interesting Mass free soloing video

[tazz]

Not sure if this has been posted before. crazy folks in Siberia

Edited July 23, 2007 by tazz

[kevbone]

Very interesting.

[catbirdseat]

Remember there is stupidity in numbers.

[spicoli11]

The downclimbing head first looks fun

[wayne]

Americans are just sissies, thats all

[TREETOAD]

They look like vampires

[EWolfe]

One person's floor is another's ceiling.

 

:ooo:

 

 

[Bug]

I wonder what they would think about a few bolts.

[Mark_Husbands]

I assumed from the title that this was free soloing in Massachusetts.

[dmuja]

I first heard about this a few years ago. When our friends free solo their "badass", when these Russians do it, climbing harder free solo then most of us do roped (even their kids) then theyre "stupid". Low and behold, the earth after all, is not flat, the sun does not revolve around it, and America is not the center of the badass climbing universe.

[catbirdseat]

The decision to free solo is and should remain a personal and individual one. It should be well-considered and free from peer pressure. In this Russian community peer pressure and the need to conform plays a huge role. There are people on those rocks that simply don't belong there.

[dmuja]

Well CBS can you really say that their version of "personal individual" decision making is inferior to yours or mine? Acceptable risk is certainly as culturally subjective (and peer influenced) as anything else - id say even in America. Different cultures view things like risk, life and death differently. Are you saying that you have better decision making skills than they have? Based on ... your own set of values? When 12 year old Vladimir passes me up free soloing a 5.12 ( I heard they climb that hard on occasion) while Im freaking out on my 5.9 who am I to criticize?

 

The only objective thing happening here is the actual climbing. On those terms (the "actual climbing") theres nothing to debate, wayne is right (even if his comment was meant as a joke).

[wfinley]

Acceptable risk is certainly as culturally subjective (and peer influenced) as anything else - id say even in America....The only objective thing happening here is the actual climbing.

Sorry; but the pan of the wall of plaques commemorating the dead kind of negates this argument. Would you say the same thing about about kids driving 4-wheelers while swilling beers? Plenty of American youth die doing stupid things and we are quick to pass judgment (I imagine you are too) -- why should we not criticize climbing when it is so obvious that peer pressure plays a huge role in this decision?

 

It's very obvious from the video that in this case many of the accidents are not due to individual choice. As romantic as it sounds to grow up in a community where free soloing is looked upon as an 'ethic' in the end dying while free soloing a route you've been pressured onto is not much different than dying while drunk driving after hanging out at a party with your buds.

 

 

[dmuja]

SUBJECTIVE.

 

Our own culture has embraced death by crispy cream, and the handgun as an ethic.

 

And people don't die while roped? Or via ferratta? Or in car accidents? We accept (subjectively) certain things even though they could be considered "risky behavior" Fuck. how many houses do we burn down each 4th of July? How many kids get hands blown apart etc..

[wfinley]

That's ridiculous. Free soloing with 100 of your closest friends is no different that playing Russian roulette at a keg party. You glorify the activity because it's 'CLIMBING' whereas you are quick to associate obesity with stupidity.

 

Russian youth suffer the second highest (after Lithuania) suicide rate on the planet; perhaps the willingness to die while free soling is better than a gun to the head but I don't see much difference. Either way you're dead.

[XXX]

What a waste. that has got to be the stupidest Sh@# I have ever seen in my life. Hanging out on a 400 foot cliff is not comparable to eating donuts!

[wfinley]

Hanging out on a 400 foot cliff is not comparable to eating donuts!

 

 

It's more like eating a Deep Friend Twinkie.

[dmuja]

On the point of "peer pressure" how can you say that "our" free soloers are free from it, but thiers are not? One way or another, its about some aspect of ego gratification and ego is built to some extent by our upbringing and culture and certainly influenced by our peers especially. A sociologist looking at Reardens (the late "free soloist") web site would easily see a cultural influence and a sense of trying to impress someone - maybe his peers especially.

 

I just think if its their culture (there is another one around Thailand I believe that climbs cliffs for bird eggs or something) we shouldn't be so quick to judge because our judgement is formed within a subjective context.

[dmuja]

I think mostly it just upsets some of us to think of being upstaged by a free soloist in a leisure suit and penny loafers.

[wfinley]

Your Thailand analogy doesn't fit because there is a purpose associated with the climbing; it's a trade that has deep roots and a strong economic market. Most of those guys would die to have a desk job making the money you and I make. Climbing is different in that for the majority of people there is no inherent purpose aside from the act of climbing.

 

Likewise the key difference between Rearden and the kids in this movie is that Rearden was an individual who made a personal decision to free solo. True ego plays a part in climbing - but I think that you can see a distinct difference between accomplished free soloers and the kids in this movie.

 

I am not upset when i see an accomplished climber free solo a route. What struck me was the casual indifference this group seemed to have in relation to deaths due to this pursuit.

[wfinley]

PS... check out these pix: http://www.stolby.ru/eng/History.asp

[ken4ord]

The decision to free solo is and should remain a personal and individual one. It should be well-considered and free from peer pressure. In this Russian community peer pressure and the need to conform plays a huge role. There are people on those rocks that simply don't belong there.

 

STFU!!! The way they climb is climbing to them. They would probably look at you on the rock think you are setting up the equivalent of a via feratta. I admire their tradition, scary as hell and very bold, most likely I wouldn't be a climber if I lived there.

 

Your above statement makes me think you simply do not belong climbing anywhere.

[ken4ord]

Your Thailand analogy doesn't fit because there is a purpose associated with the climbing; it's a trade that has deep roots and a strong economic market. Most of those guys would die to have a desk job making the money you and I make. Climbing is different in that for the majority of people there is no inherent purpose aside from the act of climbing.

 

So essentially because there is no economic purpose it should not be regarded as a purposeful activity despite the fact it has deep roots? Now that is stupid. I don't know about you, but climbing feeds my soul, which in my mind is worth more than any desk monkey job and cash in hand.

 

Likewise the key difference between Rearden and the kids in this movie is that Rearden was an individual who made a personal decision to free solo. True ego plays a part in climbing - but I think that you can see a distinct difference between accomplished free soloers and the kids in this movie.

 

I didn't see what I thought of kids taking uneducated and uncalculated risks. Yeah I wouldn't climb the same way they are though some of the stuff looked fun. What I saw in the footage, looked to be more of an acrobatic and playful style of climbing. Their decision free solo is not like ours where we have the choice to free-solo or not free-solo climb. I think from their perspective it comes don to you climb or don't climb. Like they said in the film clip, they have heard of people who climb using ropes and equipment, but climbing and what they know of climbing is what we call free-soloing.

 

I am not upset when i see an accomplished climber free solo a route. What struck me was the casual indifference this group seemed to have in relation to deaths due to this pursuit.

 

So you think watching a few minute video clip you can infer that this group of climber has a indifference to life? Even if I was spend a year there with these people I probably wouldn't understand their tradition of climbing. And, yeah my upbring might lead me to believe they are indifferent to life, but then I would have to say the same for a lot of other risky activities out there, including accomplished climbers free-soloing a route. I am not going to judge people like that, if I don't like it or think it is risky, I just won't do it, I don't need to cast judgement like that. I am sure there is plenty of people who think climbing in general is just plain stupid risky activity, I don't necessarily appreciate their armchair assesment of something that brings me great joy.

 

 

 

BTW- thanks for the link.

 

[lizard_brain]

So - Who here excactly is the final authority on what climbing is supposed to be for everyone?

[ken4ord]

Nobody, that what I am trying to say. Actually I take that back you are the final authority for yourself.