"We hope the entire WSL community stands with us in rejecting all forms of harassment and intimidation."
The Surf City El Salvador Pro is one day away from concluding and this, I suppose, is how this iteration of professional surfing ends. A last gasp of crypto and ladder sponsorships. Tourism boards defining “the world’s best waves.” A 51-year-old former champion with stunningly little shame. A truly bizarre spectacle lorded over by a billionaire, run into the ground by an Oklahoman by way of Oprah.
Bye bye bye.
The World Surf League will soon be a historical footnote, the answer to a Jeopardy question about failed sporting enterprises in the 2000s, but not, I guess, before lashing out at its most “passionate” base.
Yes, it appears that Brazil’s surf fans have been deemed a public enemy, one that needs to be silenced, and, yesterday, the Portuguese language broadcast cut its “live chat” feature taking their voices like Ursula took that little mermaid’s.
But you have certainly noticed the scrolling conversation off to the side of the YouTube feed? Oh those who participate there are not nearly as charming as those on BeachGrit’s patented Open Thread but they do seem to enjoy challenging the judges, complimenting high performance maneuvers, making small talk.
Except they are no longer allowed to if their native tongue is Portuguese.
Why?
As you know, rage against the League exploded into open hostility at the Surf Ranch Pro wherein fans, mostly from Brazil, became incensed at what certainly seemed to be suspect judging in heats featuring Gabriel Medina and Italo Ferreira. The two, each former champions, took to Instagram in the aftermath seeking clarity and the furiosity amongst their many admirers grew.
After a few days of silence, the aforementioned Oklahoman, World Surf League CEO Erik Logan, released an open letter that had a tone “somewhere between a dictator and a domestic abuser” excoriating those who had raised their voices.
“I want to respond directly to those statements,” it began, “however, we first need to address a much more important issue. In recent days, a number of surfers, WSL judges, and employees have been subject to harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence, including death threats, as a direct result of those statements. Those things should never happen in our sport or any sport, and we’re devastated that members of our community have been subject to them. It is an important reminder to us all that words have consequences. We hope the entire WSL community stands with us in rejecting all forms of harassment and intimidation.”
Heavy and now, possibly as punishment for “harassment, intimidation and threats of violence,” Portuguese has been banned.
Though do you think the move will have its intended outcome? Unable to live comment to each other during the El Salvador Pro will Brazilian surf fans come to see the light that Australian or American surfers are more marketable in the United States and therefore receive more points per move or… not?
Did China’s lashing out at brave protestors in Tiananmen Square silence dissent in that country?
Oh.
I guess it did.
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got me twiddling my thumbs…tryin to entangle ’em/
Rip wsl
I thought he was talkin bout brasil
my favela and their favela…uno mundo!
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/K…
common, solid grounds…a baseline, if you will…both of you’s are high wire acts…stand or fall! I’ll catch you’s.
ELO was a child watching ‘Oh, Oklahoma’ and dreamed big…the kin folks said “E move away from here…Hollywood is where you want to be…” damn kin folks!
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/07zl…
Rawhide!
Erik Logan and beach grit with it’s elaborately misplaced continual overuse of every known form of conjunctive adjectives, adverb, advertisement, adding the combined elements altogether resulting in a tiring dialogue of erroneous content not even palpable to the ears, or eyes in this particular case. WSL needs stopped, reevaluated, revamped, restaffed, rebooted, restructured and relaunched FOR THE SPORT OF SURFING, not for the personal malignement of a self absorbed egomaniacal narcissistic billionaire to rule as his own regime.
Isn’t there an unspoken agreement that we all stopped trying with the articles? Charles and Dez stopped writing two consecutive meaningful words and the commentariat stopped trying to make sense of the garbage and just scrolls to the comments?
Zero H there too.
Jus yayo and brick bud.
Worst combo ever
My 82 year old uncle could be a dead man walking visiting Saquarema as the event starts?
Going to visit his “girlfriend” whom speaks no English and him no Portuguese.
Any Brazilian friends here if you see a bloke walking around in speedos with no fucking idea please mail him home
hmmmm potatoes…
Your record – it’s broken.
Dear WSL,
You are a unique sports league because your entire audience also participates in the sport (unlike NFL, MLB, NHL, etc.). Therefore you can’t fool your viewers. We know how hard those maneuvers are to string together, we know what an insane lay back takes, we can desern big air.
You would have no problems WSL if you created a measurable criteria and unmasked these mysterious judges.
Allow us to know who these judges are and allow these personalities to be responsible for their decisions. Perhaps then they will work to achieve and maintain their own credibility, right now none of you have any.
I thought he is a semi-literate mounting bounding observer and marketer of minutia. Seemingly belligerent to, and hypocritical of the fact advertising and capitalism make it all possible…the highlight of which is the comments threads.
Fuck you xox!
World Sensor (sic) League
Lets see how much Zen Jrobbo has now he is under the pump to make the ” where i belong ” finals day.
Sometimes it’s good to turn off the megaphone of the crybabies.
Surfing was fine and well before they came, and will be when they are gone (hopefully).
Duke Kahanamoku will be smiling from Heaven.