And? What’s your point?
There’s no risk of damage to ‘America’; because Real America exists in an unchanging mythic past; before hippies and liberals and uppity women. Any damage that occurs today would have to be capable of time travel to be a problem.
6 Likes
Yes, in fact, it does. When I look around the beautiful valley I live in, out to the cliffs overlooking the sea and the dense forests of unique coastal plants, and I imagine all that covered in red plastic cups and beer cans, terror is one of the main emotions I feel. Thanks for your concern.
1 Like
It’s some trash. That can be picked up.
Great! So we’ll see you out here after the concert with a trash bag and your great, positive attitude towards this easy task? That’s good news, I’m happy you care about this place as much as I do.
1 Like
I watched the video on mute so perhaps in the video they referred to it as a “festival.” But as far as I can tell that was just a single, basic concert. One night, not a whole weekend with dozens of acts performing. Why does everyone keep comparing it to a festival?
1 Like
I happened to be in the right place at the right time 4 years ago to see a guy directly in front of me in a pickup truck decide he didn’t want to be on the on-ramp anymore and instead took off over the newly-sodded hill to get to the highway about 100 feet before the rest of us. Every time I see that grass mound, I can’t help but notice the gaping tire tracks which still haven’t filled in with grass or other plants because it got so chewed up at a crucial growing moment.
When people trash a place, it’s not always a quick fix to make things right again.
3 Likes
I live next to a narrow road through the woods, although my little valley is surrounded by suburban sprawl. Therefore I have to pick up the garbage you town folk throw out of your car windows nearly every day. So I’ve got no sympathy at all for country fans (or anybody else) dropping their trash everywhere.
But riddle me this: When that trash is picked up in Pittsburgh, and those hollers in Tennessee are cleared out, where do you think the garbage goes? It does not magically get jetted into the Sun, it does not get used to create clean fusion energy in Doc Brown’s Delorean. It gets dumped someplace where affluent folks don’t have to look at it so y’all can pretend that it’s magically going away. And you know who lives in those places? Poor people. Really poor people.
I’ve met people on Liberty Avenue in Pittsburgh who would not be out of place in a third world trash mountain community. Country fans might be just making the (totally understandable) assumption that Pittsburgh is where trash goes.
Only partly kidding.
I thought country music fans were supposed to be all about independence and hard work and self-determination. Seems to me that a person who depends on other people just to pick up the trail of filth they leave int their wake is the opposite of that. Littering isn’t the worst crime people can commit, but it’s a crime driven by pure, unadulterated laziness.
Also: “Trash can be picked up” is not strictly true. Garbage strewn on the ground is scattered everywhere, so a clean-up crew is unlikely to get it all. Some forms of litter (i.e. cigarette butts) leech toxins into the surrounding environment and water supply.
1 Like
Welcome to the government run infrastructure - full of “not my job”.
Look I don’t promote littering or tearing up public landscaping. I used to camp a lot and made a lot of effort not to leave anything behind.
I just have to roll my eyes when someone is “terrified” about the mess left behind by a festival or what ever.
Aw come on man. Cigarette butts leeching into our water supply? What about the hidden dangers of patchouli overdose?
Country music fans hardly hold the monopoly on being slobs. Anywhere you have a mass gathering of people, especially with lots of drugs and alcohol, and peoples’ “give-a-fuck-o-meter” where that Evian or Bud Light container goes right out the window. Which is why these places generally have a mass clean up crew for after the event.
1 Like
Yes, let’s blame government-run infrastructure for private citizens acting like pigs. I’m sure if that had been a privately owned toll road then the pickup truck driver @anon67050589 mentioned would have been so much more respectful.
I once had a summer job that involved picking up a lot of litter. It didn’t make me grateful for the people who left it behind, if anything it filled me with more contempt for the trasholes who leave trails of filth in their wake.
Not a monopoly, but a pretty good claim to the crown. The article notes that Pittsburgh is hardly a stranger to concerts, but this one left a tidal wave of trash the likes of which they’d never seen.
Ever see photos of what Black Rock Desert looks like after Burning Man wraps up?
8 Likes
I’m in no way blaming anyone else or excusing someone’s actions to act like a jack ass and tear up grass around a highway or on ramp. It’s just not a wonder that when this happens, it can take a long time (if ever) to get fixed. This includes things like accidents where they have to repair the anti-cross over wire in the median, which usually get fixed, though not necessarily the ruts.
Hey - that’s great. A wonderful example of what can be accomplished when people pitch in and a reminder there are no absolutes. Of course Burning Man is more like a camp out - you have to live there for awhile, not just get drunk in the parking lot, go see a show, and then go home. Usually camping sites and public land have the same laws about taking your trash with you etc and are cleaning in a similar manner.
It can -also- not be dropped and ground into the earthen camping/parking areas. Can’t it? Yasgurs farm had the benefit of having been tilled and used repeatedly for generations. That’s different from southern oregon. The soils don’t deal with abuse well, AT ALL there.
But it can be ‘picked up’, sure man, it’s somebody elses backyard, what do they have to complain about? right?
1 Like
Except for the ‘accident’ part. We’re discussing jackassery, not accidents.
I reeeeeally don’t like it when someone does something accitentionally.
2 Likes
Fine, if you don’t want to compare the country music fans to Burning Man then compare them to other concert goers in Pittsburgh. Like Rob said:
Big-name concerts are regular here, too: it’s only these guys! No-one else does this.
There is clearly something wrong with the mindset of people who attend country music concerts in Pittsburgh that doesn’t seem to exist to the same degree in other music fans.
I assume it’s illegal to leave piles of trash everywhere in the streets and parking lots of Pittsburgh. It’s not the law which is the problem, it’s the people who have no regard for either the law nor basic standards of human decency.
Yes yes, and there was like 100 tons of trash at the 2009 Presidential Inauguration. People in general are slobs. Generally adding more of them will create the “bystander effect” where they assume someone else will do something about it.
If you want to point at certain events leaving trash and call those people horrible to make yourself feel better and reconfirm your thoughts that these were horrible people, more power to you, I guess.
On the Gauley River in West Virginia there’s a rapid called Canyon Doors where creeks flow into the river through hollers carved all the way through slots in the canyon wall. The next rapid down is called … wait for it … Junkyard. The lore says you have to watch out for large appliances; it gives “getting Maytagged” a whole new meaning.
That hurts just to read.
If you want to see a prime example of music fans who can be found at large venues, with a ripe history of hard partying, but who really know how to pick up after themselves, look no further than Phish.
The Phish scene is built around the notion of extreme “tailgating” of the impromptu village variety, which stems from the Grateful Dead scene of the 70s and 80s. People set up an insta-main street through the middle of the parking lot where food, beers, clothes, accessories and much more can be acquired. This draws people to the parking lots very early, often late morning to early afternoon. This scenario pretty much guarantees an abundance of trash generated.
However, to minimize their impact, and help ensure that Phish is welcomed back in the future, the fans have established the Green Crew. The Green Crew is a group of volunteers who distribute garbage bags to every vendor, and many/most cars where tailgating is happening. They pick up and organize trash during the day. After the concert, they make a first-pass inside the venue ahead of the hired garbage grew, before spending hours cleaning up the parking lot. Within the Phish culture, the Green Crew commands reverence and respect, and because they are 100% volunteer AND self-organized casual Phish fans, it establishes a psychological notion that everyone can and should handle their own trash first. And it leaves a good taste in the mouths of the venue operators and city officials, knowing that the impact that Phish fans could potentially make is acknowledged in advance and expressly minimized.
I love Phish Green Crew!
6 Likes
I have walked through that tail-gating area over 14 times in the past two years. There are plenty of trash cans by stage AE and Heinz field, even RECYCLING BINS. Pitt fans can clean up after themselves. Country fans, half of whom come to tailgate (without concert tickets) then bug out once the concert starts, leave this place a mess with no excuse. I was there last summer to know that the people who trashed the place were not there to enjoy music.
1 Like
