Saudi Arabia Joins The International Surfing Association
Last week, the ISA proudly announced that Saudi Arabia had become its 110th member nation.
The kingdom sits on the Arabian Peninsula with the Red Sea running down the west coast and the Persian Gulf to the east. Neither is known for waves. The ISA calls it a "non-traditional" surfing nation.
Saudi Arabian quality
ISA President, Fernando Aguerre, said of the arrangement:
"I’m excited for our friends in Saudi Arabia to experience the joy and love of surfing. I am especially happy to congratulate Nouf Al Nasser and to welcome her to the ISA family with open arms."
"Having a woman lead this fledgling federation is amazing and a tribute to surfing’s contribution to a better world. Gender equality has always been a priority for me personally and for the ISA and I cannot think of a better way to celebrate this mission."
“I can’t wait to see the positive effects of surfing on the young women and men from Saudi Arabia with this new federation!”
An admirable move by the ISA, ratifying a federation with a female CEO, especially in one of the most repressive countries in Earth. It sits well with Aguerre's sing-song catchphrase: 'A better world thorugh surfing.'
However, Aguerre may have to reassess surfing's capacity for social transformation, as just days after the announcement, Saudi Arabia executed 81 people in a mass beheading.
Comments
Hmm, not so sure about all this. A nation of powerful hypocrisies, I smell a rat. I know the Kingdom is on a massive social/commercial drive at present with the forecast of whole new cities, opportunities for different and new businesses and way more inclusiveness for female business owners/operators. Reports filtering through that women are going to be part of some great new empowerment at the legal and social level, but I’m a bit of a watch this space type of person with that one. My son has been offered to travel there with a close friend whose family resides here in Australia, my wife and I are all for it as it can only broaden our sons horizons, there’s just a minute bit of trepidation knocking on the door of my amygdala.
Russia next?
At least Russia has good surf.
Ha...Russia has been a member of the ISA for over ten years. It joined, along with the comprehensively landlocked Slovakia, in 2011.
In early March, the ISA said it would sanction Russia over the invasion.
"This is a human tragedy that requires us all to take a strong stance and send a message that such violence will not tolerated nor forgotten."
No word on their feelings RE mass beheadings.
Well then, all that's left now is for the WSL to do a webisode about Saudi female surfers, and that'll be that for the most oppressive theocracy on the planet. Soon there'll be billboards of women doing frontside bottom turns in every windswept qarya, which will kick off an arab spring the likes of which high wheat prices and religious ultra-conservatism could never rouse. Maybe Elo was right - surfing really can unite us. Maybe Elo is the new prophet...
KBG, funny stuff.
Don’t you mean the boss of WSL the one and only ‘Profit Elo’.
May he never kiss the ground I walk on.
lol... Elo Akbar!
Close enough
https://surfingdubai.com/pages/surfing-in-dubai
wow 81 ! that's tragic
When I used to work in the Oil and Gas industry (which I know longer do). I worked in U.A.E and had colleagues that used to travel every week from Saudi Arabia to Abu Dhabi for work. I was asked to go over a few time to work at Saudi Aramco. I declined.
I did so because the Saudi regime oppression on women, LGBTQI, non-Muslims and local rules (dry country, looking a women in the eye, no shaking hands with a female colleague, no speaking to women who are not in your family, living in a western compound surrounded by people who think your worth stoning for not believing in what they believe etc, etc) made it a totally unattractive proposition, even though the money was unbelievable.
Saudi joining the International Surfing Federation reeks of a social media opportunity and has little to do with any active surf scene in Saudi. They are doing the same with golf and trying to sandbag the PGA. Greg "$$$$$" Norman is leading the breakaway golf tour with Saudi money.
Which makes me think its amazing what some people will do for money.
GregX, you’ve nailed with that summary. I recently watched an interview with Greg Norman about the breakaway group he’s part of, 99%Saudi money. Norman doesn’t like the PGA because he can’t make fortunes from it, he’s recruited many golfers (investors) from the PGA up until very recently. Many initial investing golfers have done a back flip and given Norman the ‘bird’. Surprise, surprise, Norman is moving back to Australia, the golf fraternity are all turning against him.
The middle east is one of my favourite places to visit, Jordon, Israel, Egypt, Dubai etc
All great countries to visit Mickseq, wife works there often, she says, they are the ‘safer’ ones of the region, but not necessarily as safe as we think.
Yes Egypt is still in top place of my favourite country's I have been to, first went there back in 2005, a few months before they bombed Dahab on the Sinai, still never think twice about going back. The red sea is just magic. Iran I have not been to but want to visit, the food there apparently is top notch.
Hey mickseq. Girlfriends of my wife have scuba dived regularly on the coral reefs of Egypt, they all remarked about its beauty, lack of bleaching and the excellent condition it is in comparable to our own ‘Great Barrier Reef’. None of them are keen to dive on the Great Barrier Reef in the near future, totally saddened by the unhealthy state it’s in. Why do we not care enough about our own icon ? If the reef was Uluṟu , we’d be doing something about it real quick.!!!!
The Bluehole in Dahab is Dangerous Dive eh up to 200 Divers lost there..faaark
I've snorkelled there, was amazing
Sandal surfing. They will be towing in at Chopes soon.
Good to see they had the hazards lights on there.
Saudi Arabia should be sanctioned for its genocide in Yemen. Utter hypocrisy! A bit of whitewashing PR.
Didn't Saudi Arabia execute 84 people last week, why do we interact with a government like this in anyway!!!!!!!!
More sportswashing, hello Newcastle United, Man City et al.
https://sqaf.club/newcastle-united-owners-richest-club-world/
Bit closer to home- if it smells like Russian money- it probably is. And Scotty and wifey recently sold Point Piper mansion for 40 mil. https://www.google.com.au/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/sport/soccer/australian-o...
Also, the Saudi government butchered journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside their own consulate in Turkey.
Large organisational bodies in surfing seem to have zero fucking common sense.
How do you organise a mass execution of 81 people?? Just thinking about the logistics makes you feel sick. And how can an organisation like the ISA feel "excited" about welcoming a country that still behaves like this. All this talk about social change to boost alternative industries like tourism, etc for when the oil runs out. Social change my arse. They have had ample time to adjust their social practices over the last few centuries yet they still carry on like it's the 10th Century. Fossil fuels and religion - still shaping our world.
garyg1412. Loved that last sentence, “fossil fuel and religion still shaping the world”, so true.
Saudi National Flag has swords on it, say no more.
ISA should have a long hard think about accepting SA into its organisation.
Remember Mark Babic and Chop Chop Square ?
https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/former-socceroo-mark-babic-on-sa...
Total sports washing..............execute 81 people in one day by beheading them.
Better surf in Yemen than Saudi.
Yemen surf. Socotra Archipelago of islands. Surf and a bizarre looking landscape with unusual flora and fauna. Memory tells me there was a write up about Yemeni surf way back in Tracks, Surfing World or some other publication. I’m sure someone would remember that article.
This is a fascinating read.
https://golfweek.usatoday.com/2022/03/20/eamon-lynch-greg-norman-saudi-g...
Good read Ben, thanks. Watch this space hey !!!
Having lived and worked in both Saudi and Yemen (Socotra) as part of biodiversity projects in the 1990s, I can vouch for the lack of surf in the former and occasional waves in the latter, albeit v. difficult to access back then. I think I may have been the first to surf those islands, well before that article came out at least. It may have become a wind- and kite-surfing destination subsequently ... But as to Saudi, it has massive oil reserves and presumably could create a Slater wave or 10 'on steroids' if they so desired. So the WSL may be heading there in the years ahead, an integral part of their wave-pool circuit! Can't wait (joking). Along with colleagues, I tried, as others had done before me, to get large sections of the Saudi Red Sea coast set aside as marine protected areas. Sadly two of the most spectacular and diverse regions are presently being turned into a major tourism hub and city for the very well-heeled. The Socotra project, which employed many locals and sought their input / support, did succeed, at the time, with a Yemeni presidential decree establishing the land and marine zoning plan in 2000. But times have changed there, initially with inappropriate road construction and a large airport for tourism ventures, more recently with intervention by UAE, ostensibly initially in providing aid following two highly unusual cyclones and more recently in buying up coastal property, including key turtle nesting beaches, for hotels, at some future time ... In Yemen more generally, one of the world's worst humanitarian crises continuing to unfold, with a war ongoing, which of course brings us back to Saudi.
Lindo. Thanks for all that follow up information, interesting stuff. Again, the world of all things biological, of which I adore, being totally fucked up by those who have no idea or interest in ecosystems etc. That whole Arabian peninsula is a mess, extractive industries, poor treatment of people in incredibly poor and wealthy nations and so on.
Wahhabism
Surf
League
Synergy
Thanks AlfredWallace, for sure it's a mess. Tangentially on ecosystem destruction, you may be aware of the international campaign to have a 5th crime included on the Rome Statute of the International Crim. Court - that of ecocide. It was proposed for inclusion back in the 1990s in early drafts of the Rome Statute, but was dumped after pressure from UK, Netherlands and France. What do they have in common? Three of the 7 sisters of the intl. fossil fuel cartel for a start. It's a long shot and the ICC has struggled to keep pace with the crimes it already has to deal with but there's growing momentum: www.stopecocide.earth
Could the positive effect surfing will have on the women of Saudi be that they don’t get bashed, harassed and generally treated like shit while their husbands duck out to a WSL event to perve at the women?