The time has come.
We’re all going to start suing the arses off each other.
Or at least that’s how Northern Rivers-based legal firm, Somerville Laundry Lomax, want it after taking out an ad in the Byron Shire Echo asking for people to come forward if they’ve been injured by someone riding a board without a leggy.
Which doesn’t seem real cool to me.
Or more specifically, it seems a long way from the escapist roots surfing was born of.
But let’s get real. Surfing is a long way from those roots and only getting further from them, with crowded line-ups, boards more accessible than ever, and basically everyone doing it, including lawyers. Including the directors of this particular firm apparently.
And granted, riding a board without a leggie in a crowded line-up is a bonafide dickhead act. Especially if the thing weighs a tonne. You can be as graceful and gifted as you want, but if the result of you falling off means numerous people have to scramble out of the way to avoid getting their heads taken off, then you need to rethink your shit.
Of course, anyone who’s ridden a longboard in any meaningful capacity knows all that fancy footwork is easier to do without a leggy.
Then again, anyone who’s been clobbered by a board while having a surf knows it’s way more fun when that doesn’t happen.
But solicitors, lawsuits, and all that tedious land-based drama most people go for a surf to escape?
It sounds like the beginning of the end to me.
Or maybe the end’s already begun.
If people only care about themselves to the point where they couldn’t give a rat’s arse about the safety of anyone else in the line-up, then maybe this is exactly what we deserve.
Let the lawyers come with their money-grubbing ways and turn us all against each other.
Let us equally loathsome surf journalists write about it in overdramatic tones.
Let the whole empire crumble and maybe somewhere down the track we can start again.
Or for fuck’s sake just look out for each other in the line-up, especially if you aren’t wearing a leggy.
