Instagram Is Stupid

My wife and the Stab editors recently, respectively, forced me to purchase my first non-burner cell phone and begin maintaining an Instagram account. 

I hate the damn phone so fucking much. It never stops beeping and chiming with nonsense I don’t want to deal with. Text after text after text, jarring bullshit from which I was blessedly free back when all I had was a landline and people were forced to actually speak to me when they wanted something.

Instagram ain’t much better.

Between the ocean, travel, and drugs my own life is interesting enough that I don’t need to live vicariously through others. I don’t care what you ate for lunch. I’ve already seen the sun set over the ocean ten trillion times. Selfies make you look like an idiot. No one gives a fuck about your vacation photos. The very notion of ‘influencers’ makes me want to fly into a foaming-at-the-mouth, middle-aged, get-off-my-lawn-you-stupid-fucking-kids rage. 

There are a couple facets I can get behind. I thoroughly enjoy all the young women in various states of undress. Things that make me laugh, as few and far between as they may be, are always welcome.

I’ve been digging the Greenroom Times (Check out Stab x GRT’s A Week in the Greenroom here) and Rinsed Surfing Magazine quite a bit. Satirical headlines in the spirit of The Onion and The Betoota Advocate. Both are good for a solid chuckle on the regular. Since the GRT already have a space here, I called up the Rinsed guys to see what they’re all about. 

As @mfanno reached the final in his last event at Bells, before losing to avoid any claims of rigging by the @wsl ( #youcantscriptthis – winky face), surfers around the world have taken to social media to congratulate Mick, who we presume to be really happy that Ryan from Wollongong in Australia thinks he’s done a good job over the course of his career. In retirement, Fanning is rumoured to be looking at tackling why he created a sandal that opens bottled beer and a beer company that produces canned beer. #cheersmick

Surfing is obviously a convoluted and complicated thing in terms of- is it a sport? Is it a hobby? Is it a passion? I read William Finnegan’s book, Barbarian Days, two years ago and that got me thinking about- why do we really surf? What do we get out of it? What’s your reward if you surf for, say, seventy-five years? You’ve been focusing your life, your work, your holidays, your family, on it. What do you get out of it? What’s your end goal?

And that led up to thinking the surf industry, as a whole. It’s not very self-reflective. Surfers, I think, also are not very self reflective. So we wanted to bring that voice to the table. I think that’s really important.

We also wanted to highlight issues we often take as commonplace. Silly stuff, like getting aggressive in the water. Sometimes surfers need aggression, if you’re surfing Pipeline of something, but if you’re surfing Venice or Manly at a mushy two foot it becomes kind of ridiculous to be running some kind of priority or local system.

Local surfers Sara and Nathan were stoked to find their favorite break delivering beautiful 3 foot offshore conditions this morning. Eager to get wet, the pair quickly suited up. Suddenly a passerby, who didn’t appear to be from the area, stopped to deliver a gravely ominous warning. “Looks real sharky out there today,” he said. “Bet they come in here to breed.” When questioned about the source for such alarming comments, the stranger referenced a newspaper article his sister had mailed him a few years ago but could not give any solid scientific or statistical grounds for the claim. Although he did add, “Pretty gray today,” pointing at the sky as a demonstration sharks are particularly fond of overcast weather.

Local surfer, Travis, got a cheeky confidence boost this morning when he saw himself in a car window on his walk to the water. The Valencia-filter reflection smoothed his jawline and gave a deep brown tan, while the position of his surfboard accentuated his biceps and ultimately reminded him of a slightly younger version of sexy surfing symbol, @lukedavisthegrey “Huh,” he proudly said to himself before making his way to the line up.

The two men behind Rinsed asked to remain anonymous in order to protect themselves from potential backlash wrought by poking fun at grown men playing in the ocean. It’s a legitimate concern. The people who make money from the “sport” don’t enjoy being the object of ridicule. Being blackballed, or having someone call your boss to bitch and moan, happens more often than it should. It’s no secret that those of us who talk the most shit typically have someone else paying our bills. Spouses, parents. In some cases, both. If you’re paying your own way through life you need to be cautious.

There’s no real business model behind Rinsed. They sell some shirts and hoodies on their site, but prices are low and half of any profit goes to Surf Aid. Which is a nice thing to do. Even if they aren’t, admittedly, selling many.

You can follow Rinsed Surfing Magazine here.