2021 is my last year of USAWS

[The_MS]

 

[Mrs_MS]

 

[klindy]

@Mrs_MS can you be a little more specific ? “What was happening”? “Who said it wasn’t happening (whatever “it” is”?

 

PM me if you’d rather.

[The_MS]

It means that nobody ever knows it’s going on until it happens and then it’s too late. You can’t spot it until they make a move and then it’s too late. Can you report something to safe sport that hasn’t happened? Then what? I saw stuff( terrorism ) related that was reported and the reporter was fired. Called a racist and termed. If you see something, say something . Ya right. The left and the media will protect them.

 

 

[Mrs_MS]

@klindy

It relates to many things going on in America these days. I’ll just leave it at that.

 

[BraceMaker]

Biases work both ways. Ya'll concenered other people are so entangled that you fail to see that this forum is by itself a pool of confirmation bias.

 

But this sport is an outlier @markn makes his statement but then doesn't challenge the membership to comment which is the whole point.

 

Do a blind survey of the pros ask them their opinion on the rules and the "leadership"

 

 

[BraceMaker]

Ask the "top brass" here to weigh in.

 

Pro skiers like freddie joel manon jamie lauren morgan montavon, matteo, marcus, industry folk like Krista too. etc. They all comment here periodically. Go ahead tag them and ask them to weigh in if you think they all disagree with you taking a 90 minute course because its just too much to ask.

[BS74]

@BraceMaker. They will take the course because they make Living skiing, they have no choice!

[BraceMaker]

@BS74 you minimize them and in so doing assume their answer matches your opinion.

 

Go ahead tag them and ask them to confirm your opinion. You basically imply that all pro athletes are forced to not have an opinion or life or be able to speak which is the WHOLE issue. Nate Smith broke Krista Rogers face in at moomba in Australia why? Was he scorned by a 15 year old? who knows I dont know. I know he didn't get prosecuted in Australia for something that if he did to my sister he would have served time for

 

But ya know shhhhh shhhh they dont get to speak.

 

The_Krista has a few posts here read them.

[lpskier]

 

[BraceMaker]

@lpskier yup the horse is long dead yet people beat it to death because someone maimed it and left it on the trail. And the people who finished it off constantly get told there wasnt ever horse and what are they going on about.

 

While.they stand over the corpse qsking who maimed it.

 

 

[BS74]

@BraceMaker , you have a dumb ass way of making an assumption out of a simply stated fact. What I said applies to anyone who wants to ski tournaments, but more so, when you have to make a living from it. I could care less what pro skiers thoughts are on this matter, so you tag them, you brought it up! You keep trying to make it about this one issue and it's deeper than that, but you make no sense with your comments and you certainly haven't learned from previous remarks from others statements regarding AWSA in general. Who the hell are you? Tell us about your background!

[scuppers]

@BraceMaker, There is a famous and old saying “you never know how far you can go - till you’ve gone too far”

[vtmecheng]

I am a member, just didn’t add it to my profile. I also never called someone a looser. I read most of the posts. There are some that did say they would leave for just the safe sport.

[RazorRoss3]

Can we all take a step back and nix the personal attacks, this is getting uglier than ugly faster than fast.

 

If the “for” crowd wants to stick around and keep paying dues, fine, let them. If the “against” crowd wants to leave and stop paying dues, fine, let them.

[BraceMaker]

@scuppers where am I out of bounds? all the individuals I have mentiomed have vocalized their opinions on this forum previously.

 

My opinion does not matter at all as is abundantly clear

[scuppers]

@BraceMaker Of course it does! And I like that you express it. You just can’t call out others for expressing their’s.

[teammalibu]

@Mrs_MS We the willing led by the unknowing doing the impossible for the ungrateful! We have been doing so much for so long with so little we are now qualified to do anything with nothing!

[Mrs_MS]

@teammalibu

All will fall in line, it’s what we do.

[jayski]

Dam @teammalibu ....

 

that is some deep $hit...how many Margarita's for that???

[wawaskr]

https://goodreads.com/quotes/645766-we-the-willing-led-by-the-unknowing-are-doing-the

[ForrestGump]

@LeonL I gave up my regular rating when it expired. As well as my regular judges rating. And regular scorer's rating. And when the regional person started messaging me about my ratings and getting them updated, I said please don't anymore, here's why.

[Jody_Seal]

This weekend at an event in mobile there was a lot of conversation and had the opportunity to pull the ear of the new president of AWSA and the southern region evp. Both are concerned about the ramifications of a mandate for "All" members. Both listened to many of our concerns and disagreements to this mandate. Life won't change for many that say no to this and say they will not participate in the organization. They will still ski just won't participate in awsa.

In conversation there are other sports involved with safesport that do not mandate all participants/ members to comply with this government backed indoctrination. Usually it is only coach's/ certified instructors that interact with adolescent and under age athletes. As well as elite team dr.s and support staff. (Understandable yet safe sports protection record stands poorly)

Why the beuracrats running our organization decided to mandate "All" members has yet to become apparent. Especially since at this time USAWS is on a lifeline from the USOPC financial grants.

 

Less officials / tournament skiers means less tournaments which equates to less yearly membership income as well as sanction income back into the system.

Cost to do buisness for all of the usaws sport groups involved will increase substantially.

Makes me wonder who and why would anyone

deliberately go down a business path such as Mr. Bedrue has steered our sport into.

We do pay him well though!

 

 

 

Its no wonder why industry has pulled their large support monies from the past out of the organization, as they jumped the sinking ship.

Can't blame them one bit!!

 

 

 

[klindy]

@BraceMaker @BS74 not suggesting any position of any elite athlete on their behalf but remember that elite athletes make up 33-1/3%, of the BOD and most committees.

[jayski]

@klindy not to cause more issues but to clarify, did USA waterski not get notice or mandated from someone to increase their athlete representation on the board? If so would the board really have 30% if it was left up to 'free will and interest?

[lpskier]

US Ski and Snowboard, with 30,000 members, requires all adult members to take Safe Sport.

[klindy]

@jayski i misspoke above, it’s 33-1/3%. It was increased last year by the USOPC from 20%.

 

As for what the boards position would be on athlete participation…. I believe that the USA-WSWS board and the AWSA board would encourage participation from elite athletes to the maximum extent possible/practical. It has been difficult to find enough athletes who can (and will) fill the positions available. Elite athlete input is critical and always carries weight in any discussion.

 

Remember the USA-WAWS board (and committees) are made up of sport division directors and representatives. The AAC is allocated a certain bomber of seats on the board and on committees and is independently responsible to find/select/elect someone to fill the seat. The sport divisions fill/select/elect their representatives per the sort division bylaws and P&P’s.

[ScottScott]

@lpskier and the ski and snowboarders don't have creepy old guys hanging out on the docks with 1/2 naked teenagers.....just sayin'

[The_MS]

Ski and snow board just has ski apres in the hot tub with clothing optional rules in effect.

[Jody_Seal]

@ScottScott it was not the creepy old guy that recently was sanctioned (way to lightly). It was a creepy young guy womanizing and also creeping on young girls.

And yes it is unbelievable what some of these young kids are wearing ( or not wearing) coming down to the dock or while milling around on site

At tournaments. Should a level of modesty be implemented? No we can't do that!! No self responsibility their!!'we have to farm that out to safe sport. You know in most high-school wrestling venues a wrestler can not pull his or her singlet down to expose his or her bare chest while on the mat or while in the gym or arena. They Will get docked team points and or disqualified. Unsportsmanlike conduct.. nope! We have to pay someone else to make sure we are responsible!!

 

@lpskier kinda mixing the apples with oranges aint ya?? Two different dynamics and life styles.. along

with less then 6000 members the real gorilla in the room is with such small membership the lack of finances to support the program diminishes its returns or benefits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[lpskier]

@Jody_Seal Just pointing out that we aren’t the only sport group whose entire adult membership has to comply.

[MrJones]

There are a lot of us who have a had a belly full of things mandated to us. There is a point where any normal person says "no, I've had enough thanks". People are reaching that in society (I hope)

[scuppers]

@MrJones Yes they are.

[thager]

Ovis aries

[dthate]

@thager Ha that's funny (had to look it up) don't understand those foreign words......

maaaa......

[The_MS]

[bigtex2011]

[bigtex2011]

there goes @The_MS

[The_MS]

He’s Rolling

[bigtex2011]

:)

[markn]

Lengthy article in the Wall Street Journal today regarding SafeSport entitled "SafeSport Seeks to Boost Its Name". Turns out $20 million of the center's $23 million budget now comes from the USOPC, a contribution MANDATED by Congress. The SafeSport CEO, Colon stated such an arrangement "allows her to more convincingly say that the center does not answer to U.S. Olympic officials". How convenient.

[skidawg]

Sounds about right

[Jody_Seal]

I keep saying it ain't about safety in the sport its about government indoctrination. They are prying in every aspect of our lives. Jobs for beuracrats!

 

 

So who's in to start a new competeitive organization??

[JeffSurdej]

@Jody_Seal it is tempting, I'll be honest, but I don't think the grass is any greener on the other side. Any new organization will be like a SHIBU INU pump and dump. It wont last, eventually most of the regulations we are seeing will come into play if a new organization has any success. And the things holding back waterskiing from growing, and I mean really growing to a level of other sports, are not safe sport, not government, not your board....it is cost and access, plain and simple. You cant fix those things on scale without billions of dollars. Our sport is what it is, expensive, elitest, and up against wake surfing and wakeboarding. Wakeboard (now wakesurf) is the #1 reason our sport changed. WE DIDNT GET OFF PUBLIC WATERS, PUBLIC WATERS STARTED WAKEBOARDING INSTEAD OF SKIING. We lost our share of watersports enthusiast b/c a better, easier, and more fun avenue arrived for water sport enthusiast, which is fine, but we told them to F off. USA snowski didn't tell snowboarders to pound sand, they incorporated them and grew together, we told wakeboard to get lost, and WWA took the ropes and now the 3 boat manufacturers don't even relate 97% of their boat sales to USA water ski and wakeboard, epic fail we will never recoup from. And let me say I was one of them that said go pound sand. USAWS/AWSA is not the main problem folks, stop blaming people. Looking forward to not being president so I can earn some Pandas :)

[The_MS]

Just revisit the mandate and make it so only coaches or team leaders have to do the training. It’s that simple.

[Mastercrafter]

@JeffSurdej Man, be careful what you ask for, I see you're now "Midwest Justin Bieber Fan Club President" according to your signature.

[JeffSurdej]

Game on @Horton

[MDB1056]

@JeffSurdej - well said. What's in motion won't be reversed

[Jody_Seal]

@JeffSurdej

Sorry Jeff going to have to call BS on a lot of your statement.

As president of AWSA you had the chance to increase membership within the open water and or public lake skiers. Do you think these ski company's can stay afloat selling to only private lake skiers? take a look around check out FB where all these skiers are documenting pulling their courses and boats as well as docks off the public lakes for the winter. Hmm! The elitist ideology comes from the top ! for example you can personally attribute some membership loss with your failed level 10 mandated, what a bunch crap that was!

Lets recall the towboat committee meeting in Boise where the Nautique Rep requested more future visibility as per more national events to pull.. Nautique and their promo program at the time was pulling nearly 80% of all the tournament rides throughout the organization. they were asking for more of a representation to their commitment to the sport. You were told then that unless things changed sponsorship monies would be decreased. Then again the next year in Texas you were told the same thing by the marketing manager. They held up to their statements and pulled better then 75% of their sponsorship as did the other two manufacturers. Now where are we?? having to rely on the government dole to keep the organization afloat. No sorry the elitist ideology comes from the top.

 

Got this in my email right after i posted my last reply.

 

"Awsa pushed me out years ago and I've never been less tempted than now to go back........cheers!!"

 

This organization does very poorly in communication with their members. most of you really don't know there is a new president of AWSA. hopefully this new president will be more open with communication and internal gorilla politics of the organization will go away.

 

I am with Mark "

Just revisit the mandate and make it so only coaches or team leaders have to do the training. It’s that simple."

 

 

 

 

[unksskis]

Well said @JeffSurdej . Thank you for your efforts as President, and the positive changes that were implemented, not all may have been successful, but at least we were trying.