Board, Mast, Sail... Boom!

“A wet and windy weekend”. Possibly the most familiar yet groan-inducing phrase known to the British population having been subjected to a lifetime of pessimistic weather forecasts... But what if it was said with a smile? Or, more specifically, the smile of a windsurfer?

If you’re unfamiliar with the concept of windsurfing, it is ultimately a hybrid of surfing and sailing that challenges you to negotiate coastal winds with a sail attached to what resembles a large surfboard underfoot. It is the perfect combination of technique and tenacity, enabling you to take on and convert Mother Nature’s wind-power into a fuel that feeds your very own adrenaline fix. So how do you get started?

The equipment is fairly straight forward; consisting of a board, mast, sail and boom. The board supports the mast, to which you attach the sail, with a boom running across the middle allowing you to hold on to the sail for stability and direction. You then position the sail in relation to the direction of the wind, allowing the gust to hit the sail’s large surface area and power the board along the surface of the water. In doing so, you are effectively combining and testing your delicacy of balance, grasp of wind dynamics, and physical strength in grappling with the wind. And what a battle it can be... In tandem with the speed generated, the prime thrill of windsurfing is the opportunity to wrestle against the wind as a raw force of nature, actively challenging it to further energise your sail’s capacity for velocity. Some pros take this contest to its extremities, progressing to the standard of wave-surfing, speed-swivelling and performing big air jumps that defy all of the gravity laws you’d have thought a board & sail couldn’t possibly breach. Isaac would have been impressed...

So what else do you get from this windsurfing business? Good health and good vibes to name but two. The sport provides you with a full body workout; thoroughly conditioning your legs, back, arms and shoulders whilst you lift, hold and spin the sail according to the conditions (oh and be prepared for some quality swimming time whilst you’re learning). However, you’ll be happy to hear that the adrenaline generated more than compensates for any exerted effort, with the sea air and endorphins combining to create an additive-free high without the hangover. And all of this comes at a minimal cost to the natural environment... Having discounted the initial equipment manufacture and travel fuel to your local beach, windsurfing is an eco-friendly and sustainable sport with zero dependence upon fossil fuels or other parties in contrast to other water-sports such as water-skiing or wakeboarding.

As a result, windsurfing is now a well-renowned extreme sport worldwide, and such is its popularity that there are now specific holiday resorts and inclusive packages aimed at fanatics willing to travel in search of the winds that dwell over warm waters. It has even inspired a new derivative of itself, effectively growing to become big brother of the newborn phenomenon that is kite-surfing, where you capture the wind’s energy via a parachute whilst your feet are strapped into a mini surfboard. Oh and I should mention that you can windsurf on land should you make the perfectly rational decision of strapping your sail onto a skateboard or kart. The possibilities are endless...

So check the forecast... Wet and windy this weekend? Turn off the TV, get down to the beach and you can be the one smiling come Monday morning.

Dan Bowen.

A Society's Surrender to Stimulus

What the f#!k has happened to TV and the media?!

Got your attention? Good. You’re stimulated. You’re jolted. You’re still reading... Such is the make-up of our contemporary mass-media conditioned society, this is simply an exaggerated example of a common tactic deployed to fix your attention. However our senses are now so overloaded by such stimulatory poking and probing that we no longer see it as an invasion of our privacy and balanced judgement.

A stimulus is defined as “an action, influence or agency that produces a response in a living organism”, whilst to stimulate refers to anything that “incites, instigates or excites towards increased action”. Therefore, a stimulant is effectively engineering a pre-meditated reaction within us in order to capture and sustain our attention upon the rousing source. Modern media and marketing is specifically geared towards unleashing as many of these stimulants as possible in the direction of potential consumers – i.e. you and I - in order to grip our attention and instigate interest in what they have to offer. These stimulants will appear in many different mediums; mainly in television, films and mass media, but also increasingly so in radio, music, games consoles and static advertisements. This is achieved by the inclusion of distinctive sounds, flashing visuals, arresting buzzwords, catchy sales slogans, and sensationalism of controversy, sometimes all incorporated into a single source! Think about it... How often have your eyes and ears been subjected to such stimulus today?

Just consider television for a moment... We now live in era of round-the-clock news channels, a cult-like following of soaps, and a plethora of ‘reality tv’ shows each striving for our attention with their maxed-out inclusion of emotional triggers and stimulants. The 24 hour news channels throw up and regurgitate sensationalist news stories in the form of easily digestible soundbites, carefully condensed into quick-read summaries as to fit into our oh-so-hectic lifestyles. Flick the channel over and we are at the mercy of soaps and reality tv shows that strive to include as many controversial and provocative scenes - ranging from sex & drugs to violence & conflict - as possible into their pre-watershed slots. And, of course, in the scheduled breaks between these programmes, we are subjected to the shameless deluge of slogans, celebrity endorsements and flashy animations that we call adverts in which we are relentlessly encouraged to Buy, Buy, Buy. But whilst you could argue that all of this simply adds up to provide us with absorbing entertainment, ‘stimulating media’ should not always be considered to be a positive description as is commonly perceived...

The real issue lies with the way in which these stimulants are deployed in order to deter us from being distracted by our environment, effectively slapping our faces over and over again just in case we lose focus and take our eyes off the ‘prize’. It is the concept of focus that cements the reciprocal nature of our interaction with modern media, whereby less stimulation would result in reduced viewer focus ultimately leading to poor ratings and low viewing figures. Therefore, tv executives and marketers are eager to fit metaphorical matchsticks between our eyelids by constantly jolting us without a moment’s respite to make judgements upon the quality of the show itself. So what’s the problem here? If this is a virus, what are the symptoms?

The result is that we’re walking around constantly aroused (no laughing at the back...) by our surroundings, with little or no time to digest explosive animations before we are bombarded by the next. This is hitting the younger generation the hardest; as newspapers and books are increasingly judged as boring substitutes for online or televised media, advertisement slogans predominate over parents’ preachings, and iPods are viewed as a welcome buffer for that most uncomfortable of natural silences that arise when in the untainted outdoors. And if you look hard enough, the effects are there for all to see... An increase in nervous energy, anxiousness, fidgeting and restlessness is evident within us all once that stimulation is momentarily taken away, leaving us with no visual or verbal stimulant to hold our focus. Just try asking a teenager to sit still between their marathon Xbox sessions. Furthermore, this discreet form of conditioning seems to have diminished our attention-spans, levels of concentration and focus to the point where Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is now perceived as a common ‘condition’ amongst children in contemporary society. It could also prove to be overpowering for those individuals of an impulsive disposition, who are more vulnerable than most to marketing’s relentless drive in encouraging consumption of their promoted products.

Our underlying relationship with this form of bombardment can therefore be likened to that of the respiratory process... However, as much as we are constantly inhaling all of these stimulatory media, what is being exhaled? All those sales slogans, emotional triggers, violent movie scenes and games console binges... where does it all go? With the only tangible output being that of consumption in response to mass marketing and sales advertisements, what happens to the television & media intake? It all seems to be bottling up inside of us, discreetly fizzing up nervous energy and restlessness until we sit up and take notice of just how badly this can spill over when the cap is lifted. But, what match are we for the media people in trying to avert the gaze of the millions from their television sets...

Yup, those same media people who claim the media doesn't influence people, but are perfectly willing to sell you advertising time.