Authenticity, a retrospective...

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Hi UKB types, Andy 'edge lord' Kirkpatrick here. For some reason, I've started getting activity posts from UKB, which have started to pop up at the same time as someone asked me to do a podcast on the subject of authenticity. The two things seem related, and although it might be more fitting to ask the question on UKC, the fact I'd get zapped in seconds for posting anything at all, I thought I'd ask the question here.

My authenticity question is, is authenticity a negative in the 21st century? Is it just an inability to conform, to give in to pressure or intimidation, to go along to get along, to adopt the views of your betters (like Andy Popp ; ), to agree, or just keep your mouth shut? Is it a noble thing and a virtue, or is it stupid, maybe even self-destructive (many creative people are self-destructive for a good reason, as it avoids that "second album" problem)?

I pretty much burnt up all my social capital in 2014 (for various reasons), lost my social tenure after going against my tribe (the majority of UK climbers are middle-class Labour voting professionals who work in the public sector or are public sector adjacent, while I was a Labour voting working class self-employed pleb, which pretty much makes you hard-Right in 2024). Maybe I was one of the first climbers to get cancelled (I had people writing to anyone I had any dealing with telling them I was deplorable, including sponsors, publishers, mag editors, and even the BMC in regards to funding to Jen Randell's film of Psychovertical), but I'm not complaining, it was trip!

Anyway, seeing as it's ten years later, and some of the stuff I talked about ten years ago, untouchable subjects, are now being discussed by your Labour leader and are mainstream, is authenticity worth the cost when, really, you can just conform - which is really an act of humiliation, but most people kind of get off on that - and just change with the times?
 
I dunno Andy. But 'authenticity' doesn't have to equal 'good person' - it's possible to be an 'authentic' asshole / 'authentic' idiot / etc.

You've chosen a life that requires you to attract attention to yourself to earn money. Are you really being 'authentic' portraying yourself the way you do in your self-publicity? Or is some of it knowingly provocative as a means to an end? Maybe you are. I don't know you to have any idea. But like most people I wouldn't be surprised if in private you aren't quite the same as your public persona. If you aren't, which is the authentic version?
 
Anyway, seeing as it's ten years later, and some of the stuff I talked about ten years ago, untouchable subjects, are now being discussed by your Labour leader and are mainstream, is authenticity worth the cost when, really, you can just conform - which is really an act of humiliation, but most people kind of get off on that - and just change with the times?

What subjects for people who haven’t followed your output? And I’d note there’s oceans between discussing a subject and voicing the same opinion on it!
 
I left the UK ten years ago, but looking in from the outside, it's comments like this and the people who make them: glib, complacent, and unreflective that have always kept you down.
Really?
Dude, get a grip.
(Pun intended).
You appear to have just written something that translates as “if you don’t agree with my ramblings, you are just a conformist sheep and by not agreeing you are cancelling me.”

Is that a fair summation?

The climbing world is full of all kinds of weird and wonderful people, from all kinds of backgrounds and social roots, this forum included.
If anything, you appear to be the most commercially motivated person to post here for as long as I can remember. Do you have a new book out.
PS. I’m pretty capitalist by local standards.
 
I left the UK ten years ago, but looking in from the outside, it's comments like this and the people who make them: glib, complacent, and unreflective that have always kept you down.
'kept you down,' lol. If that translates as 'intolerant of obvious crankery and conspiracism' then count me in.
 
I dunno Andy. But 'authenticity' doesn't have to equal 'good person' - it's possible to be an 'authentic' asshole / 'authentic' idiot / etc.

You've chosen a life that requires you to attract attention to yourself to earn money. Are you really being 'authentic' portraying yourself the way you do in your self-publicity? Or is some of it knowingly provocative as a means to an end? Maybe you are. I don't know you to have any idea. But like most people I wouldn't be surprised if in private you aren't quite the same as your public persona. If you aren't, which is the authentic version?
I think, in the end, real authenticity in the 21st century might be seeking anti-fame and anti-attention, losing all your followers and fans, rejecting the demand to be popular, making yourself into a brand, and to always be closing in all you do. Also, what would the world be like without idiots and assholes?
 
Really?
Dude, get a grip.
(Pun intended).
You appear to have just written something that translates as “if you don’t agree with my ramblings, you are just a conformist sheep and by not agreeing you are cancelling me.”

Is that a fair summation?

The climbing world is full of all kinds of weird and wonderful people, from all kinds of backgrounds and social roots, this forum included.
If anything, you appear to be the most commercially motivated person to post here for as long as I can remember. Do you have a new book out.
PS. I’m pretty capitalist by local standards.
No book out; I was just sitting in a coffee shop and was naive and wasteful enough to post something to see if I got something back, but it's just red meat.
 
What subjects for people who haven’t followed your output? And I’d note there’s oceans between discussing a subject and voicing the same opinion on it!
In a nutshell, circa 2014: the threat to Liberal values from Islamism (I'm the only islamophobe who moved to an Islamic country), and that ignoring the impact of mass immigration would lead to the rise of the far right in Europe, as it would the working classes who would do the heavy lifting of our luxury beliefs (they would revolt). I guess this would make me a "Daily Mail" reader in 2014, but less so now.
 
I'm genuinely curious, but do you have a reference for this?
(the majority of UK climbers are middle-class Labour voting professionals who work in the public sector or are public sector adjacent, while I was a Labour voting working class self-employed pleb, which pretty much makes you hard-Right in 2024).
and is it still the case nowadays, where in the UK "About 400,000 people climb at least twice a month, according to the British Mountaineering Council." [taken from https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj4vre2j4qqo]

I would have thought the political distribution of climbers would be similar to the general public nowadays, but perhaps not.
 
I'm genuinely curious, but do you have a reference for this?

and is it still the case nowadays, where in the UK "About 400,000 people climb at least twice a month, according to the British Mountaineering Council." [taken from https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj4vre2j4qqo]

I would have thought the political distribution of climbers would be similar to the general public nowadays, but perhaps not.
I suppose it’s possibly fair to say that climbing attracts a disproportionate number of University educated individuals. 3-4 years of relatively large amounts of free time, fairly simple to take a year out to travel and climb, active club scene, proximity in ages with your daily cohort etc etc. However, Uni isn’t the exclusively middle class thing it was thirty years ago.
 
I think, in the end, real authenticity in the 21st century might be seeking anti-fame and anti-attention, losing all your followers and fans, rejecting the demand to be popular, making yourself into a brand, and to always be closing in all you do. Also, what would the world be like without idiots and assholes?
Well you haven't closed a deal (book, show, merch) with me since around 2007 when I saw you live in a BANF film-fest, I thought your show was ok but not great enough to want to seek out any more of your creative output. You appear to have chosen to advertise yourself by being provocative.. maybe I'm too normie to be attracted to your edgey brand but there are endless talented climbers of typical intelligence producing content of 'derring-do, technical advice or achieving goals, who aren't trying to philosophise to their audience how lacking in critical thought they are. If your writing and other output on the topic of climbing was of high-enough quality it would sell itself, without needing to resort to the clownshow or the amateur philosophy. My 1990's copy of 'manual of modern rope techniques' by Nigel Shepherd was much loved and very useful, yet I don't recall the author needing to lecture me on political correctness. I think your appeal in this scene will always be limited. Stay authentic 🫡
 
I think that authenticity is something a lot of people crave and feel that they don't have but actually what they don't have is a perceived level of credibility from others, like their experience is by definition authentic, they had it, but is it seen as something to respect?

I think we have a real idea in this country that a middle class experience is inauthentic or somehow less powerful or relevant than a working class experience. To me that is largely a right wing peddled idea that "ordinary working people" care about X, Y and Z rather than whatever frilly shit you care about. That to me is a damaging narrative that the right loves to push, an anti-expert anti intellectual drive
 
In a nutshell, circa 2014: the threat to Liberal values from Islamism (I'm the only islamophobe who moved to an Islamic country), and that ignoring the impact of mass immigration would lead to the rise of the far right in Europe, as it would the working classes who would do the heavy lifting of our luxury beliefs (they would revolt). I guess this would make me a "Daily Mail" reader in 2014, but less so now.
Nothing particularly controversial about that - unless you were careless or deliberately inflammatory about how you expressed this.
I missed it all at the time. Sounds interesting.

Authenticity is only a negative if someone talks about it publicly - lots of people post loads of stuff on social media, which is public - so in many cases it becomes a negative. Keep it to ourselves and it's a good thing.
 
I suppose it’s possibly fair to say that climbing attracts a disproportionate number of University educated individuals. 3-4 years of relatively large amounts of free time, fairly simple to take a year out to travel and climb, active club scene, proximity in ages with your daily cohort etc etc. However, Uni isn’t the exclusively middle class thing it was thirty years ago.
Climbing and climbers have changed over my lifetime and I expect the last bastion of what it once was (which was counter-culture, anti-status quo etc) might be found in caving (maybe?), maybe due to the sport being a hard sell for lifestyle marketeers (as are cavers). As for class, although you're the class you're born into until the day you die, the education industrial complex does seem to output a certain type of citizen (as is primary and secondary education). They have the higher status of accreditation; they are professionalized, and they are 'management', which means they think and act in a middle-class way, which is to think of themselves as radical free thinkers and free to act and do as they wish. Really, they are trapped within the conformity of being a "good person", who acts, and says, and reads, and thinks only good thoughts. Just as the non-working and working class are kept in their place by each other, so are the middle).
 

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