Shame. Great shame.

It is impossible to be even vaguely aware of the news and not know that the State of Israel, important member of the International Surfing Association, is currently undertaking a massive military operation against the self-governing Palestinian territory, known as Gaza, to its south.

In response to an uptick in Hamas rockets sailing across its borders, the Israeli Defense Forces have pounded the the densely populated Mediterranean strip from the air, with artillery and a further potential ground invasion in the works.

Many women and children dead. Much destruction of property.

Whole apartment towers flattened etc.

Israel, defending its actions, vows to put a stop to the “terrorist actions,” with Defense Minister Benny Gatz saying, “If the citizens of Israel have to sleep in bomb shelters then Gaza will burn.”

On its face, maybe, a brutally asymmetrical but somewhat sensible argument.

In reality, though, absolutely absurd.

Now, BeachGrit regulars will certainly be aware of my bias. I’ve been to Israel and loved but have spent much more time in Yemen, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria and love more. All to say, the argument that the struggle between Jew and Arab is somehow and ancient grudge match, more deeply rooted than any struggle on earth, is patently false.

The troubles began in 1948 with the establishment of the State of Israel and the subjugation of the native Palestinian population.

And imagine, with me, that for the past 72 years the International Surfing Association’s United States and Australia’s subjugated native populations regularly threw dynamite sticks, rocks, etc. at us settlers. Would they be considered terrorists? Likely not, but, most importantly, these subjugated populations don’t regularly throw dynamite sticks, rocks, etc. and why?

Because the United States and Australia have handled their shit. Not always beautifully but handled nonetheless.

Even once-apartheid International Surfing Association’s South Africa, bravely boycotted by Tom Carrol in the 1980s, has handled its shit.

Israel?

While pretending to be a western democracy and plied with billions of yearly U.S. dollars, the proud little country has not even come close to handling its shit, not only failing in its responsibility, but continuing to cast blame on its subjugated, impoverished, alienated, trapped population for bad behavior worthy of decimation.

Squeezing the vice tighter, dreaming fever dreams that it can break the will of a battered people with next to nothing to lose.

It hasn’t worked for 72 years, it won’t work in 72 more, and this vast failure of both responsibility and imagination should be carried with great shame.

The greatest shame.

Man, if there are two things I can’t stand it’s a lack of responsibility and imagination.

Like listening to Joe Turpel describing Mick Fanning getting attacked by a shark in the middle of a heat.

Ugh.

Celebrate Surf Shop Day!

Today, in Australia, tomorrow in these United States of America is the third annual Surf Shop Day. That special time of year when we, as grumpy locals, come together and celebrate the most wonderfully grouchy places of all.

Your local surf shop.

Oh the magic, the perfectly curated magic held within a local surf shop’s four walls. I waxed poetic about in the international best-seller Cocaine + Surfing. Would you like to read?

I panic and run into the nearby Laguna Surf and Sport without thinking. To a place even more pressure filled than the mean streets, or at least a place that used to be. The California surf shop was once a bastion of all things cool. The boards, the trunks, the clothes, boardbags, magazines, VHS surf videos, Lagwagon soundtrack and especially shop workers. Grown up surfed out Orange County preteens who would mock hapless customers from behind glass counters filled with surf stickers and quiet derision.

I remember stepping through the doors and into the fog of sweet surf wax as an Oregonian youth on family trips down south. I would gaze lovingly, longingly at the at the merchandise that I couldn’t afford. I would run by hand along the rails of boards I could only dream of owning. Sometimes a shop worker would ask if I needed any help in the most laconic way possible, usually while flipping through a surf magazine and never with eye contact. My heart would always seize and I would mutter something and flee, trying not to gaze at the Sex Wax in the glass counter lest anyone caught me and think I was a blushing pervert.

And the shop worker in Laguna Surf and Sport asks me if he can help me find anything. He is standard surf cool and I feel the muscle memory of a kooky youth but swallow hard and make a panic impulse buy instead of running away. A red and black Laguna Surf and Sport trucker hat. He seems appreciative and probably is. The surf shop has fallen on hard times, even harder than the rest of American retail. Online shopping, changing habits, fast fashion, etc. have all cut into already slim margins plus the surf shop is tasked with selling the apocalypse. The Volcoms, Reefs, Quiksilvers and Billabongs that nobody wants to buy anymore.

The hat definitely won’t fit my skinny head but I feel happy giving a small drop of life support to my childhood nirvana and head back out into the perfect evening, check my phone and try to find a place to kill some time where the raddest ten year olds on earth don’t lurk. A neon light across the street advertises sushi.

Yes, Laguna Surf and Sport is very fine but my favorite, now, is Real Surf Shop in Oceanside. A crusty place with hollowed out surfboards hanging on the wall once used to paddle cocaine across the border, into these United States, from Mexico.

Only a local surf shop would display such a glorious artifact.

I also love Zuhg Life in Lincoln City, Oregon. Though I have never been, they once had many boards stolen by a methamphetamine connoisseur. Very fine.

Support your favorite today, in any case. March in and buy a t-shirt, sticker, towel, trucker hat then march outside and kick a VAL or at least heavily vibe one.

Let’s keep our traditions alive.

Brutal. Absolutely brutal.

But how much surf royalty has southern California’s San Clemente produced? More than any other seaside hamlet anywhere on earth? Off the top of my head, I count Richard Nixon (father of Nixon watches), Shane Beschen (father of Noah), Chris Ward (father of Malia), Dino Andino (father of Kolohe).

All very fine but it is the penultimate on that esteemed list who is of most interest, today, for Malia Ward is set to star in this summer’s The Ultimate Surfer won by Zeke Lau and the most interesting for sure.

The 23-year-old USC graduate, who splits her time between Malibu and San Clemente, enjoys longboard skate dancing, tennis, acting and, of course, surfing.

Though did she enjoy her time the Surf Ranch set of The Ultimate Surfer?

Well, an impeccable source overhead young Ward describing her experience thusly:

“It was psychological hell. They took our phones and the producers plotted us against each other. I had no idea what was going on and hope I don’t look like an idiot.”

Oh the trap of dang reality television. As I recently shared, contestants in any show, lured in by promises of fame, an increased platform, fame, fame are but meat in Hollywood’s ravenous, and ravenously undiscerning, jaw. There is no care for emotional well-being, for truth. Only blood, ratings-spiking blood, will do and producers have spent the last two decades-plus sharpening their teeths on the bones of naive hopefulls.

The fact that World Surf League CEO Erik “ELo” Logan threw surfing’s young, vaguely innocent QS and QS-adjacent hopefuls to the jackals shows a level of cutthroat savagery not seen since he took the reins some three-ish years ago.

He came from Hollywood and either knows, or is vaguely aware, of the game.

Brutal.

Absolutely brutal.

Expect Surf Fan Island to be put into production next where the loving BeachGrit community is rounded up, boated to Anacapa and left without food or drink to die slow, dull deaths.

It won’t be televised.