Rosher.Net

I came away from Druid Camp knowing the site was in use again the following week for Super Spirit. As we left, we made sure we left the site in good order. That’s a part of finding relationship with a place. Now that Super Spirit too has ended, I’ve come across a photograph of the site, taken as they break down the main marquees, and it offers such a direct alternative, a mirror to another photo from another festival in the last week, that I needed to write about it.

Here’s the Druid Camp and Super Spirit site, shot courtesy of Sonia Hunt:

All that is left behind is the yellow footprint of the tents that were here, some for more than a fortnight. Once the marquees are gone, and a careful sweep done of the site, this will again be home to cows. Until next time.

Then there’s a recent festival near Leeds…

I’ve just put up a screen shot of the video, which you can find here. I’m grateful both to Sophie for her video and to Sonia for her shot of the Flaxley site. If you needed a vision of how earth-based spirituality and commercialised hedonism could be distinguished, one from the other, here you have it.

How is it that anyone thinks the bottom picture is an acceptable way to behave? Clearly many hundreds thought it was, just as many hundreds felt otherwise on that lovely Forest of Dean site. What does it say of a society that produces people that produce such wasteful destruction of the environment? Ok, so there are companies now that make their living on cleaning up sites such as these – that’s how “normal” this is. Sometimes they claw back a few tents and sleeping bags that can be redistributed to charity work; mostly they send everything to landfill.

I guess I’m privileged to live in a decent part of England where this doesn’t happen in my face. But why is that a privilege? Why isn’t the top picture the normal one? There’s nothing more to say here.