was revealed just today that “one of the largest sharks ever
recorded in the area” is terrorizing southern California. Eating
kayaks and other horrifically uncouth behaviors.
Our very own M.E.G.
Man-Eating Great (White)* and these ill-mannered beasts used to
know better. They used to congregate in South Africa and northern
California leaving our sun-drenched, star-soaked paradise alone but
no longer. The Great White apocalypse is fully upon us and we must
turn to San Diego’s NBC
affiliate for the very latest.
Two San Diego men are thanking their lucky kayaks for taking
the brunt of a great white shark bite near Catalina Island over the
weekend.
Danny McDaniel and Jon Chambers can call two large shark
teeth souvenirs, or maybe even good luck charms, considering the
shark they once belonged to.
The two experienced scuba divers were taking a break from
their diving trip, coordinated through La Jolla-based company Power
Scuba, to kayak to Ship Rock near Catalina Island when Daniel felt
a strong push.
“I look back and I see this giant, actually just a snout was
on the boat as he was chomping down on the kayak,” said
McDaniel.
“He was in attack mode. He thought we were prey,” said
Chambers. “It was petrifying and amazing at the same
time.”
Once they realized they both were OK, they waited for a few
minutes to make sure the shark was gone before starting their 25
minute paddle back to Catalina Island.
“I said, ‘Jon I got a tooth.’ He goes, ‘Yeah, is there
another one?’ It was a good experience that I would never want to
do again, but it was a good experience,” said McDaniel.
Chambers and McDaniel said experts at Scripps Institution of
Oceanography estimated the shark was around 19 feet long based on
the size of the two teeth. It could be one of the largest ever
recorded in the area.
19-feet long. That is two-plus Shaquille O’Neals one standing on
the other’s shoulders. Four Jason Stathams who claims to be 5’10
but we all know is 5’8.
19-feet long. How did this beast grow so huge? How many men has
he already eaten? How many men can he eat at the same time?
These are questions we must find answers to and I think it is
time for us to start our own non-profit research and education
center. We can call it Surfers Against Man-Eaters or S.A.M.E. and
carry out important duties like telling all kayakers and stand-up
paddleboarders to get out of the ocean because there is 19-feet of
hell coming their way and beach clean-ups.
Can I count on your participation?
*Man-Eating Great (White) can also be written M.E.G. White. Like
Meg White of the White Stripes and her erstwhile bandmate, Jack
White, just played Surf Ranch. A conspiracy? I feel it coming…
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Science: Studies find World Surf League’s
“Wall of Positive Noise” leads to depression and possible
death!
I have, unfortunately, not watched one minute
of this year’s Quiksilver Pro France. The time difference between
California and France’s western front is unwieldy and I haven’t
mustered the necessary internal fortitude. I thought this lack of
professional surf watching was going to make me sad and maybe sick
but, oddly, the opposite has occurred. I wake up each morning
healthier and heartier than the night before. Happier. There’s an
undeniable spring in my step.
I didn’t correlate the two, not watching surfing and my improved
state of being, but I should have for a new series of studies
declare that the “tyranny of prescriptive joy” including, but not
limited to the World Surf League’s “Wall of Positive Noise™” is
actually depressing and possibly killing us.
And we must turn to Forge, a publication
about personal development, for more on what is being called “toxic
positivity.”
But that relentless focus on positivity — what Kate Bowler,
a Duke Divinity School professor and former cancer patient,
described in her memoir Everything Happens for a Reason as “the
tyranny of prescriptive joy” — isn’t just ineffective. Research has
shown that it’s actually harmful.
One 2012 study found that encouraging people to push away
their negative emotions often has the opposite effect, making them
feel bad about feeling bad, in addition to whatever else they were
already going through. A 2005 study found that relentlessly
focusing on the positive during times of stress — what the authors
call “avoidance coping” — increased the risk of depressive symptoms
later on. And there are plenty of other examples out there pointing
to the same conclusion: Forced positivity often leaves us worse
off.
It can eat away at relationships, too. “Seeking out people
who bring ‘positive vibes only’ will ensure shallow bonds,” says
Cleveland-based therapist Karly Hoffman King, whose work focuses on
trauma. Instead, the relationship becomes a performance of
happiness. Difficult conversations, moments of vulnerability — all
off the table. “People are left to deal with their feelings alone
instead of seeking support,” says King. “Offering up toxic
positivity like ‘look on the bright side’ or ‘it could be worse!’
often just makes the other person feel invalidated, creating a
wedge between the two of you.”
In her work counseling cancer patients, Los Angeles-based
health psychologist Stephanie Davidson often encounters family
members who maintain a facade of positivity so extreme that the
patient feels they can’t discuss their fear or the losses they’re
experiencing. “Feelings that we don’t like are not the enemy, and
there’s no research that says acknowledging those feelings will
make medical conditions worse,” Davidson says. “However, there is
research that says that those who are not able to get support from
those around them tend to do worse.”
On and on and on the piece goes, detailing the horrors of life
behind the Wall of Positive Noise. The pain and suffering. The
illness and death and it got me thinking. Now, I know I’ve been all
down on “suing” and
“lawsuits” lately but what if we brought a class
action against Santa Monica? I think, if forced to listen to one
heat featuring Joe Turpel and the ’89 World Champ Martin Potter any
judge or jury would agree that we have been poisoned.
Did you read about the billions of dollars Purdue Pharma, maker
of OxyContin, is coughing up in settlements?
Shortly, and in waves that may prove to be an
improvement on yesterday’s
bad tempered, indecipherable closeouts,
although Courts C and Johanne Defay found inviting morsels, we’ll
be gifted the money end of the contest.
I choose, Jeremy, Ryan, Marc, Julian, Gabriel, Seth, Kolohe and
Italo. Betting agencies in Australia have locked out multi-bets
thereby eliminating the possibility of a million-dollar payout.
And did you know that Jordy Smith, Sally Fitzgibbons and
Stephanie Gilmore have all successfully negotiated the Olympic
selection process and have qualified for Tokyo 2020?
Quiksilver Pro France Round of 16 (Round 4)
Match-Ups:
HEAT 1: Jordy Smith (ZAF) vs. Jeremy Flores (FRA)
HEAT 2: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) vs. Ryan Callinan (AUS)
HEAT 3: Marc Lacomare (FRA) vs. Wade Carmichael (AUS)
HEAT 4: Julian Wilson (AUS) vs. Jack Freestone (AUS)
HEAT 5: Gabriel Medina (BRA) vs. Adrian Buchan (AUS)
HEAT 6: Seth Moniz (HAW) vs. Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA)
HEAT 7: Kolohe Andino (USA) vs. Yago Dora (BRA)
HEAT 8: Michel Bourez (FRA) vs. Italo Ferreira (BRA)
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Insidious purveyors of the haole shaka, Chas Smith, Ez
Logan.
Rumour: WSL owns BeachGrit; SUP champion
and Oprah Winfrey confidant Erik “E-Lo” Logan master
puppeteer!
France is popping. The early spring sun is
flashing its tanline on Australia’s east coast. America hasn’t been
overthrown by a pro-Iran/Shark/Dora troika.
Yet. The world turns.
So, I apologise in advance for doing this. But there’s something
Ben Marcus said last week I want to examine. A tiny morsel of
interest hidden in the OuterKnown of his plucked carcass that
could, if it’s cooked the right way, deliver a tender intellectual
treat.
BeachGrit’s owned by the WSL.
Yeah, I know.
The guy’s like a Jesuit priest in Tokugawa Japan, preaching his
outdated scriptures to a dead-eyed audience. His roots cannot hold
in this laissez-faire world.
But this particular conspiracy theory is not the craziest thing
he’s ever said. In fact, he could even be right.
WSL could be funding BeachGrit. And we’d all be bit
players in a grand false flag attack.
It’d fucken suck if it was true. Wouldn’t pass the pub test, or
comments section, for a second.
But, in today’s media landscape it’d be no more surprising than,
say, discovering Trump doesn’t write his own speeches.
News don’t come for free, baby.
Of course, BM’s way off the mark. The Wozzle is too scared of
its own shadow, too risk averse, to ever consider being associated
with this glorious bin fire.
And Derek and Chas strike me as many things, but
Machiavellian ain’t one of
them.
Yet, we know the Woz froths on a good content partnership. They
love to crow about them. Show ‘em off to the world. A big green
tick on some god forsaken ‘key engagement strategy pillar’
somewhere within the Santa Monica high tower.
But dissent is important. Critical opinion is needed. Walls of
positive noise can only hold so long. The masses are smarter than
they’re given credit for, and somebody needs to keep the bastards
honest.
So, who pays the bills?
For BeachGrit it’s Cheezstix. Bemboka luxury blankets.
Lonely singles in your area. Yeah, those fucking annoying pop-up
ads and videos are this site’s lifeblood.
And, for the best surf reporting in the free world, I reckon
it’s worth it.
Between our website, social, and OTT channels, we’ve built a
comprehensive network of surf, mountain, and health enthusiasts
whom we talk to every day. We can effectively integrate your brand
into our channels to ensure you’re speaking to the right audience
wherever they go.
Just check out their sponsors list. Samsung. Corona. WSL.
Michelob ultra lite.
What’s it mean? Every word they publish is tainted. And unless
you’re a single-use plastic, there’s nary a dissenting opinion to
be found.
TheInertia
presents itself as an army of woke, environmentally
conscious warriors. But its business model is built on the most
insidious form or post capitalism out there. Paid editorial. Where
church and state are no longer separated, and corporate brands are
allowed to infiltrate our lives so completely that we’re no longer
just consumers, but unwitting advocates in their pursuits for
profit margins.
It’s crass commercialism dressed in whatever political and
social trend is popular at the time.
We all make a faustian pact when we come online. Everything’s
for sale, including and most especially you.
But at least on BeachGrit we’ll look you in the eyes
when we fuck you.
Of course, BM could be right and BG might actually be a WSL
apparatchik.
Please find my resume, buried under the southern lifeguard’s
flag at Newcastle beach.
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
You could make a case that Dora's performance
was the best of the day and find no argument here. It was loose.
Very Psychic Migrations. Big greased alley-oop on a left. Landed
and literally stepped off on the sand. Another styled-out reverse
on a right where he landed in the sand. It was one of those
cartoons where the character gets thrown into the sand and has to
be dug out. WSL
Quiksilver Pro, France, Day 3: “Sexless
crowd watches miserable closeouts, Medina survives, Toledo like
chimney sweep in Dickens novel, Yago best on day!”
The French beachbreak, like Michel Foucalt, is a
much overrated old fruit. Bad tempered and indecipherable.
To be honest, I ain’t the toothiest Francophile in the
tub ’round here. French boobs, yes. Houllebecq, Flaubert,
Stendahl, Gilet-jaunes, yes, yes, yes. Camus, De Beauvoir, Sartre:
love that shit.
The French beachbreak, like Michel Foucalt, seems very
much an overrated old fruit to me. Bad tempered and indecipherable.
When Jessi Miley Dyer stood in front of the camera at 8.30 CEST
this morning and said this was the best day in the waiting period I
thought, sick. After a million french close-outs had pounded the
beach at La Grav, it was more, what a punish.
Still there was drama, plenty of what poet Philip Larkin in his
ode to sexual awakening, Annus Mirabilis, termed “wrangling for the
ring.” Overlapping forty-five-minute heats gave plenty of
opportunity, and that was needed, but it was still, according to
Connor Coffin, “a lucky dip at best.”
When the world’s best beachbreak scavenger, Gabe Medina, scours
every inch of a lineup and can only rip a few four-point chunks off
the carcass in forty minutes you know it’s slim pickings.
I couldn’t advise a rewatching that heat but as live action,
with the Title in play, it was compelling sport.
Miserable closeouts, almost a total lack of surfable corners. Up
and down the line-up, firing at will, hucking left, then a huge
inverted backside spin which he tried to sell to judges as make and
got denied (unfairly, I thought). It was close to the perfect
sudden death scenario – French wildcard Mignot with nothing to lose
and a random lineup that could suddenly offer a teepee to the
lucky.
Charlie prowled the beach getting more and more stressed, more
visibly agitated. The salt and pepper beard seemed greyer by the
minute in the wan French sunshine. The dislike, repulsion even, for
this man confounds me. The smothering step-father adds a kind of
Grimms’ Fairy
Tale patina over the World Champions campaign and
contrasts with the worldly superstar dimensions: the hang-outs with
Neymar, the conference calls with Bolsanaro.
Great theatre.
Fifteen minutes to go and Medina trails the wildcard. Ten, five;
still behind. The unthinkable starts to seem possible. Likely even.
Four minutes and forty seconds to go and Gabe spikes a small left
toob, re-emerges and smashes the oncoming lip for punctuation.
Charlie loses his shit in the shorebreak, a one man World Cup
celebration and Gabe, of course, gets the score.
For Medina afficionados, I count myself amongst them, his best
heat of the year as far as finding a way to win goes.
Last minute reversals, after forty-five minutes of one surfer
leading the other, were the theme of the day. Kelly Slater did not
look as sparky and rejuvenated as his round nd one performance, but
neither did his opponent and housemate, Leo Fioravanti. Both
scrapped around in the straighthanders, Kelly cleaving more closely
to the Medina template of catching anything and everything in the
hopes something may materialise.
Which it eventually did when he slouched in a hollow cavern with
arms clasped behind his back. With the best wave of the heat on
ice, Kelly looked set to put the head-to-head match-up back to 2-1.
Dogs roamed the beach and a curiously sex-less crowd were silent
until with a minute to go Leo “spelunkered” his way through an
Hawaiian looking right, stepping off onto the sand and demanding a
reaction from the crowd.
That was the heat winner. The camera followed Kelly, cruelly,
into the empty locker room.
It did not follow Willian Cardoso who also led all heat and lost
to a buzzer beater by Wade Carmichael. He did not appreciate the
loss. Did he think the final score awarded to Wade was over-cooked?
The double bird he threw at the judges and the board punch-out
would suggest, yes.
But we will never know because the camera turned away. Lingering
near the cut-off at 19, that result could be the most critical of
the Panda’s career on the CT, especially with Yago Dora still alive
in the draw.
You could make a case that Dora’s performance was the best of
the day and find no argument here. It was loose. Very
Psychic
Migrations. Big greased alley-oop on a left.
Landed and literally stepped off on the sand. Another styled-out
reverse on a right where he landed in the sand. It was one of those
cartoons where the character gets thrown into the sand and has to
be dug out.
He motioned to the judges, “Look, what can I do?”
They were unmoved. Colapinto was not a walkover. He would have
won any other heat.
Poor old Pip Toledo. The pre-heat vision of Pip with the black
beanie sitting, whatever the opposite of jaunty is, made it look
like the heat was over before it began. He looked like a chimney
sweep in a Dickens novel, a junkie from Trainspotting, a derelict
Justin Beiber.
Why is he competing if the back is buggered? It seems cruel and
unusual self-punishment. He lost to Lacomare.
Kolohe surfs on. The round of sixteen match-up with Dora
potentially the best of the round. My dark horse pick, Soli Bailey,
out again in the round of thirty-two. Seventeenth place, a number
he has not been able to best all season.
It’s a cruel business, but he’s doing OK. He wont be driving
Ubers to Splendour in the Grass next
year. And he wont be the only one rueing French closeouts.
Still, there are always the pleasures of the flesh to
compensate. Larkins “quite unloseable game” beckons the single
man.
Quiksilver Pro France Round of 16 (Round 4)
Match-Ups:
HEAT 1: Jordy Smith (ZAF) vs. Jeremy Flores (FRA)
HEAT 2: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) vs. Ryan Callinan (AUS)
HEAT 3: Marc Lacomare (FRA) vs. Wade Carmichael (AUS)
HEAT 4: Julian Wilson (AUS) vs. Jack Freestone (AUS)
HEAT 5: Gabriel Medina (BRA) vs. Adrian Buchan (AUS)
HEAT 6: Seth Moniz (HAW) vs. Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA)
HEAT 7: Kolohe Andino (USA) vs. Yago Dora (BRA)
HEAT 8: Michel Bourez (FRA) vs. Italo Ferreira (BRA)
Roxy Pro France Quarterfinal Match-Ups:
HEAT 1: Lakey Peterson (USA) vs. Malia Manuel (HAW)
HEAT 2: Carissa Moore (HAW) vs. Tatiana Weston-Webb (BRA)
HEAT 3: Sally Fitzgibbons (AUS) vs. Johanne Defay (FRA)
HEAT 4: Caroline Marks (USA) vs. Courtney Conlogue (USA)
Quiksilver Pro France Round of 32 (Round 3)
Results:
HEAT 1: Jordy Smith (ZAF) 13.83 DEF. Frederico Morais (PRT)
12.40
HEAT 2: Jeremy Flores (FRA) 8.37 DEF. Caio Ibelli (BRA) 6.07
HEAT 3: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 11.16 DEF. Owen Wright (AUS) 5.30
HEAT 4: Ryan Callinan (AUS) 14.33 DEF. Michael Rodrigues (BRA)
13.00
HEAT 5: Marc Lacomare (FRA) 12.83 DEF. Filipe Toledo (BRA)
12.17
HEAT 6: Wade Carmichael (AUS) 11.93 DEF. Willian Cardoso (BRA)
9.70
HEAT 7: Julian Wilson (AUS) 11.33 DEF. Jorgann Couzinet (FRA)
6.17
HEAT 8: Jack Freestone (AUS) 8.56 DEF. Kanoa Igarashi (JPN)
8.33
HEAT 9: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 9.76 DEF. Marco Mignot (FRA) 8.84
HEAT 10: Adrian Buchan (AUS) 8.93 DEF. Conner Coffin (USA) 8.60
HEAT 11: Seth Moniz (HAW) 12.60 DEF. Peterson Crisanto (BRA)
10.77
HEAT 12: Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA) 12.43 DEF. Kelly Slater (USA)
11.00
HEAT 13: Kolohe Andino (USA) 10.34 DEF. Soli Bailey (AUS) 9.27
HEAT 14: Yago Dora (BRA) 14.50 DEF. Griffin Colapinto (USA)
13.23
HEAT 15: Michel Bourez (FRA) 11.67 DEF. Joan Duru (FRA) 7.56
HEAT 16: Italo Ferreira (BRA) 13.83 DEF. Jesse Mendes (BRA)
11.77
