蓝波

indy

A few days ago I let @kailightner borrow my instagram for the day to announce the launch of @climbing4change - his new nonprofit focused on making climbing and the outdoors more inclusive. There were tons of half baked comments basically attacking the idea that racial disparities exist in the outdoors and attacking Kai for trying to make a difference.
I have a few things to say:
Firstly, why would anyone ever attack someone’s attempt to do something positive in the world. Kai is literally a world champion climber and a college student and he’s willing to spend some of his precious time to try to make a positive change in the world - even if you disagree with him on specifics you can at least celebrate someone stepping up and acting to improve their community. Human society has a lot of room for improvement - none of us should ever attack anyone’s attempt to make it better…
Also, to those arguing that the outdoors are a great equalizer and that all American’s have equal access to nature: that’s just not true.
These pics are from a fun little paddling adventure I did on Lake Tahoe this morning (paddled from South Lake to Emerald Bay). It required a board, access to a launch beach, a ride home (and the fee to access the public beach where I took out). So yes, the lake is technically open to all, but there are many costs associated with outdoor recreation that we often overlook and that preclude some folks from participating. Not to mention the bigger, societal factors that disproportionately keep communities of color away from “nature”, the most obvious of which might be the violent displacement of indigenous communities that inhabited most of our now-National Parks.

All this to say, I celebrate Kai making an effort to improve his community in a small way. So all you haters can shove it…

indy