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Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 11:16
Rhiannon wrote:
So you can't tell what my answer is?
I must try not to waffle so much.


Lets not play politicians. Well be starting all posts with "Listen.." next ;)

You don't have to answer, naturally.
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 11:36
Er I already have.
Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 11:54
Rhiannon wrote:
Er I already have.


Lets leave it there shall we.

My own honest response to the question I posed you presents me with a dilemma. I would almost certainly take that opportunity, and, as i'm sure you can imagine, I feel that paints me as the kind of individual that you would like to throw a sharp stick at.
But I care deeply about these places and love visitng them. I love reading about them and the entire subject of prehistory, the magic and mystery, as I see it, fills my thoughts every day.

Am I the enemy?

I attempt to resolve this issue by remembering i'm a human being. I could do better (by not taking that opportunity) but, actually, I do alot of good too, and on the extremely rare occasion I break the rules, I admit it to myself. Its not an easily defended position, but its an honest one.
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Edited Sep 04, 2012, 12:19
Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 12:12
Of course you're not the enemy, I mean all this brilliant stuff "fills my thoughts every day" too as you must realise.

And as I said, nothing would make me happier than to sit in Skara Brae in a deerskin and try to grasp that ineffable thing that draws us all to these sites.

But what I'm saying is, we shouldn't do that at the sites that are in danger like Skara Brae, Silbury, Stonehenge. We have to respect them because we are the ones that really love them and we have to set an example to other people. How can we demand that other people respect them and look after them, if we then decide we're so Special that we can bend the rules? We love them So Much that we're allowed special dispensation? It won't wash. It's like those vermin politicians telling the country how to live (Back To Basics) and then having affairs and claiming for duck houses for their moats. If you've truly got principles then you have to stick by them, surely?

I'm sure we all have sites that are local to us, where nobody else seems to go, where you might meet another person occasionally, but often you wonder if it's just you and the partridges that even know it exists. And you can get that special tma connect-with-the-ancestors vibe at those places perfectly well = perhaps better than at a big half-spoiled show site like Avebury or wherever. There's no interpretation boards, no pavement, no mown grass, just you and whatever's left to snatch out of the landscape to try and imagine what it would have been like there 5000 years ago.

I'm not saying we shouldn't visit places like those and walk there, sit amongst them, picnic, chat, paint, whatever. That's the very thing we all love doing. And there's minimal harm because there aren't 70,000 visitors a year doing the same thing, maybe not even 70. But some places require us to put our personal whims aside and behave in the long term interests of the site and the people in the future that might want to see their inheritance too. I don't see that's so much to ask.

You seem to imply you just wouldn't be able to help yourself at Skara Brae. It's not a matter of huge willpower though? Erm shall I shan't I? Oh I simply must, I can't hold myself back, it's beyond my control? Surely not.

Also you seem to imply I'm being dishonest to myself for claiming I wouldn't do it. But I'm far from perfect and I really don't think I would. I think I could bear to hold myself back. It wouldn't be too much of a dilemma.
Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 12:48
Rhiannon wrote:
How can we demand that other people respect them and look after them, if we then decide we're so Special that we can bend the rules? We love them So Much that we're allowed special dispensation? It won't wash.


I would not think I am special if I were to break a rule at Skara Brae and spend 2 minutes sitting on the floor in one of the houses.
I would not think it was my right or it was ok because "I know better than 99% of the general public", or that I have special dispensation.
Not at all. I would feel guilt.

But it goes beyond that, for me. It really does. But I cannot defend it.
This is why its a dilemma for me.
I suppose I could attempt a defence by saying that if 70,000 people did what I would do, exactly, sit on a modern gravel floor in one the houses, there would be no damage. But I realise I'm on difficult ground. (I don't mean the gravel would be uncomfortable :) )

Rhiannon wrote:

You seem to imply you just wouldn't be able to help yourself at Skara Brae. It's not a matter of huge willpower though? Erm shall I shan't I? Oh I simply must, I can't hold myself back, it's beyond my control? Surely not.

Also you seem to imply I'm being dishonest to myself for claiming I wouldn't do it. But I'm far from perfect and I really don't think I would. I think I could bear to hold myself back. It wouldn't be too much of a dilemma.


I'm going to get a bit weird now probably (if I haven't already).
Human beings made these places, and human beings are interested in them now, still. We are all clinging to a huge rock in an unfathomable universe.
In 40 years I won't be here (probably less).

If I am responsible for myself (theres not enough of this these days) and ensure I do no damage, then, yes, I simply MUST experience something as wonderful as one of those houses.
And the houses will still be there in 4000 years time if I treat them well whilst experiencing them.

Maybe that is an impossibility at Silbury Hill.

I can't resolve the argument to my satisfaction, and I know your opinion is the correct one in my heart, but I feel theres more to be explored in the detail.
Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 12:57
Apologies if i've taken this a bit OT.
Rhiannon
5290 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 13:05
I don't see how, I think this is a very interesting conversation and totally at the heart of what a tma forum ought to be about.

Also, we don't seem to be arguing or slagging each other off which is especially nice :)

I can totally relate to what you're saying, about the wanting to connect with something (perhaps that's what you're saying). something about what human beings are all about. something that you can only get a clearer idea of when you're dealing in time frames much bigger than a single lifetime. dunno.

But what do you make of my point that there are other places you could go and experience something of that? That it doesn't have to be the carefully managed and manicured begravelled Skara Brae? That in fact there might be even better places? But I realise Skara Brae is pretty ace. You don't get neolithic sideboards everywhere.
nigelswift
8112 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 13:08
I reckon that basically, there's no moral or logical justification for breaking rules that have a logical justification, are respected by everyone else and which are likely to have their effectiveness eroded if you flout them.

"In 40 years I won't be here" and "I really, really want to" can both be said by the great majority that DO resist breaking rules. Imagine if they didnt! Instant return to the jungle.
moss
moss
2897 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 13:09
Not sure where to aim this but in all this debating something seems to have been forgotten and that is IT is a SSSI, which means according to me anyway, that it is a defined landscape in need of protection of people's heavy boots on the delicate wild plants. Man versus the landscape, I always choose the flora and fauna to protect, though it could be argued that the surface of Silbury was originally chalk, but according to a recent survey by English Nature Silbury is defined as 'UNFAVOURABLE RECOVERING."

http://www.english-nature.org.uk/citation/citation_photo/1002057.pdf

Which surely begs the behaviour of us, the human species, to keep off the grass and allow nature to take its course, even if it does mean sheep grazing, I think the bunnies will have to be shot for their burrow making capacity though, reproduction elsewhere will account for numbers lost....

I suspect site boards will have to be part of the picture, but making people responsible for the natural environment is also important and maybe help the general consensus of keeping off the mound......
Evergreen Dazed
1881 posts

Re: feelings vs facts
Sep 04, 2012, 13:18
moss wrote:
Not sure where to aim this but in all this debating something seems to have been forgotten and that is IT is a SSSI, which means according to me anyway, that it is a defined landscape in need of protection of people's heavy boots on the delicate wild plants. Man versus the landscape, I always choose the flora and fauna to protect, though it could be argued that the surface of Silbury was originally chalk, but according to a recent survey by English Nature Silbury is defined as 'UNFAVOURABLE RECOVERING."

http://www.english-nature.org.uk/citation/citation_photo/1002057.pdf

Which surely begs the behaviour of us, the human species, to keep off the grass and allow nature to take its course, even if it does mean sheep grazing, I think the bunnies will have to be shot for their burrow making capacity though, reproduction elsewhere will account for numbers lost....

I suspect site boards will have to be part of the picture, but making people responsible for the natural environment is also important and maybe help the general consensus of keeping off the mound......


It doesn't relate to Silbury obviously, and you may already know, but SSSIs are not 'closed' to the public by definition of them being SSSIs. There are many places with footpaths running through them.
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