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Tom Aiello on Ethics

This page is a chapter in 'BASE Wiki Philosophy'

Tom Aiello on Ethics

This is an original article belonging to the author. It has not been edited by BASE WIKI in any way.

By Tom Aiello

BASE jumping has it’s own peculiar set of ethical guidelines. These ethics have evolved (and continue to do so) over time. They stem from our shared desire to jump, which results in our desire to avoid arrest or injury. The bottom line aim of our ethical system is to facilitate continued jumping for all who wish, and are able, to do so. The nuances of BASE ethics vary from place to place, and especially vary depending on the legal status of a site. If there are established guidelines for a site (true at an increasing number of popular sites), always find out what they are, and follow them. The guidelines have been established for good reasons, and often in conjunction with local authorities. Jumpers breaking these rules (through ignorance or otherwise) undermine the legalization efforts of the entire BASE community.



Site specific guidelines aside, there are three basic points of BASE ethics:
Respect

Show respect for the sport, the sites, and other jumpers. Failing to respect the serious nature of BASE will quickly alienate many experienced jumpers, who have learned to respect BASE through hard personal experiences. Lack of respect for the sport can be shown in many ways. Dismissing the inherent dangers of the sport is one. Putting unprepared people off for a “BASE thrill ride” is another. Instructing students who lack appropriate preparation is a third. The bottom line is that BASE can be a fun game—but it can also turn deadly serious in a heartbeat. Remembering this is one of the keys to a long, healthy life, and also to a long, healthy jumping career. Failing to respect sites, and the guidelines for jumping them (formal or otherwise) will almost certainly anger the older jumpers who established, and continue to jump, those sites. Site guidelines and procedures vary from simple (“don't land by the farmhouse”, to Byzantine “drive up the left side of the dirt road, park behind the loading dock, and keep your lights on until you reach the third door”, to downright bizarre. Respecting other people is a basic guideline of human interaction we all learned in kindergarten. This nicety of human interaction is even more important in BASE. You depend on the jumpers around you for instruction, assistance and mutual aid. While this is most obvious in simple things, like carpooling to a jump site, it also applies to opening and maintaining site access, avoiding arrest, and providing medical assistance to injured jumpers. In the most extreme, we rely on each other for emotional support when tragedy occurs. While we sometimes like to think of ourselves as rugged individualists, in the end, BASE is a team sport.
Leave No Trace

The old backpackers credo, “Leave only footprints, take only pictures” is even more true in BASE (except that in our case, it’s more often “take only video”). Leaving evidence that you have been jumping an object is not only poor behavior from an environmental standpoint. It also lets the authorities know that BASE jumpers lack respect for the area, or (on less than legal sites) that they have been there at all. Things as small as being seen by a drunk at 3am have been used to arrest and prosecute BASE jumpers. To avoid drawing unwanted attention to yourself, other jumpers, or the objects we share, try to make jumps with no witnesses, and without leaving physical evidence. While this ethic obviously evolved in the context of illegal jumps, with land managers examining BASE in wilderness areas today, minimizing our impact there is equally important. Leave no trace applies to video, photographs, or other evidence of our jumps as well. Video of easily identifiable locations can find it’s way back to site managers. This can lead to access problems with both legal and illegal sites. Obviously, video and photos of some legal sites, jumped in a respectful manner, won’t create problems. But evidence of questionable jumps, disrespect of local rules, or illegal jumps can create problems for all of us.
Contact the Locals

Whether you are a new jumper just getting into the sport in your area, or a more experienced jumper who is traveling, the original rule of BASE ethics still applies. Always make genuine efforts to locate jumpers local to any object you want to jump from. Not only will this help you to meet some wonderful, interesting people, but it will help to show respect for the hard work of those who opened (and maintain) site access. Further, the locals may have worked out ways to make jumps that you would have to spend years to duplicate. Local jumpers often have contacts, access, and schedules that allow jumps to be made with minimum risk or trouble. There is a flip side to the “Contact the Locals” rule. If you are the local, you have a responsibility to provide guidance, help, and access to other jumpers, especially new jumpers in your area. While protecting site access and keeping your guests (or new jumpers) uninjured can be a valid reason to keep them off of some sites for a time, many experienced jumpers appear to restrict access for no good reason. If a visitor (or new jumper) is qualified for a site, and has shown themselves to be responsible with their site knowledge, it is the duty of local (or more experienced) jumpers to guide them. When this duty is neglected, the system begins to break down. Note that this does not mean that locals ought to be expected to come out on a moment’s notice to show you around. Nor does it mean that you are expected to take every new jumper out whenever they want. Few experienced jumpers have the energy to keep up with the seemingly insatiable thirst of a beginner to make numerous jumps off the “same old boring tower.” We all have lives, and BASE has to fit into the framework of those lives. There is a balance here, between the local guides and visitors, or the experienced jumpers and students. Maintaining it requires effort and understanding from both sides. Visitors and new jumpers must be patient and understanding. Locals must be willing to help visitors and new jumpers. When either side fails to live up to this tacit understanding, the system begins to break down, leading to political divisions, community bickering, and, eventually, less jumps for all of us.



More on the contact the local rules can be read on this page.


A note on legality: BASE ethics are not necessarily related to legality. It is obviously possible to make an illegal jump which is, by BASE standards, perfectly ethical. It is also possible to make a legal jump which is not, by BASE standards, ethical. The two systems (ethics and legality) operate independently.


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