UKH

Dear all,

I just wanted to enquire if there is a similar initiative in the UK concerning the inclusiveness of route names

https://americanalpineclub.org/climb-united

Thanks for any information,

Thomas

They've missed a trick with the Climb United Route Name Taskforce.

Why? 

Apparently Newcastle upon Tyne Poly had a similar problem when they wanted to rename themselves the City University back in the day...

Is this a badly timed April Fool's joke, or has climbing in the US lost any remnant of its former rebellious spirit?

The list of unacceptable words they publish makes for some interesting reading. These are words that they think should not be used in route names regardless of context:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_xEa0iWXY3rHV4sdRfC-OBRruF3uycaGAvw...

I can think of plenty of UK and US route names that would fall foul of that list, some perhaps rightly so others not. Which is the obvious problem with such lists.

Edit: Looks like Snake Dike might have dodged a bullet but many another route named for the geological feature may have to go...

This whole thing is pretty silly, but when your idea of rebelliousness is using racial slurs you might just be on the wrong side of history.

I think this is what is the point - route names may jokingly use poltically uncorrect wording. At the same time, route names can use racist, and nationalist language systematically, which is what definitely is no fun as part of a local climbing community...

I don't want to argue with anyone I did Holocaust the other weekend just because a first ascensionist wanted to be funny. 

​​​​​​This illustrates rather neatly the problem with a project like Climb United suggesting that some words are unacceptable in any context.

​​​​​​The word holocaust has been around for a long time and been used in a lot of different ways. I'm assuming you dislike it as a reference to the WWII genocide. Even if the first ascencionist used it in that way how do you know it was intended to be funny or disrespectful? 

​​​​​​I'm sure there are still route names out there that are overtly racist and that needs to be tackled but producing a list of banned words is not the way to do that. Context is everything.

What a stupid and ridiculous idea. Language changes over time, what's offensive in one era can take on a different meaning down the line, and vice versa. As DaveHK says, context is everything, you can't standardise acceptable language with lists of "bad words".

Sounds as though they wouldn't be too happy with 'Mick's Wall'!

Mick

It'll need to Michael's Wall.  

I completely agree, but is the best way to prevent racial slurs being used as route names to legislate against them in advance by means of a pre-ordained, committee-approved statute of permissibility that takes no account of context nor leaves scope for historical or indeed future differences in word meaning? Or is it, much like happens in the UK, to let idiots be shown to be idiots and then simply decline to publish anything offensively idiotic in books or on websites?

Absolutely agree. If I was a guidebook writer I just wouldn't include anything I thought was too offensive. Obviously that's subjective but I think having a list of naughty words is frankly pretty childish.

That word is a part of my family’s history. I have no problem with its use on Dow crag, it’s not derogatory or offensive in any way I can see.

CU’s censorious list, well intentioned as it surely is, looks far more troubling.

I hope  not. 

I am not in favour of a list of words. However what I do think is a good idea is to reflect on practices - route names one of them - that might be deemed exlusive in one way or the other.

In german language countries, the alpine clubs have a known history of antisemitism and nationalism that has been preceding the NSDAP. I do think a clear shift, even if 100 years late, is welcome. Thus what I suggest is to reflect what we do with our practices, not so much the solution taken by CU (as I get  it, this is only one part of the initiative). 

I agree with that.

Does it? Should "Wogs" have been renamed? Offensive now, certainly but is there value in remembering that it isn't so long ago that such words and the values they reflected were considered normal, at least by many? I'm not sure air-brushing the unpleasant out of history is a constructive step.

That's idiotic. Language policing like that is idiotic as it does nothing to tackle the core issue behind racism, which is to do with the way people think.

In any case, banning a geological word, dike, as it was later used to be offesive is utterly stupid.

I think it should*. Not merely offensive now but clearly racist language as I can't think of another context in which that word has been used. If you're worried about airbrushing then a footnote in the guidebook would deal with that. How would you feel about a route called Nigger?

*Edit: Actually, I'm not sure what I think about this but I do know that I'm uncomfortable with terms like that continuing to be used and I'm also uncomfortable with the historical justification of 'those were different times and that's how people spoke'. We abhor (or should) those terms now so why continue to print them as route names?

Of course it was racist language, I'm old enough that it was in common use in the school yard. How would I feel about routes with such names: same as I'd feel listening to "Strange Fruit". Painful but should not be forgotten.

"We abhor (or should) those terms now so why continue to print them as route names?"

Because we should engage with history as it was, not as we'd like it to have been. This is the opposite of justifying such language: it is looking it in the eye.

Thought Crime

This is why I'm a bit conflicted about this stuff. I understand what you say above but I also feel that opening a modern climbing guidebook and seeing such terms is problematic. At the very least they require explanation otherwise we're not looking history in the eye we're just perpetuating the mistakes of the past.

I'd happily support such an initiative here. We have a few routes and boulder problems that have really unpleasant and offensive names with racist/sexist/ableist/etc undertones, and it's not acceptable to my mind. That people seem to think that is being "rebellious" or that deciding as a community to change route names means we are somehow invoking Orwellian "thought crime" shows to me that a number of people in the community are acting in a very out of touch manner (not to say they are, but that's how they're acting on this issue).

"Wogs" absolutely should be renamed. It shouldn't have been called that in the first place. It's a racial slur. Why the fuck do we want a racial slur as a route name anyway? To protect some sort of ridiculous idea of free speech or climbing history (if climbing history's preservation rests on racial slurs, it doesn't deserve to be preserved) 

I get what you're saying, but I think I'd argue that the discomfort felt by a black climber opening a guidebook or turning up to a crag to be confronted by a route called Wogs must outweigh any benefit that the white climbing community might claim.

This isn't similar to reappropriation of offensive terms by the groups who were insulted by them (such as the reclamation of queer by the gay community or the use of the n word in rap) - it's a predominantly white community trying to insist on the continued use of a word.

So I broadly agree with what the AAC is trying to achieve here, but with blanket bans on some words with multiple possible usages I think they've gone much too far!  Context is significant.  Mick's Wall (FA M. Ward) is clearly not offensive; a route called Thieving Micks clearly would be.  

I think, we might also clearly differentiate between historic route names (no-one wants to rename the Heckmair route on Eiger although everyone knows most or all of the first ascensionists have been NAZIs), and modern day route names. We might call for modern-day routes to be named sensibly, or at least grown up. 

The flip side of this is to say that we should engage with the present and try to make it as we would like it to be. That's a power we do have. Do we want it to be a place where racial slurs are published in climbing guidebooks?

This often happens informally in guidebook production and most new routers are pretty sensible so it's not a massive problem.

 the sooner we get that disgusting affront to decency, the "Napes Needle" dynamited off the face of the earth the better!

I'd not describe it as a benefit. It's a reminder of past attitudes and sins, not to be repeated.

For what it is worth, my feelings on this are mostly informed by a conversation with a black colleague who, to my initial surprise, very much does not support erasure of relics of a racialist past. She wants them in our faces, to be reflected upon and confronted.

Anyway, my last word on this particular subject.

Except to be repeated by climbers, and repeated in guidebooks.

A route isn't a shrine to history. It's just a route. It's name is the name given to the route. Having an offensive route name and keeping it is not some sort of brave, grim-faced act of forcing people to deal with the racism of the past. It's just a racial slur as a name, and it reflects on us as a community in a shockingly unpleasant manner. We should change it and we should be ashamed that it was ever there in the first place. And that a bunch of white people will sit around and defend the use of a racial slur in a route name is pretty f*cking dodgy if you ask me too.

I agree but I'd still want a note in the history. This would show that we're trying to improve on the mistakes that were made, and would also mean that we wouldn't be covering up our mistakes of the past.

Eskimo has become an offensive word - I never knew. I did know that the native word is Inuit but a quick Wikipedia browse shows me that there's also the Yupik and the Aleut.

Despite my earlier flippant comment, I'm definitely in favour of removing any genuinely offensive (e.g. rename blatantly racist or phobic) but I draw the line at grown up. I think some of childish and immature route names are part of the "fun" and we are taking ourselves way too seriously to insist on them being grown up.

I'd go further and censor anything that was grown-up; a dreadful affliction that certainly should not be imposed on the rest of us. Not that I'd expect many names to be censored as a result!

I thought that the route at Chudleigh with the old racist name has been renamed  - and it appears that is has: https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/chudleigh_rocks_-_south_face-291/j... So now Jollie's Route.

I'm pretty certain that Alan said that Rockfax and UKC would stop using the old name last summer, and a note there says the local BMC area meeting settled on the new name. That doesn't seem a bad compromise does it?

Local solutions are of course welcome and the best way to deal with more or less local problems. 

Yankee Go Home (III)A Yankee at Large (5.10c)Yanks (E4 6c)Yank your horn for Jesus (f6A)
I am shocked and saddened that these examples of stereotypically 'humourous' route names are still disgracing the pages of our guidebooks. It's about time we let the attitudes of the past behind. They might have been OK in 1776 but don't belong in the 21st century. Visiting Americans must be disgusted but are probably too polite to reproach their former colonial masters.

Where's John Redhead when you need him?

Whilest I am happy to condemn things that deliberatly racist or sexist I am uncomfortable with morals by committee being the arbitrators of taste.

What you suggest is leaving this to private publishers, who as Alan James did, often produce the right solution. On the other hand, this is similar to twitter silencing Trump, and the question is where the comunity has its place in this respect. 

and who presumes to represent the community at large.

What the community will mostly do is argue it back and forth like we're doing now. Sometimes an organisation or individual just needs to act and the community can then come to terms with it.

My wife and daughter decided some years ago that my behavioural age could be determined by adding the digits together - works pretty well as far as I can see 😁

What I am suggesting is being cautious of arbitary outlawing of certain words (is Gimp really offensive? I took it to be a a reference to a sexual practice). By the same token a lot of rap songs would have to change their titles.

I think it is good that people are aware of and respect people but I am always cautious when it comes to banning things

One of the great things about route names is the social history that they reveal.  Flicking though the back pages of guide books shows how things have changed and how, at various stages, route-naming practice challenged the hitherto accepted norms, before in turn being overtaken.  I think it would be a great shame to cleanse the lists - finding one that sits on the wrong side of the fence is always an interesting reminder of times past.   

If you start to examine things too carefully, you also enter the realm of reinterpretation of the original intent - I have, for example, no knowledge of the origins of SS Special - but I'm sure that one could construct a case for cleansing on many grounds.

I agree, I wrote my column for Climb Magazine about exactly that maybe a decade ago. I've noticed as I've learnt more about religion - RS is a subject I now teach - just how many older routes names are Biblical references.

But there aren't that many that are really that controversial - clearly racist, sexist, or homophobic. I don't think we really lose anything by changing the name of that route at Chudleigh. But how many others are that blatant in the word being racist? I can think of one route in Finland where the first ascensionist used the N-word in it, but that was quite recently. I thought it was really ugly and unnecessary, although it was using the the English word so was picked by someone speaking in their second language which I think leads to non-native speakers not really grasping the hurt the word can cause. But besides the "W-word", are their any other route names crying out for change in the UK? There are some that I'm uncomfortable with such as Raped by Affection (E7 6c), I don't know if someone who has survived sexual assault would find it upsetting or not but I would understand if they did. But those are perhaps more edge cases than names that simply contain outright racist terms in them.

I was about to bring that up as the single Redhead route that might, possibly, merit attention.

I think that there are any number of names that could cause offence if you were minded to seek offence there.  A number of the names at Creagh Dubh, Newtonmore, for example, are not for those from a sheltered background. 

As it happens, I climbed One Less White N....r at Shorn Cliff on Sunday, first climbed and named in 1984.  It's named in the guidebook in full.  On the UKC logbook it's 'One Less White Oliver' because the phrase, comes, I believe, from Elvis Costello's Oliver Army (c. 1979).  The song is usually played in full by the BBC, uncensored because the lyrics are held to be anti-racist.   But, if the name is expunged from the climbing archive, what do we gain?  For one thing, we lose a discussion at the foot of the route about how things change.

I think what is being suggested by some people here is getting rid of a few really unacceptable route names like Wogs rather than some sort of mass renaming. As Toby points out there are probably very, very few routes names that would be affected as most truly racist etc ones have already been weeded out. I really don't see that as any sort of a threat to the history or culture of climbing, the merely rude, juvenile, old fashioned etc are in no danger.

Offensive is fine. Racist etc is not. It's a fine line sometimes though and needs to be done on a case by case basis.

To my mind for this example changing it to One Less White Oliver is the perfect solution. The history of the name isn't lost, the discussion can still be had, but a line is drawn by the guidebook author to show that times have changed and it's no longer acceptable to use the original.

You could easily put the question to the ist ascentionist John Redhead as he is alive and kicking so to speak about the route name and there is an excellent Grimes podcast with him.Well worth listening to.

I agree Toby There aren't that many in the UK that I have come across. The unnameble one at Chudleigh being the obvious one and as you say we lose nothing by changing the name (though I would include an historical footnote to that effect). But infered rasicism from single words (where not obvious as above) can be a bit Orwellian without context.

The Finnish one is interesting as again without context we don't know if it was intended as being offensive, a bad translation or using the Spanish word for black.

Is Swastika on Etive Slabs offensive? Quite probably for someone who suffered under the Nazis but someone from India or Nepal might well regard it as an auspicious name. Should Ben Moon have called his route at Volx, Maginot Line? A deliberate provocation. Which bring me to Mr Redhead and RbA. A deliberatly provocative title by his own admission. does this mean we should ban provocative thinking? That in itself is a dangerous path.

The point is I understand where all this is coming from and I absolutely have no objection to renaming where people are in general agreement for the greater good. I remember many pubs used to be called "Black Boy", Agatha Christie's novel "And then there were none..." originally had a very different title. Isn't it funny that we can't even bring ourselves to use certain words even within an innocent or discussive context? As though the merest mention will bring down the wrath of G*D upon us? Ah the modern taboo. What I object to is arbitary, blanket bans based on arbitary words. They only close down discussion.

Except that it's not really.  UKC has renamed that one, but has left Mulatto Wall.  So where do you start and stop?  Both terms, as far as I am aware, are currently unacceptable.  One Less etc is a nondescript backwater VS, but Mulatto Wall is a three star high profile route with history in a prime location.  Does that and should that have a bearing?

Guidebook authors have always applied some judgement over what is acceptable, unacceptable, unsavoury or taking the piss.  Names that are deliberately intended to cause offence are few in number, I think.  Those intended to be unsavoury rather more common.  Those that are provocative - no doubt a fair few.  Curiously, guidebook principles work both ways - F**k Pig at the Nook (early 80's) was originally listed as FP, but now seems to pass muster.  

But rude words about body parts and so on are a different matter to racist words. Are there many route names that include the word "f**k" for example? I suspect many were never allowed through by the gatekeepers at the time who were more sensitive to that than racism. For example, my first new route in Scotland was a grade II gully on Cruach Nam Miseag. We skipped philosophy of religion lectures on Wednesday morning to get the bus out to Arrochar. After, we excitedly wrote up our FA information and with undergraduate exuberance decided "Better than God" was a hilarious route name. Swiftly, the late great Andy Nisbet replied to my letter on SMC headed writing paper, he congratulated us on finding a good unrecorded line but rather kindly said something along the lines of "lads - I think maybe the name might be deemed a bit insulting by some more church-going members of the SMC". Kindly slapped down, we went with Philosophers' Gully - that might have even been Andy's own suggestion, but whichever way round, it was a more classy alternative. 

So I wonder now if the guidebook editor would have maybe just gently suggested another  related name for that route that just didn't include the N word?

I wonder if that's still the case after last year's debate?

But just easily that could be added to the history section of the guide so people can find out what happened, while for younger climbers, possibly black or ethnic minority climbers, they don't see that hateful word actually in their climbing guide.

I guess if names like that don't get changed or redacted, how can we say things have changed? It's almost like saying although none of us would ever use the N-word in everyday conversation with colleagues and friends somehow its ok to use in the context of climbing?

I remember there was something that Redhead said on that episode of Jamcrack that was really quite disturbing - I don't remember exactly what it was, but it was definitely connected to his view of women. I do remember wishing Grimer had pushed back. I don't remember whether it was an early-ish article here on UKC or in one of the magazines, but there was a withering review of One For the Crow which focused on Redhead's dubious sexual politics. I've read various things that he has written since, I think on the Footless Crow blog, including more recently what is basically covid denialism, that makes me suspect there is very little of Mr Redhead's view of the world that I'd be sympathetic to. His view seems like his route names - a product of his/their time, and quite a different time from now.

For what it's worth, I think "Better than God" would have been a far better name. I once named a route I did near Islamabad "Blame God", which generated some interesting discussion as local climbers had an instinctive scepticism about the name but couldn't actually find anything to object to!

I suspect a hip-hop fan who didn't really think to much beyond deciding it sounded cool. It's not like we see lots of black climbers in the UK, but I don't think I've ever seen anyone non-white climbing in Finland (OK, I took a Kenyan mate ice climbing after Finnish class once!), and it's not the Finnish offensive word for a black person (also an N-word, although the word for black in Finnish is "musta", but that applied to people is the offensive word for Roma!) so 10 years ago it all probably seemed a bit distant that anyone could be upset by it. I've just looked in the Southern Finnish guidebook published last year, and the route name has been changed from "Crack N-word" to "Crack Rehab", so I suspect the FA or the editor decided it needed to be changed. 

I don't think that Maginot Line is comparable in anyway though, and even Swastika is a stretch. If some one tried to call a route "Hitler was right" or something, yep absolutely racist, don't accept it but Swastika? Probably not a problem for anyone.

I can see what you mean... we give first ascensionists the right to name routes and problems out of a sign of respect for their vision... and that only goes so far. I can respect someone's right to write something, but also hold it against them if it's racist garbage. John Redhead get's props for sending a route, but if he then called it something dreadful... then the community should refuse to accept it IMO, and if he says "I don't want to change the name" well I don't really see why I should give a shit? That's not censorship or thought police. That's the community deciding that something is not acceptable.

As it happens it appears some of these route names have changed (and rightfully so although it really took until 2020 for that to happen? Shameful) and that is good. But I think that a lot of people are happy to defend route names which are pretty dreadful for reasons that seem rather sketchy and out of touch to me. You try explaining to a non-climber why those names are okay, you'll get a dodgy look and rightly so.

I'm not sure - although I remember thinking when Robertson and Benson climbed "The God Delusion" on Beinn Bhann did Andy try to get them to change the name? But I'm sure they're both SMC members in good standing and climbing IX, rather than nobody students getting up a II in their first winter of Scottish climbing! More seriously, it was 15 years later and Dawkin's had topped the best seller list with his book.

You're a braver man that me! I presume the Pakistani rock climbing scene is probably mainly pretty upper-middle class and relatively socially liberal so you got away with it! One of my favourite new route names was Jihad to be there (S 4a) - which I thought was rather droll, although I have to admit nicking the joke of something I heard on the radio. It's also in a relatively remote Finnish forest, so probably hasn't had a Muslim ascent yet!

yeah I agree with you on all points

More often it's the guidebook writer/organisation who will decide that rather than it being a thing the community or first ascensionist decides. After all that's who publishes the book and who would bear the brunt of any criticism. I know of a few incidents when route names have been rejected. I suspect there have been a lot more although most of the ones I've heard of were for fairly innocuous or personal opinion reasons rather than anything discriminatory. A first ascensionist can be as edgy or offensive or downright racist as they like, the guidebook writers are under no obligation to accept it.

I'm editing a guidebook that includes Mulatto Wall and wrestled with this for a while. Prior to the BLM movement I had no idea that a mulatto was a derogatory word for a person of mixed race. The name isn't a name given by Ron Fawcett, who was the first to free the route, but by two aid climbers in the 60's whose surnames were Brown and White. If you flip through the old Yorkshire Limestone guide from the era it's definitely not the most egregious name for an aid route (the route I'm thinking of was renamed when freed).

I had a go at getting in touch with Ron but he's a reserved man who isn't all that easy to get hold of. I tried for ages to think of an alternative and everything that I came up with was rubbish. I eventually thought of something which I think fits: Mallet Wall. It's phonetically similar to the original and gives a nod to the route's inception as an aid climb. There's a note with the FA text pointing out that the route has been renamed.

There haven't been many route names at all that I've tweaked. Maybe three? My MO is to only change a name when it involves a word that would be considered hate speech. Rudeness, lewdness, bland references to historical events are OK I think. I'm not sure where this might go as societal attitudes develop. In my experience we don't have huge numbers of racially hateful route names in the UK (the US seems to be quite different), but we do have a lot of Suicide Walls, and a lot of route names that reference mental illness of one form or another.

I'll wager most people when they see the phrase "Blame God" will be thinking that it's either a criticism of God based on all the bad things that happen, or a criticism of the bad things that come from religion, and that religious offence could come from either of those.

But of course John could have been blaming God or religion for all the good things that happen (although I suspect not). 

'Skewbald Wall' would keep the original ascensionists intent intact without the currently unacceptable overtones.....

Considering John Redheads  tormented paintings about life and he is a well recognised artist there is I would suggest there is more to his route names.A bit of digging round helps to give another perspective.

If of course you are not aware for all this then you can easily look at his website just type in johnredhead in google.