Let's say skateboarding becomes an Olympic event (which will probably eventually happen due to the authority of certain people... people with a lot more pull than anyone reading or typing this). So now what? We need a governing body to represent our "discipline," but what happens when non skaters with purely industrial ties to the skate industry wind up being the chairmen, if not representatives of skateboarding to the world? I'm all for pro skaters doing something to gain more exposure... and I know many pros are OK with the potential of being in the Olympics one day. I don't disrespect them, but I would argue that with the inclusion and eventual mainstay of skateboarding on such a front, it will just continue to do what every other multi million dollar skate contest campaign seems to do: It spreads the myth that skateboarding is all about competition, and that's wrong. It perpetuates a new mindset in skateboarding... the kind of mindset that has children making sponsor me tapes the day after they learn how to kickflip. On top of the little stuff, I don't think it's too conspiratorial to consider the idea that new monopolies will be built around skateboarding. Example: What if the company that builds the official skateparks and ramps (or whatever genre of skating they have to construct for) winds up being a really shitty company? What happens when this same shitty company uses it's Olympic credentials into building your skatepark instead of a solid, skater owned and operated company like Dreamland or Team Pain? Does skateboarding need to be any more recognized than it already is? We're all over cable (shit, even I've been on cable), commercials, print, online, and any other medium you can think of. Is skating any more legal? Are we going to effectively codify skateboarding, or at least make steps in that direction? What about that eery thing that some parents do (globally) when they try to project their own failures onto their kids? Is it possible that children that wouldn't normally be into skating, or at least just in it for fun, might be forced to skate in hopes that fame and fortune come to the nation in question? That shit already happens inside of the worlds of sports that people don't even give a shit about. What I mean to say is that there may be ramifications to this that we have yet to think of. Surely some positives, but what could be the cost of the negatives? As always, this is just an opinion from a random skater in a city you've probably never been to. And to be clear, this site isn't addressing a "what if" situation, rather, a "when will this occur?" Keep skating hard, Neal Boyd (a mid 30's skater in Louisiana that really does get off the computer to play skateboarding, pinkie promise)

If you want it, do nothing. If not, sign the petition or just get online and talk shit about it.


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