Here's to grumpy old climbers. :thumb:
The whole bluetooth at the crag thing is enough to make me want to rumble. Perhaps only surpassed by the climbing with an actual bluetooth speaker slung to someone's harness. You can't even find peace up on the pitch -- there's always some jackass blasting house music or thrash metal. It's like they are trying to live in some climbing movie.
I do find, however, that many of our shared grievances are mitigated when climbing trad. I've seen folks who swear they can flash 5.12 at the gym go to pieces fumbling with nuts and cams on a 5.6 in the monument. This failure to recognize the difference between plastic pulling and actual rock climbing can be a dangerous discovery. Especially in some of the more classic areas where the crux pitch is the third one of seven and there's no way to get off the route without topping out, short of leaving a lot of gear behind. Which, I must say, I have noticed a lot more bail biners and abandoned cams in recent years -- won't commit to definitively saying it's a consequence, but perhaps a correlation?
Like others have said, climbing has blown up in the last few years. And of course, this is potentially both a blessing and a curse. The curse has been well outlined in previous posts. My hope is that many of these folks in the gyms do make it to the outdoors and fall in the love with monuments and parks. Then not only develop their climbing skills, but also learn crag etiquette, understand the history of rock, and then become stewards of outdoors by joining the Access Fund, Nature Conservancy, AAC, or some other organization protecting these places. If even a fraction of the people I meet at the gym went outdoors and became involved with action committees, we'd see the best possible results for everyone.
Still, I LOVE climbing. Trad is my preference, but sport and bouldering are great too. When I was in grad school we were at J Tree every single weekend, and Tahqutiz all summer. I spent my dissertation fellowship year living in Joshua Tree. But now, I'm married, have actual responsibilities that make it hard for me to jam out there as often. Most of my old partners have children and jobs or moved somewhere far. So I'm grateful for the gym near me. I've met some great folks who have very similar experiences. Shared a rope with many of them now in the outdoors. Perhaps the best way we can challenge the onset of grumpiness is to consider what theesotericone writes:
What most of the new generation doesn't really have is a mentor.
There were no gyms near me when I started climbing, so I relied on beneficence of some very hard climbing older fellows to teach me how to crank it out. Granted, this may lead to some arrogant pricks telling you to bugger off; despite the fact that you're watching them do some really inane, virtually suicidal stuff.
I too come from a surfing background. And definitely learned to come correct to the break through the school of hard knocks. But I think the inherent difference is that rock climbing carries with it a specific deadly learning curve. You can easily die on a 5.5, but it's pretty unlikely somebody is going to get too battered at a beginner break. Nobody learns how to surf at Rincon or Mavericks, simply because they couldn't even paddle out to the break where they could face mortal consequences.
All of which to say -- it's great seeing all the different perspectives on here. Would love to rally a 4Runner climbers get together perhaps in the fall. Somewhere somewhat remote. Away from the techno music and obnoxious folks. Open to suggestions.
