She says:.
Some Olympians spend their entire lives training to make history, to carve out a name for themselves. I trained for exactly 37 minutes, and now I’m the most famous break dancer in the world. My sick moves shut down an entire event. How many Olympians can say that?"
She’s some sort of professor of cultural studies. But if I were one of the other competitors I’d think she was taking the piss.
lol academia is so self regarding.
Edit: haven’t and won’t watch this - good luck to whoever the fuck she is for doing whatever the fuck she did but as somebody who walked away from academia with friends still in that world who spend their time worrying that their musings might be futile…lol
True. Last night my brother in law explained to me that she had done it on purpose to prove a point that break dancing is not an Olympic sport. In that case, I’m not so impressed by her decision.
What would you think if a skater did runs full of lofty backside airs or bonelesses to prove a point that skating wasn’t an Olympic sport? Partly your argument holds but at the same time true skaters watching might appreciate the essence of real skating getting displayed…? No real winner to the argument. Jogs my memory to Neil blender’s spray paint run bitd.
I would support her on that but where has he heard that? I haven’t heard that anywhere. From her own words she tried her best.
This basically happened at Tokyo where this person cruised around the park not really trying anything to prove that skateboarding is just for fuuuun and for everyone.
No idea. I hadn’t heard that version either. I suspect social media…
I prefer my version.
Sidenote, my 80 year old dad had a bit of a late night rant last night about how the truth isn’t being safe guarded anymore. It was funny but heartfelt at the same time. I guess this Australian breakdancing debacle slides into this ethical topic.
Granddad what was 2024 like?
“It was simpler times, Hawk Tuah girl, Kangaroo breakdancing and misinformation caused riots everywhere…”
what’s the difference between Raygun and the African Skateboarder? They both qualified and they both competed with knowledge of not being up to scratch but did it anyway for the experience.
Of course the main difference is some sort of paid dues and legitness but as far as qualifying and being there, shrugs
Has breakdancing been pushed into this through governing bodies unrelated to breakdancing?
If so then you’re never going to get the cream of the crop in that event.
I’ve just looked her up.
First off - she’s not called ‘Raygun’ obvs - she’s Rachel Gunn. She’s an academic whose PhD thesis is entitled ‘Deterritorialising gender in Sydney’s breakdancing scene: a b-girl’s experience of b-boying’.
She’s been a dancer since a kid and started breakdancing in 2010 apparently.
I’m always deeply suspicious of high brow explanations and/or explorations of subcultures if I’m honest, including skateboarding. Her research sounds like it might be interesting but looked at from a larger perspective seems a bit navel-gazing.
I’m assuming her zero score represented some frustration from the judges at a point where they were keen to promote their thing to a global audience and have it taken somewhat seriously. Having this woman do her ‘it’s interpretative dance’ statement probably flew in the face of that and maybe came across as a bit hubristic on her part. If it pissed off the afficionados then that’s likely because 90% of the online discourse about their thing now focuses around this Doyle pretending to be a kangaroo, right?
There ends any interest I had in this ‘furore’.
Am I right in thinking that breakdancing is now re-relegated to a non Olympic sport too?
Whatever - fuck the Olympics - it’s interesting and compelling when it’s on but afterwards means not very much.
Or to put it more succinctly 
I don’t really care for Breakdancing personally but like skating, it’s far too subjective to be broken down into a competive scored sport. These disciplines have grown without the need to for that world stage, the olympics is the pinnacle of achievement for many of these sports but it’s not for these subcultures.
Street league has done a great job of producing generic ways to skate and rank tricks and while it’s entertaining occasionally it makes you so desensitised to how fucking amazing people have to be to do it.
I don’t watch Street league. Is the crowd made up of people that are non-skaters but started watching it and now have circuit favourites? Or is it still mainly skaters watching skaters?
I went to the first one in London and it was mostly 8 year old kids and their soccer dad style parents
Plus a very drunk me
This wrecked my head so much, for that same reason that they denied a more deserving person several years of Olympic and sponsor funding.
I think that’s how I feel about it.
Raygun’s position was a luxury one: she has a secure job in a high-status profession. She doesn’t have to struggle in life. She can afford to treat a place in the Olympics as a joke or as an opportunity to make some kind of obscure point. She doesn’t see it as the potentially life-changing culmination of years of ambition and training. She’s sort of saying ‘I’m not one of the little people who care about these things.’
For everyone who gets a place at the Olympics there are many more who try and fail.
This just feels disrespectful.
We’ve all fallen into Raygun’s trap
Self-obsessed bellend talks about nonsense text about him on the internet to other strangers on the internet. Shut up mate.
Sounds like all of us on here tbf! 
I think you’ve fallen into another trap
Isn’t the video a joke about how their trap is some self deluded idea that isn’t the genius concept they think? Everyone else can see it but them?
Wouldn’t it be interesting if Raygun’s act was a stunt for a new Will Ferrell movie or for a mockumentary, like an Aussie version of This Country
