“Rip Curl could not have made their contempt for women clearer.”
Yesterday’s story about Rip Curl and its celebration of the wildly inspirational and aspirational Sasha Jane Lowerson quickly exploded into Bud Light-esque flames after anti-trans-women-in-sport activist Riley Gaines slammed Rip Curl as “crazzzyyyy”.
“You mean to tell me that Rip Curl dropped Bethany Hamilton for opposing men surfing in the women’s league then picked up male surfer who surfs in the women’s league as a women’s ambassador?”
Rip Curl joined two other Australian swimsuit brands in a pivot to the queer market describing their ambassador as, “West Australian waterwoman who loves the freedom found in surfing, disconnecting from the mainstream, and the feeling of dancing on constantly changing waves… It’s a state of mind, always being ready to try something new, curious to seek out knowledge and learn the rules – and break them.”
Comments were quickly disabled on the post (although it was liked almost two thousand times) following calls from surf fans to boycott Rip Curl, which was bought by camping giant Kathmandu for 350 mill four years ago.
A small sample of the 2200 replies to Riley Gaines’ post on X.
6 months from now: Rip Curl announces that it is laying off half of its staff..
How are the advertising team not getting fired for this , how many companies have been damaged and they still use the larping blokes in their campaigns. I thought they had to know trends , not watching hard enough
They could not have made their contempt for women clearer.
Now, the pro skateboarder Taylor Silverman has joined the chorus calling for a boycott of Rip Curl.
Silverman hit the headlines when she lost a skateboarding contest to a transgender woman. She argued that allowing transgender women to compete against biological females in sports is unfair due to potential physical advantages. Silverman’s stance has been met with both support and opposition, with some people applauding her for standing up for women’s rights and others criticizing her for being transphobic.
Taylor Silverman was unsparing in her criticism writing,
“According to Rip Curl this man is a ‘waterwoman’…reality is he’s just a mentally ill man making a complete mockery of actual women and “The “community” is so supportive that Rip Curl had to disable the comments!”
According to @ripcurl this man is a “waterwoman”…reality is he’s just a mentally ill man making a complete mockery of actual women. pic.twitter.com/XeCSeLKyPF
— Taylor Silverman (@tmsilverman) January 26, 2024
All pretty interesting from a biz point of view.
Rip Curl knows, or it should, that it’s going to piss off a significant percentage of your market but you do it anyway because, and I’m guessing the logic here, the wrong of not including trans gals, is greater than any fiscal loss down the track.
The question is, I suppose, how much is Kathmandu willing to lose to push the trans agenda?
And do you think that same agenda would be getting pushed if the company was still owned by Doug Warbrick and Brian Singer and Neil Ridgeway was at the tiller?
