Building a Climbing Community With Color the Wasatch
Color the Wasatch meets for a climb night. Photo courtesy of Color the Wasatch.
As the writers of this article, we acknowledge that the experiences here are not shared by all BIPoC, particularly given the history of violence and oppression against Black and Indigenous communities in the US. In this feature, we’d like to celebrate both the work that Color the Wasatch has done and their commitment to reflect and reassess in service of inclusivity and liberation.
We recently attended an impactful climbing meet-up hosted by Color the Wasatch (CTW)–a climbing affinity group in Salt Lake City, Utah that builds community for climbers of color. While the idea of going climbing and feeling part of the community for many BIPoC and queer people is a constant struggle–attending the Color the Wasatch meet-up proved to challenge the systemic barriers that contribute to the inaccessibility of outdoor and recreational sports.
Let’s start by addressing those barriers:
The cost of climbing can be prohibitive
Climbing culture can be exclusive
Gender binaries are pervasive
Places to climb can be inaccessible
The dominant race of climbing is white
So, how truly accessible is the sport of climbing for BIPoC? For many, not as accessible as we think it should be. We sat with Priyam Patel (she/her), founder of Color the Wasatch, to hear how CTW is breaking down these barriers for BIPoC.
Founder of Color the Wasatch, Priyam Patel. Photo courtesy of Priyam Patel.
“Our mission right now is building community, and making the statement that ‘we're here, and we’re here to stay’. We are going to do things for our community if our needs are not being met in the broader climbing community,” says Priyam. CTW works to address the constraints that BIPoC face in climbing, and more fundamentally, they work to build community through liberation.
Color the Wasatch ultimately creates a space where BIPoC can climb without thinking about the things that might stand in the way, whether that mental load is rooted in financial or social reasons.
1. Eliminate financial barriers
CTW provides free and discounted day passes to climbing gyms in the Salt Lake City area, gear, and instruction to its members.
Priyam says that CTW makes sure that their community knows, “If you need a piece of gear, a climbing lesson, or to get certified to lead inside, let us know and we will cover the costs for you.”
What underlies this is a sense of common care and welfare in the group–although CTW recently became affiliated as an American Alpine Club Affinity Support Network Organization, much of the group’s financial support comes from the community itself. Community members will cover the cost of day passes and shoe rentals for other folks, and their leadership team will find any way possible to cover costs to support individual needs within the group.
CTW also works closely with their partners, including gyms like The Front Climbing Club and Salt Lake Bouldering Project to provide discounted day passes, and large companies to provide gear for raffles–a grassroots, community-centered version of redistribution of wealth within the sport.
2. Host climb nights and clinics
CTW hosts climb nights and clinics with local athletes, like a recent event with Caleb Robinson where he taught techniques for projecting efficiently.
On why she started CTW, Priyam says, “People really need a space to feel that lift of the burden of being the only person of color in a climbing gym. You can't climb your best and your mind is not free, when you're constantly feeling othered in a climbing space.”
If you’re a BIPoC living in Utah, there’s a good chance that in many spaces, you feel that pervasive, low-level tension of being “one of the only ones” in a predominantly white sport in a predominantly white state, macroaggressions aside. It’s just different from walking down the street in a big city. CTW’s goal is to let folks take up space together, be loud, and just focus on climbing with that tension dialed back as much as possible.
“There are many axes of marginalization, and we cannot forget that being a person of color is just one of them. All of our members are coming in with those identities, so we want to focus on broader inclusivity and hold each other accountable.”
3. Prioritize intersectionality
CTW also works closely with another affinity group in the area, Salt Lake Area Queer Climbers (SLAQC), to put on events and exchange insight about how to better serve their communities. Priyam emphasizes the importance of intersectionality in their work: “There are many axes of marginalization, and we cannot forget that being a person of color is just one of them. All of our members are coming in with those identities, so we want to focus on broader inclusivity and hold each other accountable.”
Inclusivity isn’t just about making a diversity statement, and it’s not a problem to be “solved” once and for all. Through their work, CTW keeps reassessing, reflecting on, and refining the work they do.
4. Advocate for community needs
To that end, CTW’s leadership team actively stays in discussion with community members to understand their needs and create space to actually talk with each other openly about the issues that their members face. On the other side, the leadership team advocates for the community by communicating them out to their partners for support.
Color the Wasatch has to constantly balance the work of liberation in a predominantly white sport. “We are responsible for a huge group of people and meeting their needs is our number one priority,” Priyam says, and Color the Wasatch’s leaders find new ways to stay connected to the group’s changing needs, like building an advisory board of participants from the CTW community itself.
Their work requires continued reassessment of these needs and revisiting them with partners. “Our leaders are constantly in conversations with the places we hold events, and we don’t let go of the hard conversations,” Priyam says.
Color the Wasatch climbers gather before climbing. Photo courtesy of David Robles.
The hard conversations are what help dismantle the systemic barriers that exist in climbing.
The fatigue of accessing and existing in these spaces is real, and–speaking from our own experiences–it’s something that can keep BIPoC from climbing regularly. Color the Wasatch creates spaces where BIPoC get to be present in their climbing, with less mental energy devoted to the constraints that exist. For us, picking up our chalk bags and putting on our climbing shoes with our people reenergized us in a way we hadn’t felt before.
Priyam said it best: “Climbing is your community. It's not what crags you've been to, it’s–when I go somewhere, do I have my people around me?”
“Climbing is your community. It’s not what crags you’ve been to, it’s–when I go somewhere, do I have my people around me?”
Try reaching out first to Black hikers. You don’t have to comment directly on our race, ask us if we’re new, or tell us we’re doing a good job. Just say ‘hello’.