Safety Third. The Glorification of Injury.

David Kerkeslager wrote: Tradiban is just a troll

Nah. Tradiban is good people who is also a troll. Can’t throw the baby out with the bath water 

Russ Keane wrote: "you can get hurt, paralyzed, or killed without effing up."

Mr. Goldstone, with all due respect, I do not agree and I don't think you actually believe this to be true.   Other than the once-in-a-lifetime (or never) circumstance of a block falling from above for no good reason, trad climbing is all about control, mitigation, and in most cases elimination of danger.   Isn't this the reason we dissect everything to the smallest of details, and review/discuss like scientists?  Knowledge > awareness > execution.   Don't you think accidents are the result of you doing something wrong?   You posit:  "The foundational essence of trad climbing is risk," but I think it's quite the opposite and I'm really surprised at what you said.

We absolutely try to control the risk, that is a major part of the game, and that is precisely why risk is foundational---all that effort, all the years of perfecting climbing and protecting and rigging technique, all that discussion and dissection, they are all aimed at mitigating risk.  And they'd all be utterly pointless without risk, making risk an essential ingredient, as I said.   Without risk you have sport climbing, in which the pursuit of pure difficulty is the central feature.  To be clear: we control risk not simply with gear, but also, and perhaps primarily, with climbing skill and mental control.

Accidents are the result of doing something wrong by definition.  In some cases, a person or party behaved stupidly, but in other cases not.  Sometimes gear you judged to be good isn't and the piece you placed to back it up blows as well.  Sometimes a critical nut lifts out as you move past it.  Sometimes (a lot of times) you fall further than you expected.  Sometimes a solid tested hold breaks anyway. Sometimes you make one move too many and get committed to something really dangerous.  Sometimes the weather moves in and even easy ground becomes deadly.  Sometimes the crack you are climbing has hornets or a rattlesnake. Sometimes your are distracted for a moment and neglect something absolutely critical.  All these things have happened to me, by the way, and I could go on and on.

So sure, we do everything we can to mitigate the risks of trad climbing, and that process is part of the difference between trad and sport, and so part of what makes  trad what it is.  Do we in fact "eliminate" the danger?  I guess this is a matter of perception, but I'd call it wishful thinking.  I think the danger is never eliminated.  Reduced to a tolerable level by our efforts, sure. But eliminated---no.  And I'm not saying that the only dangers left are those with astronomically tiny probabilities.  Gravity never sleeps, and things can go from casual to critical in a few instants.

Mark mentions "adventure" as the foundation of trad climbing, and I'd agree with that, but what, in the end, makes "adventure" adventurous?

Tradiban wrote: Did you just "epic"? So cool bro, I wish I could "epic" some day.

Hansy just ate shit, thumbs up? So cool? Gobright has decked, twice. Awesome? Had Osman lived by falling into a tree and being bounced around the branches, would we be singing a different tune? The climbing community has a sickness, we're addicted to "sickness".

To epic is a bad thing my friends. If you do epic and live to tell the tale you are probably just lucky. Be well.

Epic troll...

I had some reservations about Safety Third film, though after watching it i thought it was better done than I expected, from watching the previews.

I don't think Gobright's attitude in the hospital, or Hans Florine's glib Instagram announcement that he just fell and broke his leg are in any way glorifying the injuries. It is more of a gallows humor, if you will.

if you had ever been injured, from climbing or otherwise, and you've been in a situation that you just can't change, this type of humor manifests itself very often. I mean, what other option you have? Melt down into a puddle of emotional tears because the last few moments have irrevocably changed not just your plans for this evening, but for many days, weeks, months to come? Maybe for life, but you don't even know it yet, even as you fear it? I cry at a drop of a hat. A sappy movie, a book, a frustrating move on a route? Trust me, there are tears running. But something serious... I don't cry. And I don't even make it a conscious effort not to. The humor is the way to cope, it's the nerves, the adrenaline, the way to reassure yourself, your friends, your loved ones that things aren't as bad as they seem to be at the moment.   

rgold wrote: Accidents are the result of doing something wrong by definition.  

Acts of God?  You can always concoct an argument that everything should be foreseeable, nothing is random and if you act appropriately you'll be bullet proof.  People want to believe that.  That's one of the reasons why some people are so obsessed by getting the details of accidents - "so that we can learn and prevent". One lesson to be learned is that sometimes random, unforeseen, un predictable and UNPREVENTABLE things happen.. Yes even sport climbing.

Rich, I'd agree that there is no adventure if there is no risk.

But it seems to me, that mitigating risk while maintaining adventure, has always been part of trad climbing.

If risk is the essential element, wouldn't that call for magnifying risk, rather than minimizing it?

We're veering slightly off topic, and that's cool.  Whatever your relationship with risk, or reasons for trad climbing- that surely varies from person to person and you can debate all day long about different perspectives.  One thing is for sure though, it's definitely more dangerous than climbing on bolts.  Now, back to the original poster- does anyone at all believe that there are people out there that are effectively adopting risk based these videos that supposedly "glorify injury"- that is to say that they're adopting it, and engaging in it without truly having an understanding of it, and therefore not able to truly accept it when they adopt it?  

What I mean is, Trolliban is painting the picture of people going out and buying a rack and slinging it over their shoulder and going for it because they see Brad Gobright smile in a video after he was injured?  I just think that's a stretch.  And if there are, well, idk what to say about it that won't get removed by an admin.

People don't take avalanche courses to ski less in the backcountry, although if they were paying attention that is what such courses suggest. They take the courses so that skiing backcountry when they want to ski will somehow be safer because they know more about the risks. It's like an addict who is a doctor convincing themselves they are in control because they know more. Maybe enthusiasm for epics where people got hurt but survived also feeds into the narrative that hey, you might not die either?

" I am inspired to climb by what people post here and I hope that others are inspired by what I post."- Tradiban.    Another inspiring thread brought to you by Tradiban.   Facepalm! 

So I should call SAR not spend the night outside. OK got it.

Mark E Dixon wrote: Rich, I'd agree that there is no adventure if there is no risk.

But it seems to me, that mitigating risk while maintaining adventure, has always been part of trad climbing.

If risk is the essential element, wouldn't that call for magnifying risk, rather than minimizing it?

is it the word "essential" that is problematic?  You seem to agree that risk is a sine qua non for adventure, and that makes risk "essential" in my view.

By the way, I think the preservation of risk is pretty much the nexus of the arguments we see about things like adding bolts to trad climbs.  The "traditionalists," for lack of a better term, want to keep the element of risk alive so that they can deal with it.  Others speak of the climb being "dangerous" without the added bolt and justify the bolt precisely because it negates the risk the traditionalists want to preserve.

Rich, thanks for your reply to my post.  I think there's a difference between something being an essential ingredient, and it being the foundation.  Personally I prefer trad to sport, but not because of the higher risk involved.   Tons of other reasons, but if anything I believe the goal of trad climbing is to ascend carefully and with great judgment, while constantly bringing the risk down to as close to zero as possible.  Certainly death or paralyzation is not part of the equation.

I guess I'm not really sure where my problem with the concept comes from.
It reminds me of my difficulty with the film Valley Uprising.
I felt that the film made it seem like the goal of climbing was to increase risk, take bigger chances.
For me, trad was more about climbing something that appealed to me, necessarily accepting and mitigating whatever risk was inherent.

Mark E Dixon wrote: For me, trad was more about climbing something that appealed to me, necessarily accepting and mitigating whatever risk was inherent.

This.

rgold wrote: By the way, I think the preservation of risk is pretty much the nexus of the arguments we see about things like adding bolts to trad climbs.  The "traditionalists," for lack of a better term, want to keep the element of risk alive so that they can deal with it.  Others speak of the climb being "dangerous" without the added bolt and justify the bolt precisely because it negates the risk the traditionalists want to preserve.

Interesting. That's a way more concrete argument against bolting than I've heard before: most people seem to just say that bolting causes the climb to lose some je ne sais quoi, which has always been a bit esoteric for my taste.

Is it just about risk, though? Or is it about they want risk forced on the climber? It seems like if it's just about preserving risk, the "Just don't clip the bolts" counterargument wins. But if it's about forcing the climber to accept/mitigate the risk themselves as part of the difficulty of the climb, "Just don't clip the bolts" doesn't work as a counterargument.

rgold wrote:

is it the word "essential" that is problematic?  You seem to agree that risk is a sine qua non for adventure, and that makes risk "essential" in my view.

By the way, I think the preservation of risk is pretty much the nexus of the arguments we see about things like adding bolts to trad climbs.  The "traditionalists," for lack of a better term, want to keep the element of risk alive so that they can deal with it.  Others speak of the climb being "dangerous" without the added bolt and justify the bolt precisely because it negates the risk the traditionalists want to preserve.

well you're assuming that the reason "Traditionalists" speak out against adding bolts is purely because of a risk stance.

this isn't true.  aesthetics and desire to not heavily modify the rock also are a major part of the stance of trad.

all climbing is "dangerous" so those "others that speak" need to update their viewpoints ;)

David Kerkeslager wrote:

Interesting. That's a way more concrete argument against bolting than I've heard before: most people seem to just say that bolting causes the climb to lose some je ne sais quoi, which has always been a bit esoteric for my taste.

Is it just about risk, though? Or is it about they want risk forced on the climber? It seems like if it's just about preserving risk, the "Just don't clip the bolts" counterargument wins. But if it's about forcing the climber to accept/mitigate the risk themselves as part of the difficulty of the climb, "Just don't clip the bolts" doesn't work as a counterargument.

Let me try to answer this one...

Adding a bolt eliminates the adventure. The mental dialog that goes something like "I wonder if there's gear up there, and will I be able to hang on long enough to place it, and will it be good enough to safely carry on..."

If I see a bolt ahead, I know (rightly or wrongly) that if I can get to it I'm safe.

Even if I planned to skip the bolt, thereby reinstating the prior level of risk, the adventure is lessened because the uncertainty is gone.
I know the option of clipping the bolt exists, even if I intend not to do so.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

Let me try to answer this one...

Adding a bolt eliminates the adventure. The mental dialog that goes something like "I wonder if there's gear up there, and will I be able to hang on long enough to place it, and will it be good enough to safely carry on..."

If I see a bolt ahead, I know (rightly or wrongly) that if I can get to it I'm safe.

Even if I planned to skip the bolt, thereby reinstating the prior level of risk, the adventure is lessened because the uncertainty is gone.
I know the option of clipping the bolt exists, even if I intend not to do so.

While I agree w/ you in general, there is a bit of irony (in the context of this thread) that Brad cracked his back on a route w/ bolts that he decided to skip and almost died soloing a route w/ reasonable gear placement.

I don't know him personally, but for all his (undoubted) ability, Brad comes across as a little sketchy!