All the nike affiliated pros in the comments with the neoliberal ‘it’s his money he can do what he likes’ dismissive lolz. Embarrassing shit.
In the grand scheme of things obviously it doesn’t matter but it’s clearly engagement farming from a guy who, although he’s great at skating, has based his entire career around being instagram guy. Again, in and of itself that is inconsequential but seeing all these millionaires telling normal fee-paying people to ‘lighten up’ lays bare the tone deaf selfishness at the heart of it all. All that guy wants is engagement and he’s prepared to get it by acting like a twat. The clip isn’t even funny enough to qualify as satire.
Much of pro skateboarding is such an embarrassment these days.
Skateboarders are just an extension of normal folk nowadays, not an antidote like it felt like in the past (rose tinted?) Normal folk and people in general are getting more narcisistic and warped by the chemicals we produce when having unrealistic an non person to person interactions.
Basically, I hate the world that my kids are growing up into. I wish I could afford to make a difference or even just to make a massive personal change to location without finacial worry. Oh well.
Interesting point. Definitely a rose-tinted aspect to it but weirdos have less currency than cool guys now I suppose. That’s a proper ‘tell me you’re 50 without telling me’ statement I know but it feels a bit like that tbh.
Of course, it goes without saying, just sometimes it feels like you have to vent, get it down to remove it so you can give room for good stuff in the brain.
These are questions I wrestle with. Is producing a video for social media inherently bad? Are you just adding to the noise? Can you do things which are creative and fun with the medium, and is there any way of cutting through the me-me-me narcism of it all?
Which is why I think Girogi’s video might have some (limited) value. He’s rejecting the fetishisation of products which goes along with so much influencer crap and embracing the more nihilistic aspects of skate culture. Skate and destroy, but mainly just destroy! I kind of like the last shot of him playing a harmonica over a bunch of burning decks. He’s skateboarding’s Joker.
But he is engaging in the self-promoting nonsense of social media whilst doing it, which kind of makes it all feel very cheap.
I dunno man. I’d say the multiple Nike logos on everything throughout the clip and the fact that he’s being ‘defended’ by multiple nike related people probably means his fetishisation of product is wholly intact. Honestly, who cares though, really? I’ve always thought he was a bit of a Doyle - this just made me feel like I was right.
Honestly that part pissed me off more, setting fires in public skate parks. That’s because there was a kid here (non-skater) that would set fires down our local and the short lived DIY. So that’s probably just a personal trigger thing, haha.
Maybe. Felt the Nike stickers were there to trick us into thinking these were genuine boards. But you are right, this may well have been content Girogi was contractually-obliged to produce.
Yeah, but there are lots of different motivations to being a weirdo nowadays rather than just the few in the past. Conforming and non conforming have similar reasoning just opposite side of the same coin. Wanting to be different is way more flimsy and anyone can do it, it means nothing more than wanting to stir something in order to stick out and be noticed in the sea of the same copies of copies. Genuine expression still shines but surface individuality hides the diamonds and gets the credit but that’s ok because genuine expression doesn’t need credit. Controversy is addictive and skateboarders are as prone to this whether they follow or buck trends.
All good man, say what you mean but allow a retort, of sorts.
“Are you using social media? I suggest you don’t. The sun will still rise regardless.”
replies like this are just as annoying and fairly damaging.
If people don’t call out misjudged social media then they go by without controversy, the creator thinks that it’s all acceptable and keep going, nothing learned. All veiwers see that it’s the norm and follow and take in the new acceptable. People need calling out in order to rethink their reasoning and opinions otherwise we’re gonna keep falling deeper into a more narcistic world than we have now. Can we really sit at the side and watch the world burn? It starts with tiny little things like this.
There is a fine line between creating a happy bubble, ignoring everything and burying your head and letting thinks get worse around you. Not suggesting everyone needs to become social media vigilantes, I’m not suggesting anything other than wishing that people just had healthy reasons for doing anything they do. Simple, if you can decifer it from amongst my lettuce and radishes.