“The ‘Brazilian Storm’ is a beacon of inclusivity,” says Dylan Graves in his latest episode of Breaking Waves. Dylan, after exploring the “frontier of surfing” in three incredible seasons of Weird Waves (hopefully more to come), has turned his attention to other unexplored and often overlooked areas in the surfing world – the social issues relating to inclusivity in the water. Episode One dove deep into the Queer Surf movement, discussing issues of gender and the way that the beach, which has become an escape from the constraints and norms of daily life for many of us, is anything but that for countless others who don’t fit into surfing’s heteronormative categories.
In Episode Two, Dylan tackles the issue of race and inclusivity in the water from a variety of fronts. He attends the recent Black Sand Peace Paddle and speaks with action-sports legend Selema Masekela about unconscious racism and Tyler Wright’s controversial stand against racism. Dylan then heads down to Trestles for the WSL finals to narrow in on an often-overlooked facet of racism in surfing: the surf-world’s sometimes xenophobic behavior towards Brazilian surfers.
“It just requires empathy and curiosity,” says Selema when Dylan asks him about what it will take to get to a more inclusive vision of surfing. “Be empathetic, attempt to feel what others might be feeling. And then be curious and want to know about different types of people and how they might be experiencing this thing.”
