Kris Fiore wrote: Adding my opinion to this dumpster fire of a thread against my better judgement... (It's also worth noting I actually really wish I could sit down for a beer with some of you since MP threads are about as diplomatic a place for conversation as a mosh pit is a place for breast feeding.)
The author here is a feminist and an advocate for racial justice. If those two things make you roll your eyes then what hope do you have of understanding anything they have written? Just move on with your time and stop lobbing garbage into the internet. Attacking or making demeaning comments about someone you haven't met because you read one of their articles is immature at best. You look like a fool and your anger makes you look fragile, not right or strong or cool. I wish some of us could slow down and read the article a few times and try to remain calm. It's amazing anyone in this thread climbs less than 5.14, the speed at which you rage type would lead me to believe your forearms are impenetrable to flashpump.
This is the second edition of this article. When I read the first one I read it with skepticism. I rolled my eyes a few times and I was annoyed and grumbled to myself. But I kept reading and tried really hard to read it again and again with understanding even though I didn't like the words that were being written. I loved Free Solo and Dawn Wall and I like most climbing movies and I think I was just pissed off that someone was criticizing something I liked. I also didn't love that Honnold was catching shit for having a movie made about such an impressive feat when it has directors of color and he is one of few climbers doing advocacy work with his nonprofit. Lastly, I also didn't like the tone which I found at the time somewhat arrogant. It's worth noting that white people often find people of color, namely women of color irritable when they are raising hell. (This is implicit bias, no you can't tell when it's happening, that's what implicit means.) This has been researched and proven ad nauseam, Google it.
But none of that is the point. Someone in this thread mentioned thinking about who the audience this article is written for and I think that's a good place to start. It's written for people who are advocates of social justice and equity first and climbers second. I fucking love climbing, we all love climbing, that doesn't make it perfect or immune to racism/white supremacy and it definitely doesn't mean that climbers are somehow immune to the work of acknowledging our privilege.
Certainly you could argue that climbing is merely falling to the racism and white supremacy that plagues all of society. Or you can argue that we should just be able to watch a climbing movie about an awesome climbing accomplishment and not bring race into it. And both of those points are valid to a certain extent. I felt the same way at first, but I don't think they hold water.
The author is essentially arguing that we should push to be better. Let's make climbing a place that tackles racism and white supremacy and toxic masculinity (I've obviously lost anyone who disagrees with me at this point so fuck it, let's just start peppering in the progressive buzzwords, shall we??) and let's make climbing a place that is better than the larger society.
Why make it about race? Because race is always there and not talking about it is willful ignorance to that fact. It's such a privilege for white people to be able to ignore race. Why does it make us uncomfortable to talk about? Every single white person on this thread, myself included, has a racial bias against people of color. If you can't acknowledge that then articles like this one are 5 steps too far ahead for you to even begin to grasp.
We can acknowledge that climbing favors white people and falls to the same systemic racism as the larger society and STILL watch Free Solo and love it. But if you are someone who thinks that Free Solo was a perfect movie and throw hate at someone who says yo Alex could have done a lot of good for people of color and indigenous folks if he used his platform better then you have to resolve yourself to this simple fact: You would rather enjoy watching a climbing movie than dismantle racism in America. The author of this article simply disagrees and would rather watch Free Solo, appreciate the badassness that is soloing El Cap, and then think, "Damn, would have been cool to see people of color raised up."
Perhaps the only thing I truly disagree with in this article is the headline and that's only because it's not actually what the author is really asking for. But they sure got your attention and pissed you off. I have massive doubts that anyone who has voiced disagreement with the article actually took the time to read the whole thing. So fine... I'd nick a few points off for the headline. Still a solid work of intersectional thought.
The main and perhaps most disturbing point that has been regurgitated 45 times in this thread: "As soon as people of color start doing cutting edge things, they will make movies about them." Someone even wrote, "If anyone is interested in making movies about a brown guy doing very average shit, hit me up." and it got 128 FUCKING LIKES?
What is wrong with you? Dead serious, who are you people? You have the nerve to write that as a white person and climber in the United States whose ENTIRE LIFE is what it is because it was built on the generations of slavery, lynching, segregation of schools/redlining of housing that exists to this day, the extermination of MILLIONS of indigenous folks and the overtaking and destruction of natural lands for a nearly sole benefit of white people. Amazing.
This article is literally just asking for the first step - acknowledge that white people who climb benefit from white privilege in their climbing. If you can't handle that maybe reconsider who the real snowflake is.
Some of us just don't like outrage culture. Go ahead and pin all the mean names you want on me because I am a white male and that makes it okay to attack me for being critical of anything. Pretty sure the guy who wrote "If anyone is interested in making movies about a brown guy doing very average shit, hit me up." might be a brown guy from the way he worded it. It is called a joke. It is funny. So laugh.
Go ahead and tell me how wrong I am and how I know nothing because of my whiteness and maleness.
There's nothing in this thread that comes close to the anger in the article. Until your post, at least. It's been a chill discussion mostly.
Yo I for real didn't realize how heated I would get about this when I wrote it so I can admit (and have a laugh at) my hypocrisy.
That said, I'd defend a person of color being angry about racism before I pat white people on the back for being chill about having their privilege pointed out. :P
mpech wrote: we need to talk about the real problem in professional climbing-- how attractive people can get videos/sponsorship despite only being able to climb 5.14-...
My problem w/ the original & sequel blog posts is while it may contain some valid points, the examples are way, way off. There are plenty of climbing movies of white guys doing pedestrian stuff, but the 2 Alexs? That's real cutting edge shit. On the hand, we've got the likes of Ashima Shiraishi and Kai Lightner (and yes, movies are made of them). Are they mentioned? Instead, the articles have a bunch of photos of non-white/non-men doing some very pedestrian stuff. The problem w/ this is it only helps perpetuate the stereotype that only white men are good climbers.
reboot wrote: My problem w/ the original & sequel blog posts is while it may contain some valid points, the examples are way, way off. There are plenty of climbing movies of white guys doing pedestrian stuff, but the 2 Alexs? That's real cutting edge shit. On the hand, we've got the likes of Ashima Shiraishi and Kai Lightner (and yes, movies are made of them). Are they mentioned? Instead, the articles have a bunch of photos of non-white/non-men doing some very pedestrian stuff. The problem w/ this is it only helps perpetuate the stereotype that only white men are good climbers.
Maybe the blogger needs a bit of self-reflection time to try and understand why they are so Alex-ist. Why do they have an implicit bias against Alex? Did an Alex do something to them in the past? Why are you blaming all Alex's? They should take the time to get to know an Alex on a personal level. Look beyond their elite achievements and see the person for the Alex they really are.
Kris Fiore wrote: Adding my opinion to this dumpster fire of a thread against my better judgement... (It's also worth noting I actually really wish I could sit down for a beer with some of you since MP threads are about as diplomatic a place for conversation as a mosh pit is a place for breast feeding.)
The author here is a feminist and an advocate for racial justice. If those two things make you roll your eyes then what hope do you have of understanding anything they have written? Just move on with your time and stop lobbing garbage into the internet. Attacking or making demeaning comments about someone you haven't met because you read one of their articles is immature at best. You look like a fool and your anger makes you look fragile, not right or strong or cool. I wish some of us could slow down and read the article a few times and try to remain calm. It's amazing anyone in this thread climbs less than 5.14, the speed at which you rage type would lead me to believe your forearms are impenetrable to flashpump.
This is the second edition of this article. When I read the first one I read it with skepticism. I rolled my eyes a few times and I was annoyed and grumbled to myself. But I kept reading and tried really hard to read it again and again with understanding even though I didn't like the words that were being written. I loved Free Solo and Dawn Wall and I like most climbing movies and I think I was just pissed off that someone was criticizing something I liked. I also didn't love that Honnold was catching shit for having a movie made about such an impressive feat when it has directors of color and he is one of few climbers doing advocacy work with his nonprofit. Lastly, I also didn't like the tone which I found at the time somewhat arrogant. It's worth noting that white people often find people of color, namely women of color irritable when they are raising hell. (This is implicit bias, no you can't tell when it's happening, that's what implicit means.) This has been researched and proven ad nauseam, Google it.
But none of that is the point. Someone in this thread mentioned thinking about who the audience this article is written for and I think that's a good place to start. It's written for people who are advocates of social justice and equity first and climbers second. I fucking love climbing, we all love climbing, that doesn't make it perfect or immune to racism/white supremacy and it definitely doesn't mean that climbers are somehow immune to the work of acknowledging our privilege.
Certainly you could argue that climbing is merely falling to the racism and white supremacy that plagues all of society. Or you can argue that we should just be able to watch a climbing movie about an awesome climbing accomplishment and not bring race into it. And both of those points are valid to a certain extent. I felt the same way at first, but I don't think they hold water.
The author is essentially arguing that we should push to be better. Let's make climbing a place that tackles racism and white supremacy and toxic masculinity (I've obviously lost anyone who disagrees with me at this point so fuck it, let's just start peppering in the progressive buzzwords, shall we??) and let's make climbing a place that is better than the larger society.
Why make it about race? Because race is always there and not talking about it is willful ignorance to that fact. It's such a privilege for white people to be able to ignore race. Why does it make us uncomfortable to talk about? Every single white person on this thread, myself included, has a racial bias against people of color. If you can't acknowledge that then articles like this one are 5 steps too far ahead for you to even begin to grasp.
We can acknowledge that climbing favors white people and falls to the same systemic racism as the larger society and STILL watch Free Solo and love it. But if you are someone who thinks that Free Solo was a perfect movie and throw hate at someone who says yo Alex could have done a lot of good for people of color and indigenous folks if he used his platform better then you have to resolve yourself to this simple fact: You would rather enjoy watching a climbing movie than dismantle racism in America. The author of this article simply disagrees and would rather watch Free Solo, appreciate the badassness that is soloing El Cap, and then think, "Damn, would have been cool to see people of color raised up."
Perhaps the only thing I truly disagree with in this article is the headline and that's only because it's not actually what the author is really asking for. But they sure got your attention and pissed you off. I have massive doubts that anyone who has voiced disagreement with the article actually took the time to read the whole thing. So fine... I'd nick a few points off for the headline. Still a solid work of intersectional thought.
The main and perhaps most disturbing point that has been regurgitated 45 times in this thread: "As soon as people of color start doing cutting edge things, they will make movies about them." (edited out some dumb shit I added here)
What is wrong with you? Dead serious, who are you people? You have the nerve to write that as a white person and climber in the United States whose ENTIRE LIFE is what it is because it was built on the generations of slavery, lynching, segregation of schools/redlining of housing that exists to this day, the extermination of MILLIONS of indigenous folks and the overtaking and destruction of natural lands for a nearly sole benefit of white people. Amazing.
This article is literally just asking for the first step - acknowledge that white people who climb benefit from white privilege in their climbing. If you can't handle that maybe reconsider who the real snowflake is.
Louder for those in the back.
(Thank you, Kris, for taking the time + giving your energy to make all of these points.) Sending support.
Please consider there may be perspectives out there that hold some water other than your own. Please consider re-reading Kris's post a week from now, and (dare I ask it) then re-reading the article as he suggests. Please celebrate that we're united by a sport + way of life that we all love. Understand that discussing our differences in a compassionate, informed, and intentional way will actually make us stronger. Nobody is claiming to have all the answers or to be an expert on anything: I think we're just trying to figure out how to make our community better. <3
One other thing that Kris didn't explicitly address. Yes, there are climbing videos/movies about climbers of color. (Grateful for that!). No, the author did not spend space writing about them. Of all the reasons to critique, this is a silly one: Melanin Base Camp's feed is almost exclusively focused on highlighting and celebrating POC climbers. The underlying message is that even though these media exist, they are in the margins of climbing media and culture. The article talks about how much "cultural space" DW/Free Solo took up, and you can understand this: when mainstream media quotes a climber, is it going to be an Ashima or an Alex?
I'm not going to make any presumptions about why the author made the choices they did or what they "could have done better" - there's a lot of that happening already. I think a point is that while the article didn't spend as much time highlighting pieces that do focus on climbers of color, the mainstream (climbing community and mainstream mainstream) doesn't either. Media centering up BIPOC isn't given the same cultural space and aren't as pertinent in our consciousness. Assuming the intended audience is for people genuinely interested in working for social justice and equity, they will know that these films exist and will probably have watched them!!
Just my thoughts. I think I understand why the people making that point are doing so, but it sounds a lot like tone policing, and I just thought I'd point that out. As somebody who interacts with new climbers + their entry-level impressions of the climbing world on a near-daily basis (e.g. "you only count if you're strong" etc etc), I will echo the sentiment that representation really really matters.
(Thank you, Kris, for taking the time + giving your energy to make all of these points.) There are parts of this thread that make me want to puke a little so I don't plan to engage further! But I want to voice my support + make the presence of people who aren't in agreement with the tone policing + racism.
To everybody else *speaking gently,* please take some chill pills. Please consider there may be perspectives out there that hold some water other than your own. Please consider re-reading Kris's post a week from now, and (dare I ask it) then re-reading the article as he suggests. Please celebrate that we're united by a sport + way of life that we all love. Understand that discussing our differences in a compassionate, informed, and intentional way will actually make us stronger. Nobody is claiming to have all the answers or to be an expert on anything: I think we're all just trying to figure out how to make our community better. <3
Judging from the tone of the article it doesn’t seem that way. It basically boils down to us and them. I feel sorry for her that she sees climbing community that way.
By the way, Alex is a professional athlete, that’s his job. Bashing on him churning out climbing videos is like hating on an auto mechanic making videos. Also, if the author had made an attempt to see who Alex is and what’s his stance on her point of view, then her piece might have come out with more substance.
Judging from the tone of the article it doesn’t seem that way. It basically boils down to us and them. I feel sorry for her that she sees climbing community that way.
By the way, Alex is a professional athlete, that’s his job. Bashing on him churning out climbing videos is like hating on an auto mechanic making videos. Also, if the author had made an attempt to see who Alex is and what’s his stance on her point of view, then her piece might have come out with more substance.
I think that was kind of the point though. Like, the personality of the white person is (somewhat) irrelevant. It’s not meant to be an attack or hating on the white subject of the film, it’s the circumstances that perpetuate films being made about one type of person over and over and over.
I don’t think anyone is reading these articles and thinking “Tommy Caldwell is an asshole and doesn’t deserve a movie made about him.” At least that’s not how I’m reading it. It’s more like, if deep-rooted racism/sexism didn’t exist we would have more movies about black women so it would be rad if white people started being more active in helping POC get recognized in the climbing world.
I think that was kind of the point though. Like, the personality of the white person is (somewhat) irrelevant. It’s not meant to be an attack or hating on the white subject of the film, it’s the circumstances that perpetuate films being made about one type of person over and over and over.
I don’t think anyone is reading these articles and thinking “Tommy Caldwell is an asshole and doesn’t deserve a movie made about him.” At least that’s not how I’m reading it. It’s more like, if deep-rooted racism/sexism didn’t exist we would have more movies about black women it would be rad if white people started being more active in helping POC get recognized in the climbing world.
I get what you are saying but you’re missing the point that the color of the skin doesn’t matter if you’re performing at the world class level. That’s the catalyst that separates the masses and pros from being featured in climbing videos, not deep-rooted racism/sexism.
I would personally like to see more videos of regular people doing stuff that I can relate to but until more of that content is available I’ll be watching pros at work.
I already shared my 2 cents last night on this topic, I thought I was done. Then I went back and actually read the article without skimming through it like I did the first time. I want to make some corrections to my first post. The article is not garbage, it's actually self loathing, hateful, racist, garbage. I underestimated the amount of hate this person has towards white males, privileged or not. If Alex Megos was a black, transgender, Ethiopian, gay, man crushing 5.15d we would all be queuing the video up in our playlist. But alas, he is not, he's a white German kid crushing 5.15d so we que it up in our playlist and watch it because we share his love for climbing and like to be inspired or demoralized (depending on how you look at it). I travel an above average amount, not because I work hard and save up, no, no I just do it because I'm white and priveledged. A couple weeks ago I got back from Chile with my wife and son. We climbed, almost entirely with Chileans for some reason, I think it was because we were in Chile but that's just a hunch, they shared their mate and cookies with us, showed us the trails to a hard to find crag. We had an incredible time even with the unrest and riots. Rioter's riot, burn, and loot. Climbers just leave the crowded, smelly, burning cities and go climbing. We climbed in Oman last year with Omanis, Saudis, and a wide variety of other races or skin colors, if you will;) including some Bangladeshis and Indians. We experienced the most wonderful hospitality from the climbing community, they loaned us camping gear and topos and endless information. I climbed in Cyprus a couple years ago with Cypriotes. The man than ran one of the only outdoor gear shops in Cyprus was of Turkish descent, he and his Iranian wife who also was an avid climber, showed me a crag they were developing and even let me get the first ascent on a route they found and bolted, and took us out to the most amazing dinner afterwards. I've climbed in Colombia with Colombians who shared their gear, empenadas and beers. I've climbed in Cuba with Cuban's who've done jail time for climbing, who climbed with us and invited us to their homes despite the fact that they could be arrested for climbing with us (as we could have been spies). The list goes on but you get the point. The climbing community is made up of an incredibly open, warm, diverse, group of people. This Anaheed person is not a part of the warm open diverse community that I know and have experienced around and in the world of climbing. Why is she so angry about who's being filmed and who's not? I have no explanation for that. She appears to be willfully blind and living in a bubble of her own creation. Why did this article see the light of day? Well that's the internet for you and also thanks to the internet here I am reading garbage blogs about people who aren't making a difference at all in the world. Even worse now I'm wasting not only my time but also everyone else's time that is reading my rant about a rant.
I get what you are saying but you’re missing the point that the color of the skin doesn’t matter if you’re performing at the world class level. That’s the catalyst that separates the masses and pros from being featured in climbing videos, not deep-rooted racism/sexism.
I’m trying to stay civil here but to say the reason there aren’t more POC performing at a world class level isn’t because of gatekeeping and deep-rooted racism/sexism is pretty hard to hear.
There isn’t a corner of society that white privilege doesn’t impact. Why would the climbing community be suddenly immune? The climbing industry promotes what it wants to see (more white dudes training hard) so that the predominately white audience can relate to it. I’m surprised this is even considered controversial. So then we see people of color and black folks bring race into it and see women bring gender into it and see white dudes get up in arms about making things “just about the climbing.”
But when we make things "only about the climbing" POC have no way to break the cycle and it just perpetuates. Again, nobody is saying Honnold and Caldwell and Megos aren’t world class athletes who don’t deserve movies. But when we only support movies like that we are ignoring things that make it harder for people of color to feel super stoked on climbing and making climbing their jam.
Greg Davis wrote: The brown guy comment was a brown guy. As my dad would say, cool your jets.
Unpopular opinion, the darker skinned you are and the more outspoken you are the more you face challenges of racism. So when light-skinned POC make jokes that ease the pressure for white folks they are perpetuating the problem. It’s not new to point out how much anti-black hate there is among Hispanics. There is a difference between racism and anti-blackness and immigrants/brown people are just as able to perform anti-blackness as white people. In fact, many times over history has seen light-skinned people of color dodge racism by joining white folks. Jews gained sympathy among white people during World War II when they started becoming seen as white.
EDIT: Worth acknowledging that the person here WAS making a joke which is totally legit and not for me to judge or comment on as its not my lived experience. In that comment I’m speaking for POC which is wack and I shouldn’t be the one to say who is perpetuating the problem. My larger point was to raise awareness to benevolent racism and connecting that point to that joke is wrong. I will add that I believe many of the people who liked that comment are looking for an excuse not to hold themselves accountable which I think is where my opposition stemmed from but my above comment does a poor job of communicating that. Thanks for people who called that out. I am leaving the comment up to both as a means of holding myself accountable to my rhetoric and so other peeps can learn from it. This is not a “clarification,” I’m saying I was wrong.
I think that we should probably give the author the benefit of the doubt on some of the angst. I'm sure she has gone full SJW but is probably far less hostile if you were to sit down with her. The vast majority of us would probably even agree on most of the fundamental points. But the truth is shes a writer for a blog/publication. She NEEDS clicks! Part 1 probably was her most viewed piece of writing to date. Heck we have two massive threads going on it on MP, let alone whatever is linked to social media. So obviously she's writing another piece and will probably continue to do so until it fizzles out. That's not to say she doesn't believe in the issue but she has to pay the bills; and stash away as much loot as possible while waiting for the next ALPENGLOW GEAR mega sale just like the rest of us.
Kris Fiore wrote: ... there aren’t more POC performing at a world class level isn’t because of gatekeeping and deep-rooted racism/sexism is pretty hard to hear.......
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