Police Brutality, Systemic Racism, And The Embarrassing Nature Of A Bunch Of Middle Class White Kids Looting Surfboards

With thousands arrested over the last four days of both violent and non-violent, peaceful and pandemoniacal demonstrations, like so many of you, we as a media organization have been left feeling like silence on the subject equates to complicity. 

Basic human rights, human decency, shouldn’t be a politically or socially polarizing topic, but, well… the Internet. 

Surely some of you will bitch about us staying in our lane, but we are moved to make it very clear where we stand as an organization: we’ll be donating 100% of profits from the sales of the Stab Store this week to two organizations: Campaign Zero, who have been working to ensure we “live in a world where the police don’t kill people by limiting police interventions, improving community interactions, and ensuring accountability,” as well as the Peoples’ City Council Freedom Fund, a Los Angeles-based non-profit working to “pay for legal support, bail, fines, and court fees for arrested protesters in the city, as well as medical bills and transportation for injured protesters, supplies for field medics, and direct support to L.A.’s Black Lives Matter chapter.”

Photography

Sam Moody.

Photography

Sam Moody.

We stand with marginalized people and communities around the world against systemic racism. 

We are appalled at the truly poisonous, corrosively counterproductive police brutality and racism that remains deeply woven into the fabric of so many communities in our country. 

Photography

Sam Moody.

Photography

Sam Moody.

We demand justice for those killed by overzealous, passively or actively racist, under- or poorly trained men in uniform.

We hope to see radical reconsideration and reshaping of how police officers are educated to deal with conflict situations. 

We are super fucking embarrassed by the surfers looting our local surf shops, and at the looting and vandalism, in general, derailing the national and local conversation. 

Photography

Sam Moody.

We do not condone the looting of small businesses and residential homes, but we ain’t here to tell anyone how to protest. (Though, if you’re gonna smash the Oligarchy, might we recommend starting with a few Amazon fulfillment centers or Wal-Marts, not fucking Patagonia.) 

We are embarrassed by the countless examples of aggressive force and physical violence by police officers on protesters in cities across the country. 

We believe police forces across the country should be joining arms with protesters and doing the hard work of addressing their abusive track records head-on, transparently, and with an eagerness to improve. 

Photography

Sam Moody.

We believe that at the very foundation of our American Freedom should be citizens’ freedom from Fear. 

We recognize the massive racial divide within our own community. That people of color make up a tiny percentage of our lilly white, middle-class sport is no secret; it’s up to us to change that. 

We mourn the death of George Floyd and countless others and hope their tragic, entirely avoidable stories are the catalyst for real, intelligent, wide-scale policy reform. 

Photography

Sam Moody.