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nigelswift
8112 posts

Edited Sep 04, 2012, 08:46
Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 08:43
........
Littlestone
Littlestone
5386 posts

Edited Sep 04, 2012, 08:49
Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 08:48
Brilliant! That deserves its own thread - Climbing Silbury - feelings vs facts - lest it gets buried and forgotten amongst this one on the wider (and equally important) issue of trespass at SSSI sites.

Silbury is a special case.
Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 09:10
Rhiannon,

As I've stated earlier, im no advocate of climbing the hill, but I'd like to ask you a question.
If you were at Skara Brae alone and after hours and an opportunity presented itself for you to enter the houses for a few minutes, without being 'caught', would you do it?

I'd just like the position to be clarified, because there's some possible misinterpretation here. Merely setting foot on Silbury damages it in a way that setting foot inside a house at Skara Brae wouldn't damage that structure, granted, but would you, if you knew you could 100% 'get away with it', so to speak, enter one of those houses?
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 09:46
I'm not sure my own particular behaviour is central, that isn't really what I was getting at although I used myself as an example about Silbury.

I think the underlying issue's the same though. If people sit down and discuss the issues, and decide in a logical way that there's a risk that a precious site will be damaged because of the footfall of lots of people, then you have to stop large numbers of people stepping on the site.

If that means the general public can't wander around Skara Brae, Stonehenge, Silbury, then that's how it is.

And we are the general public. Even though some of us might like to think we're extra special and the rules don't apply to us.

OF COURSE I'd like to sit in Skara Brae, put my cup of tea on the sideboard, snuggle down in one of the beds, imagine myself back in the stone age and listen to the wind howling outside Etc- who bloody wouldn't, especially weird people that have a particular obsession with all things prehistoric?

But it's irrelevant, because the rule is no one is allowed to do that. It's not quite the same thing as sneaking into the ruined abbey at Canterbury after hours (as I did many years ago) because that's somewhere that everyone is allowed to trudge round during the day.

The question is, am I more special than everyone else, do I have some special right to bend the rules that apply to everyone else for the good of the site? What's more important in the long run, the welfare of the site or me satisfying my impulse?

(It sounds like I like rules, I don't particularly, but I think we're talking about rules as in societal consensus. The people looking after Silbury, Skara Brae, Stonehenge, you'd like to think they are people who have the sites' protection at heart, and they're experienced / educated people who have been hired for their expertise. So if they decide we shouldn't trample all over Silbury etc, in this case I'm willing to believe that it's quite a good decision)
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Edited Sep 04, 2012, 09:55
Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 09:50
oh I missed out that you said "Merely setting foot on Silbury damages it in a way that setting foot inside a house at Skara Brae wouldn't damage that structure"

I'm not sure there's any difference, you can say that one person climbing silbury - I climbing silbury - does not leave any noticeable damage at all. Likewise at Skara Brae. But the important thing is the cumulative damage to our irreplaceable prehistoric structures.

That's why people aren't allowed to wander through Skara Brae, right? What other reason would there be? It got nearly 70 thousand tourists this year!
nigelswift
8112 posts

Edited Sep 04, 2012, 10:01
Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 09:59
"The question is, am I more special than everyone else, do I have some special right to bend the rules that apply to everyone else for the good of the site? What's more important in the long run, the welfare of the site or me satisfying my impulse?

(It sounds like I like rules, I don't particularly, but I think we're talking about rules as in societal consensus. The people looking after Silbury, Skara Brae, Stonehenge, you'd like to think they are people who have the sites' protection at heart, and they're experienced / educated people who have been hired for their expertise. So if they decide we shouldn't trample all over Silbury etc, in this case I'm willing to believe that it's quite a good decision)"
.......................................................

....tumultuous applause....
(From me anyway)
tjj
tjj
3606 posts

Edited Sep 04, 2012, 10:58
Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 10:06
Rhiannon wrote:
I'm not sure my own particular behaviour is central, that isn't really what I was getting at although I used myself as an example about Silbury.

I think the underlying issue's the same though. If people sit down and discuss the issues, and decide in a logical way that there's a risk that a precious site will be damaged because of the footfall of lots of people, then you have to stop large numbers of people stepping on the site.

If that means the general public can't wander around Skara Brae, Stonehenge, Silbury, then that's how it is.

And we are the general public. Even though some of us might like to think we're extra special and the rules don't apply to us.

OF COURSE I'd like to sit in Skara Brae, put my cup of tea on the sideboard, snuggle down in one of the beds, imagine myself back in the stone age and listen to the wind howling outside Etc- who bloody wouldn't, especially weird people that have a particular obsession with all things prehistoric?

But it's irrelevant, because the rule is no one is allowed to do that. It's not quite the same thing as sneaking into the ruined abbey at Canterbury after hours (as I did many years ago) because that's somewhere that everyone is allowed to trudge round during the day.

The question is, am I more special than everyone else, do I have some special right to bend the rules that apply to everyone else for the good of the site? What's more important in the long run, the welfare of the site or me satisfying my impulse?

(It sounds like I like rules, I don't particularly, but I think we're talking about rules as in societal consensus. The people looking after Silbury, Skara Brae, Stonehenge, you'd like to think they are people who have the sites' protection at heart, and they're experienced / educated people who have been hired for their expertise. So if they decide we shouldn't trample all over Silbury etc, in this case I'm willing to believe that it's quite a good decision)


Thanks for your posts Rhiannon, as ever you've pulled everything together in a down to earth way that we can all relate to.
One of Skara Brae's biggest threats is from the elements and natural erosion - this might not apply to Silbury but all of us here watched with bated breath back in 2007 when Silbury was so very fragile and it wouldn't stop raining. The work, albeit left too long, to strengthen and 'rebuild' Silbury from the inside out was an engineering wonder ... I for one won't forget how tenuous it all seemed for a while.
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 10:09
Thank you Nigel.

Ultimately it's only my opinion. But it does seem like a no-brainer to me. And it does surprise me that the topic goes round and round on this forum, because you'd imagine the very people you'd find here, they'd be the ones most keen to look after these islands' prehistory. But as it turns out some fans of prehistory think they're more equal than others. Is that because of some spurious spiritual connection they've got that no one else can understand. Or is it that they just think Fuck The Law in general. Or what is it. I'm intrigued to know.

Anyway having stirred that up I really ought to go and do some work :)
Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 11:11
Rhiannon wrote:
I'm not sure my own particular behaviour is central, that isn't really what I was getting at although I used myself as an example about Silbury.

I think the underlying issue's the same though. If people sit down and discuss the issues, and decide in a logical way that there's a risk that a precious site will be damaged because of the footfall of lots of people, then you have to stop large numbers of people stepping on the site.

If that means the general public can't wander around Skara Brae, Stonehenge, Silbury, then that's how it is.

And we are the general public. Even though some of us might like to think we're extra special and the rules don't apply to us.

OF COURSE I'd like to sit in Skara Brae, put my cup of tea on the sideboard, snuggle down in one of the beds, imagine myself back in the stone age and listen to the wind howling outside Etc- who bloody wouldn't, especially weird people that have a particular obsession with all things prehistoric?

But it's irrelevant, because the rule is no one is allowed to do that. It's not quite the same thing as sneaking into the ruined abbey at Canterbury after hours (as I did many years ago) because that's somewhere that everyone is allowed to trudge round during the day.

The question is, am I more special than everyone else, do I have some special right to bend the rules that apply to everyone else for the good of the site? What's more important in the long run, the welfare of the site or me satisfying my impulse?

(It sounds like I like rules, I don't particularly, but I think we're talking about rules as in societal consensus. The people looking after Silbury, Skara Brae, Stonehenge, you'd like to think they are people who have the sites' protection at heart, and they're experienced / educated people who have been hired for their expertise. So if they decide we shouldn't trample all over Silbury etc, in this case I'm willing to believe that it's quite a good decision)


Absolutely agreed.

Regarding my direct question, you don't have to answer it, of course, but i'm keen to hear the honest answer.

I'm not trying to catch anybody out here, and for me, at least, the question wasn't "Am I more special than everybody else" (although I can see how it might have been interpreted in that way).

My direct question was coming more from a philosophical attitude, perhaps trying to form ideas of how human beings interact with places they feel attached or drawn to. The 'law' and the idea of site preservation just make this more intruiging.
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 11:13
So you can't tell what my answer is?
I must try not to waffle so much.
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