Media Scum Invading Us

[guest]

Hi!! I'm Pat Doyle(and I'm a piece of shi8t) and I want to hear bad stories about your sport so I can sell them to FOX's "when sports go wrong" show. I just want to make money and don't care how this hurts your interests, after all in a free speech country, I am willing to say whatever I have to to make money, no matter who I hurt. HEY PAT--GO AWAY!!!!

[guest]

I'm a cool producer and was wondering if any BASERs want to humiliate themselves for my crappy little discussion so I can get ratings. I can't find a better story because I'm not a very good producer. Please let me know if you want to give your sport a worse image. Pat Dorkle
sorry mick, I hate flaming on this board, but this guy needs it. Maybe he will get the point??

[guest]

A couple of interesting things I've discovered.

1) The address that Pat Doyle posted on the board "pat@uk.now.com" is not valid. I sent him a response to his post that was returned.

2) now.com does have a feedback email address. It is "general@pcg-group.com". I sent this address an identical email.

Basically, my email just requested that they refrain from spamming all the threads on the board, and that they come back and clean up their mess.

I recommend that anyone who feels strongly about this direct their flaming to the above address, where they'll have to read it, rather than filling our board with it, where we'll have to read it and they can ignore it.

--Tom Aiello

[guest]

For all of those concerned, I have contacted Pat at the address pdoyle@uk.now.com
He has apologized, if that counts any. Any other flames/comments can go to the address as it is a working address.

[guest]

To those concerned,

below is a copy of the e mail i sent to Mick Knutson apologising for the recent spamming incident:

Dear Mick,
I realise that this may be arriving too late but please accept my sincere apologies for the recent 'spamming' of your web site. This occured due to a break down in communication in our production office. Basically a researcher was asked to place my 'Calling all BASE jumpers' notice on numerous BASE sites and went about his task with rather too much vigour.

Too make matters worse the BASE Board 'worst experience' strand was targetted as it gave direct access to BASE jumpers e mail addresses. This insensitive act was genuinely unintentional but has caused particular offense to several BASE jumpers. In an attempt to make amends i am in the process of writing an apology to all of them.

The point of the posting was to generate discussion on the subject of BASE and to give jumpers a new forum for expression. It was not intended to exploit or show BASE jumping in a bad light.

Of course it would be hypocritical to say that the sport does not make excellent material for television. However, we already have footage of succesful BASE jumping in our archive and have no intention of going out to film jumps in the hope of capturing a disaster on tape.

The BASE community seem to have a fairly low opinion of the media and another jumper has written me a detailed account of why this may well be justified. However, not all reporters are out to exploit. The project we are hoping to put together may do the opposite as we hope to include information on safe jumping, BASE ethics and BASE jumper's struggle to legalise their sport.

Best wishes,
Pat Doyle.


I hope this helps to clear things up and i await further comment.

In the mean time, i must say i find Merlin's comments to be ill advised.

The decision to position our request for informantion on the BASE board was a poor one but the motives were sincere. The wording of the document was courteous and at no time were BASE jumpers at risk of being humiliated. We were merely trying to open a forum for discussion and provide BASE jumpers with the opportunity to tell their story as they want it to be told.

Think about it.
BASE jumping is a fascinating subject and the public are anxious to know more about it. Therefore producers are going to make shows about it - whether you like it or not!
Is it not better that you have a say in how those programmes are made?

Furthermore, BASE jumpers in the USA are in the process of lobbying government in a attempt to legalise their activitys. To be successful this will require a swing in public opinion. How do you propose to achieve this without using the mass media? Learn to play the game my freind. Learn to use us media scum to your advantage.

[guest]

Mr. Doyle,

You are eloquent, (thanks for that) and you said, "The project we are hoping to put together may do the opposite as we hope to include information on safe jumping, BASE ethics and BASE jumper's struggle to legalize their sport."

Okay, but . . . on this "struggle" thing.

There is no struggle.
There never was no struggle.
There will never be no struggle.

(Well, there goes the TV show . . .)

BASE jumpers (these days) who are pushing for legalization of BASE jumping are using the sport as you want to Mr. Doyle, to boost themselves and maybe turn a buck or two. If that’s not true of you, I’m calling you a fibber right here and now, and also a lousy TV producer to boot!

Legalization and access are both non-issues in BASE jumping. BASE jumping is and always has been legal except for a few (half dozen) sites that are posted specifically against BASE jumping. And there is access everywhere you look. (It’s just not access for fifty jumpers at a time, but that’s okay because, hello, it’s not skydiving).

Access, in the end, may be "meant" to be found, and not handed out.

Real BASE jumpers are rebels more than freedom fighters. The good ones seek neither publicity, permission or support. They are the last cowboys of aviation and when gone this sport will be just another pastime, like golf and bowling because the new people will soon forget. They will forget what real freedom is. (It’s not being competitor number whatever at Moab or being able to legally jump in a National Park). They will forget when courageous people died in pursuit of knowledge, rather then today’s trend of dying from ignorance of knowledge.

As for promoting "safe" BASE jumping, well, I'm gonna just let that dangle out there like the big mottza ball it is . . .

Mr. Doyle,

We don’t have a real handle on this sport yet. No one does and maybe we never will. I often wonder just how much there is to know. But I do know this sir, and I speak for the hundreds that have never heard of this BASE Board and also for another group that can’t reply to you, the forty five of us who are dead, for them I say to you, sir, how dare you?

How dare you tell us what to think, say or do.

How dare you . . .

Nick_BR

[guest]

>Real BASE jumpers are rebels more
>than freedom fighters. The good
>ones seek neither publicity, permission
>or support. They are the
>last cowboys of aviation and
>when gone this sport will
>be just another pastime, like
>golf and bowling.

I believe that's the best nugget I've heard.

Thanks Nick.

--Tom Aiello

[guest]

"Legalization and access are both non-issues in BASE jumping." --Nick_BR

Gee, now you're thinking Nick.

[guest]

Nick,call me old school but that was the coolest and most truthful posting I have ever seen on this site. Andy West.

[guest]

I'm confused.

If there is no struggle to legalise BASE jumping then why does Fred Morelli's strand on this site urge jumpers to lobby congress on the issue?

As for BASE jumping not being illegal - a representative at Yosemite National Park has informed me that the opposite is true. He tells me that the authorities make use of an arcane law (originally passed to prevent the illegal air delivery of materials to miners) to prosecute BASE jumpers.

What is a mottza ball? Somthing unpleasant i imagine.

[imported_mknutson]

1. BASE Jumping is only outlawed in National parks!

2. Aerial Delivery is a permitable activity but never issues permits! So it is NOT illegal!

3. Trespassing is illegal NOT base jumping.

4. If you are not trespassing, and/or have a permit, BASE jumping is totally OK!

5. Ask the park service why permits are never issued?

6. Ask the NPS why it costs $500.00 to discharge fire arms in a park and kill squirels, yet it is $5,000.00 to jump off a rock?
--
Thanks

Mick Knutson
BLiNC Magazine

"Everything you ever wanted to know about BASE Jumping, but didn't know who to ask."
--

[guest]

Hello Pat,

My point is directed at the statement you made concerning "Safe" BASE jumping. There's no such thing as safe BASE jumping. That's something you assumed. When that assumption is published and the inevitable happens we look like the losers.

And if ever there is a foolproof way to BASE jump it won't be BASE jumping anymore. Get it? It's the challenge of having it all come out right in the end.

On the access and legalization issues here's why you may be confused. There are all kinds of issues that need attention in BASE jumping. The most important ones are the safety issues. All the access in the world is useless when you're dead.

In the beginnings of modern BASE jumping (in this country) the fatality rate seemed a steady two, sometimes three per year. This is in a time before the internet, before the CJAA, before anybody really knew what they were doing. And we accepted that number because we knew we were pioneering something and a price would have to be extracted.

It was also the Jolly Roger era of BASE jumping. We were Pirates of the Sky and we revealed in that fact. But then a funny thing happened. We grew up.

We starting raising families and careers and found the truth of it. We really "are" just sportsman. And BASE jumping really "is" just a sport.

Here's another assumption you made. Not all BASE jumpers are that concerned with the legalization of BASE jumping. There are many reasons for this, some say it will alter forever the very nature of the sport (screwing up a good thing seems something we humans are especially good at) others think it's a non-issue because it simply doesn’t stop them from jumping.

Most of BASE jumping's problems center around the fact that some people want to BASE jump in the light (access and legalization) and some want to BASE jump in the dark (we just keep doing what we are doing).

However, even that is a non-issue as there are legal jumps throughout Europe (If not the entire planet) and I personally know people who have hundreds of BASE jump to their credit and none of them were illegal.

Now, here's a little surprise. I'm as pro BASE as they come, but here's how I feel about access in national parks. If they give it to us, fine. If they don't, that's fine too.

That sounds flippant but here's my reasons. If they say yes to us, what's the next fellow going to ask for and so on, and so on. If you believe in the value of National Park system, and realize the world doesn’t revolve around you personally, then there you go. Besides, anytime I want to jump in the park I can and will because I'm a BASE jumper . . .

Our fear of you as the "evil media" comes from the fact that you don't want to pay anything to get our story. So what happens is you won't interview a experienced BASE jumper with something to say, you'll wind up with a yahoo with 10 BASE jumps who will do it for nothing just so his mom back in New Jersey sees him on the tube. He'll give you what you want (DEATH & ADRENILIN) and we'll look like death wish idiots and it happens over and over and over . . .

(Don't give us the line, "it's news and we don't pay for news." If you make money we make money).

There are many of us who are tired of trying to convince anyone that what we do is alright. We already have our hands full keeping the hordes who want to jump from killing themselves so frankly, I don’t care what the man in the street thinks.

We can afford to say that because it leads to the very essence of the sport. Unlike skydiving where we depend on aircraft and airports we need neither. We need no one’s permission or support. One boy, one rig, one object, that's all there is to it.

No one can ever stop us.

Ever.

Unless we stop ourselves.

(Listening Mick)?

Nick_BR

[guest]

Nick,

You're on a roll and I'm 100 percent with you on this. Go for it !

Earl