Maybe we can take a lead from land reform acts such as the creation of reserves and National Parks. Photo: Christor Lukasiewicz
“Nothing was your own, except the few cubic centimetres inside your skull.”
– Winston Smith, 1984
Long before Facebook, GoPros, and Google Earth, George Orwell tried to warn us that technology would be one of our many failings as a species. Today he has been proven correct, as he has been so many times.
The “Secret Spot” is dead.
The notion of the secret spot and the hunger to discover the next one is still alive, of course, but those crusty seekers and hardcore local dreamers are nothing if not deluded.
We’ve all met surfers who speak in hushed and reverent tones about their “secret spot” like it’s some mythical giant living in the hillside. These spots are inevitably “oh so fickle” yet “oh so perfect – on their day…” We humor them, smiling politely, yet silently remembering seeing a clip of it on someone’s Instagram; or we furtively hunt it down later at our work desks via Google Earth.
The notions of these people are lovely, they really are, but I’m afraid they are drastically misguided. We live in a world where everything is mapped, tracked, and claimed. A vast majority of us have the resources and the nous to reach anywhere on the planet with the touch of a few buttons or the swipe of a few fingers. And our greasy lust in seeking out these last places of refuge in far flung corners of the globe is rarely satisfied–at least not until we’ve found a wifi connection to let everyone know about it. We capture and claim, posting media on a multitude of channels, adding teasing captions which thinly veil neither locations nor self-congratulatory smugness.
In surfing, we occupy a strange place between technological advancement and traditional values. On the one hand, we are happy to embrace futuristic board design and production, 21st century swell tracking and forecasting, and any gadget or media platform to discuss and disseminate our collected data; yet on the other we shun the crowded surf spots, the blogs and surf trolls, and the environmental devastation left in our wake.
As surfers we forever hark back to an era (which many of us probably didn’t even experience) where everything was bathed in a golden light, waves were free, and kooks didn’t exist. Perhaps it’s just part of our psyche. We yearn to be the first, and we naturally see ourselves as elevated from society, physically and spiritually. Yesterday was always a little bigger…a little more offshore…and the tide was definitely a little better…
Surfing draws in the outliers and welcomes the outcasts. We just can’t accept that we aren’t the only ones who might feel like this.
But there is a solution.
It sure isn’t privatizing resort waves for the sole use of fat capitalists and pros á la Tavarua or the Maldives.
And it certainly isn’t policing local spots with vigilante justice, minor acts of petty vandalism, or death threats from furiously sweaty keyboard warriors.
To solve the problem, we must reject our natural urges to hunker down and keep the spoils to ourselves. And we need to recognize that sometimes the only way to get back is by moving forward. It is precisely through technology that we can reach like-minded people who want to preserve and protect what we have, not exploit it.
We cannot fight the battle against technology, we cannot dictate what “types of people” learn to surf, and we cannot claim the ocean as anyone’s private property. What we can do is utilize the technology at our disposal, embrace the democratization of information and surf spots, and above all, trust in the many people we all know who value surfing and respect the ocean as we do.
Most surfers I meet are pretty positive people. Maybe I’m lucky to live in such a sparse surf “scene” where we are happy to share information. I understand that my next statement is going to be alien to most of you, but quite often when I turn up at any given spot on any given day, I hope to see some other surfers! I trust the majority of surfers I meet to protect the integrity and ethos of what we do.
Where I come from, according to ancient traditions, which are now codified to law, we are afforded the right of universal access to the land. This freedom to go where we please – providing we adhere to a code amounting to nothing more than basic rules of common sense – works very well. On the whole, people embrace the trust that is put in them, and work together to promote and re-enforce guiding principles that allow the system to succeed.
Of course there are always exceptions, and there will always be people who abuse our trust. There are one or two areas (normally within close proximity to cities and accessible by car) which are regularly spoiled by litter and alcohol-related debris.
But here’s the thing: this never inflicts surf spots, and never involves surfers.
Maybe we need to evolve our thinking. Perhaps we need to recognize that the notion of secret spots as we once knew them is gone, and we need to trust in our own kind to protect the integrity of what we all share.
We can’t hope to protect our spots in the long-term through Neanderthal-led mob justice. But we can preserve the spots we love by investment in shared interests and shared information, rather than through poorly guarded secrets that none of us really have the right to keep.
To this end maybe we can take a lead from land reform acts such as the creation of reserves and National Parks. If this was applied to surf spots (just as World Surfing Reserves are doing) then maybe we instill in people a collective pride, and an educated mob justice.
Maybe I’m misguided, but I trust in surfers as a collective. I’m not naïve enough to think that every surfer shares my ideals, but I do believe that this is the exception as opposed to the rule. At any rate, it’s worth finding out because right now we’re all losing more than we’re gaining, and we are blinkered by our golden-hued notions of the past.
And, once again, Orwell knew it all along.
“Happiness can exist only in acceptance.”
– George Orwell
