Violence or Respect? Surfer Slaps Surfer and Sends Him in on Oahu's West Side

Jade Eckardt
·2 min read
247

Physical violence.

It's something people are taught to avoid in life. They're told to turn the other cheek, keep hands to themselves, and to be nice.

But somehow, violence is kind of, sort of, acceptable in the world of surfing if someone breaks a cardinal rule. But is hitting someone over a surfing faux pas a matter of teaching respect or just plain old violence?

In the clip above posted by Hawaii News Report (HNN), one surfer slaps another and sends him in.

One can only assume that the slapee committed a surfing offense like dropping in on the slapper, getting in his way, or talking to his girlfriend.

But maybe, just maybe, he did nothing wrong. No one knows.

The post is captioned:

"Posting this video is not to hurt anyone’s feelings but to ask what you think and is this ok to treat visitors like this? I don’t know what happened before the slap.

"I Posted on my story this video and there was a mixed reaction. Most people said this is not Pono but some said it was ok to do… obviously this person who was slapped was not from here but is it ok to slap him if he did get in your way?

"A lot of people said what if local people traveled to mainland and the locals at those places we visit slapped us and treated us like this? When u travel to the mainland do people welcome you or do they mistreat you? Let us know in the comments"

The comments were divided. Some say the slap is okay, others said it's no.

To keep the conversation going, HNN later posted the surf video clip below with some of surfing's elite like Kelly slater, Rob Machado, Kalani Robb, and Sunny Garcia addressing the topic.

It's captioned:

"Some insight into surfing from the Pro’s. From the earlier post with the guy getting slapped at tracks. @sunnygarcia @kellyslater @kalanirobb"

The conversation kept going strong in the comments. Check them out.

But Kalani Robb made his opinion very clear:

"Hawaii and its protectors demand respect"

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