Mainstream media continues to decry the World Surf League’s “cruel” and “depressing” mid-year cull: “Have grace and mercy completely vanished from this swathe of humanity? If you have tears prepared, shed them now.”

"Hey WSL, what is wrong with you guys?"

We surf fans, we watchers of webcasts and listeners to Joe Turpel, have now had a month plus to really sink our teeth into the World Surf League’s “mid-year cut.” Theoretically, I suppose, we knew it was on the boil some time ago, or at least before Covid, but was shelved until this year though still, I didn’t think about it until Bells where the professional surfers, themselves, tried to stage a coup.

It was quashed by Erik Logan’s rusty cudgel and on to Margaret River everyone marched, we surf fans, we students in shades of Rabbit Bartholomew, wondered which of our gladiators would live and which would die gruesome public deaths.

And yet, a funny thing happened on the way to the forum.

Mainstream media, for reasons either unknown or related to the new Apple television series “Make or Break,” have taken a precious moment to turn eyes away from war in Ukraine, Johnny Depp, Amber Heard to focus on the plight of those professional surfers who died those deaths and/or were sent back to the salt mines of Snapper.

De-leagured as it were.

The Guardian’s headline screams, No one really likes it’: brutal rule change breaks hearts in World Surf League with Kolohe Andino quoted as saying, “It’s just kind of hard the whole cut thing. No one really likes it. We’re all friends on tour and we all love each other, so you don’t want to knock the guy off tour. It just seems like it’s a TV show a little bit, like drama all the time. Watching the women’s the other day it was just heartbreaking with the girls that were losing. They were crying all day.”

Yahoo! Sports ups the ante by declaring, ‘Devastated’: Surfing world shattered over ‘heartbreaking’ scenes with legendary surf photographer Jimmy “Cane” Wilson adding, “Watching Owen Wright’s interview and he has a day and a half to make a decision on his career. Is this mid-year cut supposed to be fun and exciting, cause all I feel is sadness?”

Others weigh in too, begging the WSL to stop the cruelty and asking WSL leadership “What’s wrong with you guys?”

Etc.

But who could have guessed the plight of guillotined professional surfers would rank amidst the sufferings of the world and/or Johnny Depp + Amber Heard?

Did the World Surf League overplay its hand here? Will public perception turn sharply against?

Wild times.