Survey on sexual harassment in climbing (Guest post)

A number of American climbing organizations & publications are running a survey on sexual harassment in climbing: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web18s/newswire-sexual-harassment-survey

It’s worth filling out if you’re involved in climbing at all, or have been, or have thought about getting involved and been uncomfortable and left (or whatever your experience). It seems to have quite a limited lens on what harassment consists in and what its effects on you might be (it might cause you to climb more, climb less, climb the same), but there are open text fields you can use.

Climbing feels relatively egalitarian to me, but what do I know–I’m in philosophy! (Haha. Not.) I know accomplished female climbers who have to deal with a lot of questioning of their ability–e.g. people downgrading routes they have climbed. There has been a recent discussion around harassment among elite climbers.

One thing that I consider an interesting kind of sexual harassment is the way that the culture of adolescent sexual humour in climbing means that a lot of routes and peaks and problems have sexist or racist names–and in coded youth language (of whatever era) that I don’t know. I’m constantly wondering whether I’m saying something offensive in saying that I climbed x. There is a peak in Alberta with a name that would make you spit your coffee. Peakfinder says “Obviously very politically incorrect, the name will likely not be made official but is in common useage [sic].” It offers no alternative, despite its being 2018 and the name’s offensiveness having been more than apparent my entire life. (That’s 52 years and counting.)

I was very proud of the first thing I climbed on Le Salève outside Geneva—and then I figured out I was saying something pretty offensive in saying what I had climbed. I wanted to talk about that in the post I wrote, but I thought that having to write about it in my “proud I climbed this” post was part of the problem, not the solution. So I saved it for another time. (Now. The survey.)

I know Sam likes climbing pictures along with my posts ( 😉 ), so here are pictures of some great climbing partners on Sorrow’s End, a cliff in my own neighbourhood that I finally got to climb this week. I was so excited that in Europe I found I can climb things that supposedly translate into a 5.9+ in North America! I’m ready for 5.10s, I thought! But here I am back to reality, and granite, and my local scene. The people here are on two 5.7s. I climbed them, one on the first attempt but with a lot of coaching and the other on the fourth or fifth attempt. I’d be flashing the European equivalent of a 5.7, no question. (Flashing means climbing on first attempt, with no coaching and without having seen someone else climb it.) 5.7 for 12 metres of layback! Google “layback” and you’ll see it’s described as an advanced climbing technique. Sigh.