It was barely dawn at Huntington Beach, Calif., but 75 wet-suited surfers were already bobbing patiently offshore, waiting for that special surge. Finally, the right wave came. But as the surf rose so did hostility levels, and what had been a peaceful line of paddlers suddenly converged into a snarling, sideswiping throng. Hapless riders were pitched off their boards as their more aggressive mates slammed ahead. "Ten years ago surfers talked to each other in the water," sighed onlooker Joe Anderko, 25, who was once hospitalized for three weeks after someone deliberately smashed a board into his head. "Now it's a matter of total intimidation out there."
Back in the sunny, surfing '60s, the worst Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello had to worry about was sand on the blanket or terminal nose peel. But those sappy days of golden surfer boys and their giggling girls are gone, wiped out by surfing's own success. There are currently more than 1 million surfers fighting for waves along the southern California coastline--and what was once beach-blanket bingo now often looks more like beach-blanket blitzkrieg. Overcrowding has caused more than just discomfort; it has prompted an unsettling riptide of violence and vandalism. Those blissful old Beach Boys paeans to the joys of "Surfing U.S.A." have been washed out by real newwave music: one of the hottest groups in California these days is the Surf Punks, who accurately describe today's surfing scene with songs like "Beer Can Beach" and "Punch Out at Malibu."
Tribalism: Behind the outbreak of surfing violence runs a strong current of territoriality and tribalism. When outsidrs--"unlocals," in beach speech--invade a popular area, natives defend their surf. Sometimes enmities are racial, pitting barrio chicanos against local white kids. They can also be geographic, squaring off inlanders (known as "Vals," after the San Fernando Valley) against seasiders. Occasionally they are generational, between edgy short-haired punks and their laid-back, long-haired elders. Even fashion can cause clashes: conservative surfers (plain boards, black wet suits) often tussle with the trendies (striped boards, fins and colorful wet suits). "I've won a colored wet suit at a black-wet-suit beach and gotten a lot of hate stares," says competitive surfer Matt George, 22.
The flood tide of surfers first started building in the early '60s. Over the next decade boards got progressively cheaper, lighter and easier to handle. Before long the beaches were jammed with hordes of novices known as wannabees (as in, "I wanna be a surfer"). In turn, their numbers were swelled by throngs of sidewalk surfers-skateboarding kids with an aggressive, street-smart style. The Beach Boys' old boast that "everybody's gone surfing" seemed to be literally true--and the natives were not overjoyed. Surfing pro Sam George recalls asking one local surfer why he was carrying a tire iron. "We were like a gentle tribe of peaceful, coastal Indians," the man replied. "Then the outsiders came, invading our land. It was only natural to resist."
The level of resistance varies from beach to beach. Hermosa Beach, 15 miles south of Los Angeles, has such a rough reputation that it doesn't take anything more menacing than graffiti to keep unlocals away. And at nearby El Porto the atmosphere of nonwelcome is underscored by a sketch of a Nazi machine gunner. Elsewhere, tire-slashing and gas-tank sanding are popular pastimes; rocks, sticks and even knives have reportedly been wielded at some hot spots.
Territories: Some of the beaches most famed for their surf are now notorious for their violence. At Hollywood-by-the-Sea in Oxnard and at Redondo Beach, south of Los Angeles, gangs of toughs defend their territories with chains and even guns. Police say that most of the serious incidents involve inner-city gangs fighting among themselves, but the unease they inspire can spoil the atmosphere for everyone. At Redondo, rival white and chicano gangs have split the beach down the middle by painting a line across the boardwalk; one side is marked "U.S.A.," the other, "Mexico."
The surfers themselves downplay the violence. "There are isolated incidents, of course, but I know there is less violence in surfing in one year than in any one high-school football practice," says Jim Kempton, editor ofSurfer magazine. "No one who goes to the beach with a local friend has a problem." Even so, that's a far cry from the old days when all a surfer had to care about was the joy of getting stoked, sliding through a tube, shooting a curl and otherwise flying high and free on the wild "bluejuice" of those oh-so-perfect waves.