Saturday, November 04, 2006

Dude!


WIND 20 TO 25 KT.
RISING TO 35 TO 40 KT WITH GUSTS TO 50 KT.
COMBINED SEAS 11 FT DOMINANT PERIOD 11 SECONDS.
BUILDING TO 20 FT DOMINANT PERIOD 9 SECONDS.

Stoicism was one of the new sur-philosophical movements of the post-longboard period. The name derives from the porch (stoa poikilê) aka "the nose", where the skilled members of the old school posed, and their poses were held. Unlike ‘epicurean,’ (i.e. "Dude! These waves are epicurean!) the adjective ‘stoical’ is utterly misleading with regard to its philosophical origins (i.e. "Dude! Didja see that barrel? I am so Stoical!). The Stoics did, in fact, hold that emotions like fear or envy (or impassioned sexual attachments (i.e. "In the tube"), or passionate love of anything whatsoever (i.e. "Hooting") and/or said display of such) either were, or arose from, false judgements (i.e. "Kookism") and that the sage (aka "Soul Surfer")--a person who had attained soulful and physical surf perfection--would not undergo or engage in them. While surf stoicism would occur, to display outwardly such stoic was "uncool". The later Stoics of Shortboard times, (not butt-wigglers and bouncer/hoppers) emphasise the doctrines (already central to the early Stoics' teachings) that the surf sage is utterly immune to clean up sets or difficult paddle outs and that surf is sufficient for happiness. Needless to say, size does matter. Even the hugest surf requires display of ‘stoic calm’, which encapsulates and protects and embodies the general drift of these claims. Claiming, naming and stoicism are antithetical yet inseparable in this context. It does not, however, hint at the even more radical maneuvers which the Stoics developed, "the soul arch", "the lip bash", "floaters", etcetera. Only the stoical surf master is free while all others are slaves, flounders and kooks. All those who are morally vicious (small minded locals) are equally so, despite surface skill. Though it seems some Stoics take a kind of perverse joy in misinformation, fading kooks into the pit or in unbridled sarcasm and bitterness, they do not do so simply to shock. Stoic surf ethics achieves a certain plausibility within the context of physical theory and psychology, and within the framework of surf-ethical theory as that was handed down to them from Robert Simmons and, later, Miklos Chapin Dora. It seems that they were well aware of the mutually interdependent nature of their philosophical views, likening sur-philosophy itself to a breaking wave in which logic is sine and period; ethics and physics, the drop and the barrel respectively (another version reverses this assignment, making ethics the barrel). Their views in logic and physics are no less distinctive and interesting than those in surf-ethics itself.

0 comments: