Trash is trash is trash...right?

Billy "Poserlander" Badly said:
Yeah, in spite of my post, it's not so black and white, is it? Trash + Time = Artifact? Trash + Intention + Talent + Permission = Art, maybe? I don't know.

Mostly, I'm opposed to things like this: Woman who defiled national parks with graffiti banned from 524 million acres of public land as well as your standard camp waste, toilet paper, car parts, refrigerators, old tires, etc...

In other words, it's like pornography: I know it when I see it.
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Definitely true. It's subjective at best.

Defacing federally protected land, on the other hand, is a crime, plain and simple. I would hope any reasonable person would agree that's not OK - if not by moral standards, at least by the standards of simply being a law-abiding citizen.
 
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VCeXpedition said:
Trash vs. Art... It's all rusty metal in the desert!


A couple of sculptures out in Anza Borrego State Park --> very popular stop for tourists. Art? probably.
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Metal / tin cans left by previous inhabitants of Death Valley Mine out off of the Mojave Road. Art? Maybe not, but if someone wanted to clean it up, there would probably be someone that said that it should be left there because it's part of the history of that mine.
It appears as if this is where they just dumped their old food cans, probably over many years, this was just a small part of what was there. To me, it was kind of a cool find, but still, just someones trash.
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As odd as it seems, I would enjoy seeing that pile of cans as well. An interesting artifact that tells some kind of story. :grinning:

I wonder if there was any point in time when people were outraged about it, when the cans were still fresh garbage, before time had the opportunity to make them "historical".
 
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TacomaDave said:
It's a perspective thing. Hundreds of years ago bored Native American kids drew pictures on the rocks and cave walls. We treasure them today and call it petroglyphs. When modern kids do it we call it vandalism. Who knows what they'll call our trash 200 years from now. Those gnomes may be in a museum.
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Or the graffiti found on the walls of Pompai .
 
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Dave K said:
.....but then you have state sanctioned “art” out there as well. I’d say it’s all a blurry line at best. Eye of the beholder type thing I guess. I lean toward the “trash is trash” angle as I see the close it down angle being used one day. View attachment 91923
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Yah, it's become a popular tourist stop. I have mixed feelings about it, due to where the BLM allowed it to be set up.
If it had been put either in Jean, Nv. Or closer to Las Vegas, I might have accepted it with some enthusium..
 
Jeremiah Johnson said:
Anyhow, when I see stacked rocks or chunks of wood I toss them to the downhill side of the trail. If they want to stack them again it will take a bit more effort next time at least.
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Umm...

Don't go doing that in Moab.

Stacked rocks are known as "cairns". They are the markers for the trails so that folks don't wander off and damage the landscape. Many trails in Moab would be next to impossible to find without the cairns. If you were to remove those markers you would be doing far more harm than good.
 
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Anak said:
Umm...

Don't go doing that in Moab.

Stacked rocks are known as "cairns". They are the markers for the trails so that folks don't wander off and damage the landscape. Many trails in Moab would be next to impossible to find without the cairns. If you were to remove those markers you would be doing far more harm than good.
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I could have clarified I suppose. I wouldn't be going out in someone els's back yard and removing anything. I didn't do it in Afghanistan where the stacked rocks indicated the path through a minefield, etc. No, I knew this was simply the work of someone extremely bored because I watched them start appearing. Since that time I've even talked to the person who has been doing it. More than anything though, Moab is probably safe from me because I may have seen enough desert in my time. I enjoy the beautiful pictures shared by the members here but I don't feel that one calling.
 
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Jeremiah Johnson said:
I could have clarified I suppose. I wouldn't be going out in someone els's back yard and removing anything. I didn't do it in Afghanistan where the stacked rocks indicated the path through a minefield, etc. No, I knew this was simply the work of someone extremely bored because I watched them start appearing. Since that time I've even talked to the person who has been doing it. More than anything though, Moab is probably safe from me because I may have seen enough desert in my time. I enjoy the beautiful pictures shared by the members here but I don't feel that one calling.
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For me it was the exact opposite. Living in the desert SW, I went in 1975 as a kid for a month to New England. At first,....WOW...all this green. A month later, my thoughts were..."get me out of here"

Haze, mugginess , trees, trees, etc. My only respite was going to Cape Cod/ocean.
That was in the summer. Been back a couple of times as an adult, during the winter, and it was more enjoyable. The under brush had thinned, allowing more....line of,sight....thru the trees. I did like seeing all the ancient stone fences thru the trees, separate from modern boundary lines.
 
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So, it begs the question. If the gnomes (or toy trucks, or tea kettles, etc) are just things left behind by random people on public land, who would get in trouble for picking them all up and hauling them to the nearest dumpster? You would certainly be leaving the area better than you found it.
 
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Roots66 said:
So, it begs the question. If the gnomes (or toy trucks, or tea kettles, etc) are just things left behind by random people on public land, who would get in trouble for picking them all up and hauling them to the nearest dumpster? You would certainly be leaving the area better than you found it.
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I would not recommend this course of action, particularly if you want to be part of a respected community.

I don't understand why people have put those things there, but they represent a tradition to a number of people, and those people would certainly take offense. I think their offense at losing their tradition would be substantially greater than anyone else's offense at the tradition.

I have come across comparable things, though on a smaller scale, that are clearly grave markers or places where the ashes of the deceased were probably scattered. The things such as toy cars and small plaques certainly are not native to the location, but to take them away to satisfy my own desire for nature and nothing but nature would be self-centered and thoughtless.

A far better course of action would be to learn the history of the gnomes, or tea kettles or whatever. Then perhaps one could at least understand what others are doing and why. It may not be worth embracing, but it could help to differentiate the trash from the curious.

I don't have a problem distinguishing trash. It is the stuff that was thoughtlessly (at best) left behind. The gnomes and tea kettles required forethought and deliberate planning in order to arrive there. Someone (or a bunch of someones) had a purpose. Far be it from me to play "holier than thou" with their purpose. Anyone who does is likely to bring a backlash down on their own backs and quite possibly on the backs of all those with whom they are associated.

Don't mess with what you don't understand, and don't adopt a course of action which you cannot fully reverse.

My two cents, and that as someone who has spent hundreds of hours on Adopt-A-Trail cleaning projects.
 
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It's all MOOP = Matter Out Of Place. Some of you may recognize that term from a particular Leave No trace event sometimes referred to as TTITD (That Thing In The Desert). Personally, I like my wild 'n free public lands unadulterated, at least let me pretend to entertain the fantasy that no one else has ever been there before...
 
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Jeremiah Johnson said:
There's a river here in Oregon where people leave pumpkins on rocks. It started of as sort of a head scratcher, like how did that pumpkin get way up there? Now every Tom, Dick, and Harry is leaving pumpkins of all sizes all over the place. ODFW has to send rafts down to collect them there are so many.

I prefer the leave no trace approach. I get tired of hiking around my home area and seeing people stacking rocks, and firewood ends, basically anything that will sit still. It's disruptive to my outdoor experience to see this type of thing around every corner. I was on the stunning McKenzie River Trail once and rounded the corner to find somebodys trash pile on the side of the trail. Turns out it was some half-hearted attempt at a shrine for the Black Lives Matter movement. Why in the world would anyone feel that one of the most beautiful trails in the state was the place for that? It was very close to a road crossing so it was obvious they didn't have to pack all that junk very far. (Please don't read into this as my opinion on BLM, this is just how I feel about any trash, be it political or not, left in the wilderness.)

Anyhow, when I see stacked rocks or chunks of wood I toss them to the downhill side of the trail. If they want to stack them again it will take a bit more effort next time at least.
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Outside of Las Vegas, on the North end of MT. CHARLESTON (Cold Creek), there is an area that has wild horses. The residential community there started something that changed how the horses act. It seems years ago somebody their left their leftover pumpkins on the side of the road. And then others did too. The horses discovered a new SNACK, and ate them. Then honeydew and watermelon was left also. But only until it was scarfed down by the herd.
I grew up around horses, and we gave ours melons too. A real treat for them. For wild horses in the desert, think sagebrush vs juicy water enriched melons....

While cool to watch, the downside is a change in behavior....I stopped to photograph the area, and was surrounded by mares and their fillies/Colts. I mean touching and brushing distance against me. Our first horse was a wild capture/taming. I knew what a dangerous position I was in, if any dispute was to happen. A full power kick was possible. Not good, not good at all. And it happened so quick, that I got trapped and surrounded. Luckily they moved down the road, but it was a tense couple of minutes.

A little off topic....pumpkins.....rotting vs munching, but within the scope of stuff thrown out car windows.

A side note.....there are efforts to curb this practice, due to the horses becoming a road hazard, especially at night.
 
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Anak said:
I don't understand why people have put those things there, but they represent a tradition to a number of people, and those people would certainly take offense. I think their offense at losing their tradition would be substantially greater than anyone else's offense at the tradition.
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Good point....in American society now, there is power in victimhood. Whoever gets the most offended, WINS!!
 
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Anak said:
I would not recommend this course of action, particularly if you want to be part of a respected community.

I don't understand why people have put those things there, but they represent a tradition to a number of people, and those people would certainly take offense. I think their offense at losing their tradition would be substantially greater than anyone else's offense at the tradition.

I have come across comparable things, though on a smaller scale, that are clearly grave markers or places where the ashes of the deceased were probably scattered. The things such as toy cars and small plaques certainly are not native to the location, but to take them away to satisfy my own desire for nature and nothing but nature would be self-centered and thoughtless.

A far better course of action would be to learn the history of the gnomes, or tea kettles or whatever. Then perhaps one could at least understand what others are doing and why. It may not be worth embracing, but it could help to differentiate the trash from the curious.

I don't have a problem distinguishing trash. It is the stuff that was thoughtlessly (at best) left behind. The gnomes and tea kettles required forethought and deliberate planning in order to arrive there. Someone (or a bunch of someones) had a purpose. Far be it from me to play "holier than thou" with their purpose. Anyone who does is likely to bring a backlash down on their own backs and quite possibly on the backs of all those with whom they are associated.

Don't mess with what you don't understand, and don't adopt a course of action which you cannot fully reverse.

My two cents, and that as someone who has spent hundreds of hours on Adopt-A-Trail cleaning projects.
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Great point. I'm curious though - since it's public land, surely there are laws against trash being left out there (in this instance, "trash" being objectively considered to be anything left behind on the trail)?

Does anyone know if that's the case or what, if any, applicable laws there are? If there are laws, I think subjectivity goes out the window since that would mean it's objectively illegal.
 
Dave K said:
And if there are enough stickers placed there.... art?
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A interesting debate, where you think your held belief on art or trash, gets turned upside down, as others have chimed in with examples that will challenge yours. Sometimes it becomes a blurred line, as seen in Death Valley (NPS), where they could have enforced/removed tea pots, but made a decision ....NOT TOO. Another, as others on this thread have alluded to, is the BLM on the Mojave road. Both government entities have made a wink wink...nod nod decision... to let it go. My thought on this is that they would rather have a designated outlet for those that might have otherwise chose to leave stuff in other places.

"Does anyone know if that's the case or what, if any, applicable laws there are? If there are laws, I think subjectivity goes out the window since that would mean it's objectively illegal. "

Yes, but as i said, and others have alluded to, it's a executive decision, by officials to direct a bad behavior action, into a particular direction/action.

The picture above is interesting,.....where?.....snow country obviously, and you wonder how many stickers were applied before it BECAME A THING! Not knowing where(BIASED), and taking a wild speculative guess, it looks like either Pyramid Lake......in WEST (NEVADA), or WILD HORSE Reservoir.....in (NE-NEVADA) areas. The scenery is similar to the picture shown, but could be anywhere in parts of the WEST.
 
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