The weather is crap today. It's raining like Hell and the wind is blowing like a bus load of Qxxxr'x (self edit). So I am not jumping today. Just sitting hear smoking a big fatty. So bear with me on thought process hear,I can't remember if this has already been talked about.

People sometimes use the term -The sport of Base jumping- Can you call BASE jumping a sport ?

The rough definition of a sport is, A specific activity involving physical exercise and a set body of rules.
Base jumping can involve physical exercise.
There have been a handful of competitions in the past ( i.e.,) IPBC or MIXSA
Having organized competitions is a good argument to calling it a sport. So then are a lot of us out there doing a jump tonight, athletes in training ?

>Do we have a set, Body of Rules ? Hard rules on paper how to play our Sport ? ( i.e.,) Soccer, Volleyball .
>Or is it just an extreme stunt practiced (most of the time skillfully) over and over again by a small group of people in the world ?

Skydiving is called a sport but it at least has a huge paying body of members. Written tests and licensing. Training method and BSR's ( basic safety rules) on paper. Also an elected body of member representation,- national and regional officers.
To say the least -A HUGE effort to pull that off.- for a much larger group of people.
>In the beginning, Civilian Skydiving was just as raw as BASE.

The trend I see that is constantly being pushed forward, (especially on the public BASE forums), is the attempt to improve the Publics Perception of BASE and our actions, which on the large part at least here in the U.S. is illegal.

-Questions-
1. Do you Honestly think the public will ever see the activity of jumping off fixed objects with a Parachute as Acceptable social behavior ? Is there even a chance ?
2. Can we Market BASE as a Sport to try to get it more socially accepted.
3. Do you think BASE is a sport ?
4. Do you want it to be a sport ?
5. Is the best way to keep BASE underground ? At best loosely organized, with good communication (i.e.,) BASE Board.or DZ.

...Ray Losli...