NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby GroundquestMSA » Mar 31, 2020 9:01 pm

Squirrel Girl wrote:Yowsa! A) Though there are a number of highly difficult personalities in caving, I disagree on your assessment of the NSS. I've got other things to do, or I'd type up with the many good things it does.
B) A few years ago, I purchased a couple hundred acres of NM rocky desert. I has a road that leads to USFS land, though that is closed to motor vehicles. I have tons of trespassers, and it makes me really mad. I put a gate across the road and added a "private road" "No Trespassing" sign and someone stole my gate! People trespass all the time. I absolutely, emphatically find trespassing abominable!


Hey there. I'm not bothered in the least by the difficult personalities in caving. My assessment of the NSS comes from the perspective of one who didn't know the NSS existed until after many years of caving, who then joined and got involved to some small extent, and who then saw that the mission statement was hollow and that the organization was of little personal or ecological benefit. So I quit giving it money. I do appreciate many of the books the NSS has published, and feel that a national caving library is a very worthwile thing. Other than that, I'm unimpressed or discouraged by it. But I don't need to attack the NSS piece by piece. Besides, I think I've already done that here before. Most importantly, there are lots of very kind and high-quality people involved with the NSS, and I don't wish to attack any individuals.

I wonder why trespassing is abominable to you? This is an honest question. I think it involves some cultural mutation of values, and you are in a prime position (as owner of a "large" amount of non-commercial land) to give me some perspective I would truly value.

Thanks
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby FreightTrain » Mar 31, 2020 10:56 pm

This has become a thoroughly enjoyable and interesting read. Thank you all for one of the more exciting exchanges we've had in a while. Lol.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby trogman » Apr 2, 2020 8:19 am

GroundquestMSA wrote:
Squirrel Girl wrote:Yowsa! A) Though there are a number of highly difficult personalities in caving, I disagree on your assessment of the NSS. I've got other things to do, or I'd type up with the many good things it does.
B) A few years ago, I purchased a couple hundred acres of NM rocky desert. I has a road that leads to USFS land, though that is closed to motor vehicles. I have tons of trespassers, and it makes me really mad. I put a gate across the road and added a "private road" "No Trespassing" sign and someone stole my gate! People trespass all the time. I absolutely, emphatically find trespassing abominable!


Hey there. I'm not bothered in the least by the difficult personalities in caving. My assessment of the NSS comes from the perspective of one who didn't know the NSS existed until after many years of caving, who then joined and got involved to some small extent, and who then saw that the mission statement was hollow and that the organization was of little personal or ecological benefit. So I quit giving it money. I do appreciate many of the books the NSS has published, and feel that a national caving library is a very worthwile thing. Other than that, I'm unimpressed or discouraged by it. But I don't need to attack the NSS piece by piece. Besides, I think I've already done that here before. Most importantly, there are lots of very kind and high-quality people involved with the NSS, and I don't wish to attack any individuals.

I wonder why trespassing is abominable to you? This is an honest question. I think it involves some cultural mutation of values, and you are in a prime position (as owner of a "large" amount of non-commercial land) to give me some perspective I would truly value.

Thanks

Hey GroundquestMSA, a couple of questions for you to consider:
1) If you appreciate the NSS books and the library, how do you expect such things to happen without the support of members through their finances and volunteer efforts?
2) As I said in another post, I believe that the best way to change an organization is from within. If you have ideas about how to improve the NSS, and to change the things that you see as flaws, then wouldn't you and we be better served by your being a member and helping fix those issues?

There are a number of reasons I am a member. For one, I couldn't be a member of my state cave survey group w/o being an NSS member. Then there is the monthly publication, The NSS News, which is worth the membership price alone. Lots of great trip reports, caving news, and great photos. Those are my top two reasons.

Trogman :helmet:
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby GroundquestMSA » Apr 2, 2020 8:59 pm

trogman wrote:Hey GroundquestMSA, a couple of questions for you to consider:
1) If you appreciate the NSS books and the library, how do you expect such things to happen without the support of members through their finances and volunteer efforts?
2) As I said in another post, I believe that the best way to change an organization is from within. If you have ideas about how to improve the NSS, and to change the things that you see as flaws, then wouldn't you and we be better served by your being a member and helping fix those issues?

There are a number of reasons I am a member. For one, I couldn't be a member of my state cave survey group w/o being an NSS member. Then there is the monthly publication, The NSS News, which is worth the membership price alone. Lots of great trip reports, caving news, and great photos. Those are my top two reasons.

Trogman :helmet:


Howdy.
1. I would support a national caving publisher and library as a separate organization. I acknowledge a debt to the NSS for the many books and magazines they have published. However, other, smaller, organizations have produced books and magazines of exceptional quality without the help of NSS. Perhaps an organization dedicated solely to producing high-quality material and compiling an exhaustive mass of caving literature would be well supported and deliver the best of the NSS without need for the worst.
2. I do not want to change the NSS. Put most bluntly, I would that it disappear. The culture that organized cavers have created and encouraged is not one that I can conscientiously share in. I cannot change that culture from within it. The membership, thanks to not only to decades of established caving culture but also generations of powerful social conditioning on the national level, are not equipped to even comprehend the (ecological, spiritual, practical, social) values of someone like myself, much less can they weigh and refine and discuss and, most of all, actively adopt, alien ideas.

This does not mean that NSS is evil, or that I have no respect for its members. Only that at its sanest it is not important to me, and is, in its sometimes blindness and hypocrisy, a source of sadness and frustration. But I'm just one little person, and not important either. I responded to try and give Mr. Martello some perspective on the nature of the NSS. Alas, he seems to be a permanent resident of a very specialized fantasyland, and I think should be left to his rage.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby NZcaver » Apr 4, 2020 3:41 am

This topic has become rather spicy. Time to dust off the moderator hat for a moment. Spirited discussion is fine, but clear violations of the forum Terms of Service are not.

When you join the forum: "You agree not to post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful, threatening, sexually-orientated or any other material that the moderators deem offensive. Doing so may lead to you being immediately and permanently banned."

Specifically:
arachiya1 wrote:You sir, are an asshole and the very reason the NSS should be done away with. If you ever trespass on my land, I will shoot to kill you just like every other trespasser. You are all a bunch of scum bags with no respect at all for landowners and i hope all the landowners, which will never happen, shoot all of you the moment you cross the property line. The one good thing about you is that you are honest and admit what a scumbag you truly are.


Arachiya1, if you are really of the opinion that we (NSS members) "are all a bunch of scum bags" I see no reason for you to continue posting here on the official NSS forum. Consider this your one and only warning for threatening and abusive language. Or feel free to show yourself out. Thank you.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby ohiocaver » Apr 12, 2020 8:01 pm

To the question asked: What's the problem with trespass?
The answer is that it depends on where you are. In the USofA, we have a long-standing tradition of being selfish about land. A piece of property is mine, Mine, MINE and I can use lethal power to make you stay off my property. However, that is only one approach. In the UK, for example, anyone can walk across anyone else's property, field or farm...as long as they leave gates the way they found them and don't disturb property or livestock. Even in the states, we have some odd rules. For instance, in Michigan you can fish along any stream that is accessible from a public road (just about all of them). However, you are allowed only within 3 feet of the streambank - otherwise, you are trespassing. In Pennsylvania, you can hunt private land (in season) unless it is posted. The rest of the time, stay away.
It'll be a long time before we change society's viewpoint. I'm sure anyone who grew up in suburbia has a story or two of a neighbor confiscating some little kid's ball because it rolled into "his" yard. If society condones that kind of attitude over a tenth of an acre of crabgrass, how deeply engrained is this ethos?
In the US, we've even gone so far as to "close" the Grand Canyon and to "close" state parks and the 2200 miles of the Appalachian Trail (I get stopping services...I don't get "closing" 100,000 acres). The timid stay home.
I've deliberately avoided mentioning caving. I will say, however, that IMHO fortune favors the bold.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby NZcaver » Apr 13, 2020 4:36 am

ohiocaver wrote:To the question asked: What's the problem with trespass?
The answer is that it depends on where you are.

Good question, good answer. And I agree with most of your comments except the first one.

In the USofA, we have a long-standing tradition of being selfish about land. A piece of property is mine, Mine, MINE and I can use lethal power to make you stay off my property.

I can tell you that in the majority of US states, while you *can* use lethal power to make someone stay off your property, you will likely be tried for criminal homicide. An affirmative defense might be if the trespasser could reasonably be seen to be an actual threat to your life (or in some cases, livestock). Actions do have consequences, and it might behoove a potential trespasser to be aware of not just the law but also local "customs." It doesn't help being right when you're dead.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby ohiocaver » Apr 17, 2020 8:55 am

True about being criminally tried - even cops in righteous shootings are tried. However, the point is not what the landowner does as the chilling effect this atmosphere has on a potential hiker, hunter, caver, etc. in the US who must weigh the possibility of death or injury vs. taking a walk across a neighbor's lawn.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby GroundquestMSA » Apr 18, 2020 5:48 am

ohiocaver wrote:True about being criminally tried - even cops in righteous shootings are tried. However, the point is not what the landowner does as the chilling effect this atmosphere has on a potential hiker, hunter, caver, etc. in the US who must weigh the possibility of death or injury vs. taking a walk across a neighbor's lawn.


I'm not bold, but I'm comfortable with that math, and tresspassing doesn't make me nervous. The odds of being harmed are miniscule and not worth worrying about. The odds of a landowner having a hissy fit are slightly higher, so I try to avoid that. But even in that worst possible case it doesn't hurt me too much to watch people make asses of themselves.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby trogman » Apr 21, 2020 7:03 am

My son and I went hiking a few days ago, checking some LIDAR sinks. We parked on a gravel road just off the pavement that was not posted, nor was the land that we walked on posted. We walked ~1.5 miles, and never saw a sign. When we got back to the car there was a note which said "Don't trespass on my land or I will have you towed."
We got a chuckle out of that; since there was no sign or any way to know the land was posted, we were pretty sure he wouldn't have a legal leg to stand on. In such a case, I'm not even sure most towing companies would do the deed for him. We also wondered if he could perhaps be charged with grand theft auto.
Since none of the leads we looked at panned out, we have no plans of returning to this area anyway, which is a good thing.
Anybody else ever find any nasty notes on your car like this?

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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby Squirrel Girl » Apr 21, 2020 7:52 am

trogman wrote:My son and I went hiking a few days ago, checking some LIDAR sinks. We parked on a gravel road just off the pavement that was not posted, nor was the land that we walked on posted. We walked ~1.5 miles, and never saw a sign. When we got back to the car there was a note which said "Don't trespass on my land or I will have you towed."
We got a chuckle out of that; since there was no sign or any way to know the land was posted, we were pretty sure he wouldn't have a legal leg to stand on. In such a case, I'm not even sure most towing companies would do the deed for him. We also wondered if he could perhaps be charged with grand theft auto.
Since none of the leads we looked at panned out, we have no plans of returning to this area anyway, which is a good thing.
Anybody else ever find any nasty notes on your car like this?

Trogman :helmet:


Yeah, S/he needs to post "No trespassing" signs.

My experience with nasty notes, was a few years ago in suburbia. I carpooled with a co-worker. Twice/week, I'd ride with him. He suggested I park, not on his cul de sac, but on the main road. Someone left a note saying not to park in front of their hose. D'oh! It's a public road. Nothing they can do. But then I no longer worked that project and quit parking there.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby GroundquestMSA » Apr 21, 2020 7:46 pm

trogman wrote:My son and I went hiking a few days ago, checking some LIDAR sinks. We parked on a gravel road just off the pavement that was not posted, nor was the land that we walked on posted. We walked ~1.5 miles, and never saw a sign. When we got back to the car there was a note which said "Don't trespass on my land or I will have you towed."
We got a chuckle out of that; since there was no sign or any way to know the land was posted, we were pretty sure he wouldn't have a legal leg to stand on. In such a case, I'm not even sure most towing companies would do the deed for him. We also wondered if he could perhaps be charged with grand theft auto.
Since none of the leads we looked at panned out, we have no plans of returning to this area anyway, which is a good thing.
Anybody else ever find any nasty notes on your car like this?

Trogman :helmet:


In a particular Virginia county I used to get notes from the police department a lot, saying to call them. My van would be reported as suspicious or the police would wonder why it was parked along the road with out of state tags. One night I was on a solo survey trip with permission from the landowner to stay overnight on the edge of his field. Unaware of my plans, the tenant got worried when I wasn't back before dark and called a police officer, who found the cave and came in a few hundred feet hollering for me. I didn't hear him. I came out of the cave in the middle of the night and had made some food and coffee when the officer returned with backup. We talked for a while and drank coffee and everything got sorted out. After they left I got to sleep but about 4am another policeman stopped and knocked on my van windows worried I'd crashed or overdosed or something. So I got to meet a lot of cops that night and they were all very friendly and apparently passed the word around and I got a reputation as the cave guy and was left alone ever after. The End.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby ohiocaver » Apr 24, 2020 8:05 pm

Had a similar experience when hiking the Horseshoe Trail in PA (we did it in sections). We had parked on the side of a gravel road. As we returned to the car, a guy belligerently asked why we thought we could park just anywhere in his front yard. There was a ditch between the road and the woods and we were about 100 feet from his "lawn" area. He then spent some time telling us that next time he'd slash our tires and break our windows. "How'd you like it if I parked by your house?" he asked. I told him that would be just fine - he could park in my driveway. I told him my address, and invited him to come over for a beer. He gave me the finger and went inside. But it would have been mighty inconvenient to have to walk out and find four new tires on a Sunday evening.
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby trogman » Apr 29, 2020 1:15 pm

ohiocaver wrote:Had a similar experience when hiking the Horseshoe Trail in PA (we did it in sections). We had parked on the side of a gravel road. As we returned to the car, a guy belligerently asked why we thought we could park just anywhere in his front yard. There was a ditch between the road and the woods and we were about 100 feet from his "lawn" area. He then spent some time telling us that next time he'd slash our tires and break our windows. "How'd you like it if I parked by your house?" he asked. I told him that would be just fine - he could park in my driveway. I told him my address, and invited him to come over for a beer. He gave me the finger and went inside. But it would have been mighty inconvenient to have to walk out and find four new tires on a Sunday evening.



:laughing: That's hilarious!
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Re: NSS members disregarding caving proceedures

Postby danstraley » Jul 7, 2020 4:32 pm

Ohhh.. haha.. as a longtime Florida caver, I'm 100% sure I know everyone involved here.. and I can't believe that this many words have been written over dragon cave... geezussss! it's a tiny, tight cave, but a thru trip for the small people as I remember.. there used to be a mattress in the other nerd hole next to it, for sexy time.. hahaha.. if memory serves it barely qualifies to be listed in the FCS under the 30ft rule.. I'll keep in mind that it's off limits.. as it's located very close to an interesting old tour cave..
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