Are there more ars*h*les in the hills now?

Yep. All a bit depressing really. Though just got back from a ride on the outskirts of Sheffield and everyone was pleasant, didn’t see any litter in the usual spots and only real blot was the remnants of the big moorland fire from the week from chuffers with a disposable BBQ on peat moorland.

The world is full of arseholes. Always has been, always will be.

Luckily, they’re a minority. Despite what the Daily Mail and social media would have us believe, most people are nice and just want to potter around in the least conspicuous way possible

Modern life just gives the arseholes greater and more noticeable ways to be arseholes

If disposable barbecues were readily available for 2 quid a pop at every garage and supermarket 30 years ago, the moors would have been ablaze every year then too

If disposable barbecues were readily available for 2 quid a pop at every garage and supermarket 30 years ago, the moors would have been ablaze every year then too

This is true. We've reduced the value of a lot of things so that they are disposable.

But I do think 30 years ago more folk had a basic awareness of themselves and thier actions...

For sure. We're getting all that plus heaps of quads. Quads chasing Dear with big dogs around my partner's school fields is my particular highlight.

General don't give a toss attitude is more acceptable.

I mean, clearly lockdown opened up the countryside in many ironic ways and people found new places. That's part of it plus I think Tory 'culture' is rubbing off on people. 'We can get away with anything.'

Definitely agree with you.

Awful. It's making me dislike my area which is full of fabulous riding.

Oh, way way more fly-tipping here too.

(Also for even more messy analysis - I think the whole culture war; GBnews, Talk radio etc basically creating intolerance amongst us is feeding in too.)

People need good jobs, prospects and social schemes. This is going to take some time to turn around.

****s everywhere. If you don't like what they're doing you're a snowflake or woke.

Yes I think there are. There was an increase in people venturing into the countryside during lockdown ('cos "stay local"). I had thought they would all sod off back to Blackpool afterwards but sadly that doesn't seem to be the case.

When I was a kid in the 70s we were taught the 'countryside code' at school and cubs/scouts.  On telly too - regular public info ads about littering and the countryside code etc.  I'm deffo not a rose tinted spec wearing nostalgia freak.  Things are better now in many ways, but a bit more education about stuff like this wouldn't go amiss.

). I had thought they would all sod off back to Blackpool afterwards but sadly that doesn’t seem to be the case.

This - there just not going back to the town centres these days.

Just from my own experience talking to my daughters (16 & 19) and their friends then they’re about a squillion times more conscious of environmental concerns than we ever were.

It’s also difficult to be critical when you spent the 90’s ripped to the tits on weapons grade MDMA at all nighters in fields and warehouses. I doubt the aftermath of that looked too pretty but there weren’t any Facebook groups to post pictures up and be suitably outraged about it all then

I even reported kids going up the street with guns (not covered up) - air-rifles (which are firearms) going into the woods shooting blindly.

Rang cops - "how do you know it was a gun?"

In my youth - I reported this once and an armed response team came out and took away three lads.

To be fair I did sit next to a bloke in Moab out with his family and he'd got his gun in his holster with him. Lmfao.

But I do think 30 years ago more folk had a basic awareness of themselves and thier actions…

I’m not so sure. My feeling is that folk just have more money so more cars and disposable income to go places and buy stuff.

I couldn't believe the amount of litter dropped @ trail heads especially cyb.

Yes... absolutely everywhere. I'm absolutely all for encourage folk to use the outdoors, but they need to be respectful - COVID seems to have introduced a load of 'new' people into the outdoors and they don't give a monkeys about how they treat it or leave it.

It isn't just COVID as it has been happening for years, but I genuinely dispair when I see the state people leave the outdoors.

I've said it before on other threads (and been shot down for it) but the people who started mountain biking in the 80s/90s seem to be the minority but have the most respect for the outdoors (in MTB circles). Plenty of other people who spend time.outdoors (who also MTB) also have respect for the outdoors but the new kids here now that seem to think they can build stuff anywhere and everywhere without seeking permission, those skidding all over the place for no real need and those just leaving all their litter...it is a shameful example of disrespect.

Stopping before I properly rant about it...

Just from my own experience talking to my daughters (16 & 19) and their friends then they’re about a squillion times more conscious of environmental concerns than we ever were.

They probably are, and yet, overwhelmingly, it's groups of young people that leave the most litter in the parks near me with their little shindigs.

Disposable BBQs need banning now, as does McDonald's 😊

I think a lot of people expect their shit to be cleared up by someone in the countryside much like they do/did at Blackpool or wherever.
Obviously it doesn't work like that.

This morning, picking up around the starting mound in the jump area of a big mountain bike area built locally to me.

There are more folk in the countryside. The percentage of arseholes is probably about the same. Do the maths.

Disposable BBQs need banning now

I thought they were going to be banned after a series of horrific injuries on beaches

There are more folk. The percentage of arseholes is probably about the same. Do the maths.

But the countryside is much more accessible to a greater percentage of people than it used to be and social media encourages people to go visit

I was thinking about this the other day, in the 70's I remember the ever present keep britain tidy campaign and the effect it slowly had on the country. It still exists I think but needs a reboot.

Driving up along many many roads the verges are just a shitstorm of litter, miles and miles of it.

I made a pledge to always pick up a piece of litter when I am out - even at work I am always picking up rubbish though.

And i'm old enough to remember thinking france had a litter problem.

Disposable BBQs need banning now, as does McDonald’s 😊

While I agree about the barbies, imagine all the hungover people in the world unable to access double sausage and egg McMuffins?

Be careful what you wish for. You might inadvertently usher in the end of days

Thirty years ago I went to Loch Lomond for the first time, and was amazed that families would just walk away leaving their chip suppers behind.

That said it is getting worse. And the disposability of everything doesn't help.

Never been much of an outdoorsy type, but every few years I’ll have a little road trip around Wales, visiting family in Pembs. On the way back heading through snowdonia/Llanberis. Bloody hell it seemed busy this year! I usually stop and have a wander up snowdon and some food etc, but nowhere to park and it all looked a bit stressful.

Kormoran, round our way we have bins emblazoned with
I'm a bin, throw your litter in.

Noone bothers

I had thought they would all sod off back to Blackpool afterwards but sadly that doesn’t seem to be the case

Careful now.....

We've got enough arseholes visiting here and sh!tting the place up as it is

The amount of litter around is absolutely disgusting. You brought it with you filled up with food, drink, vaping fluid etc....why are you too bone idle to take it back with you or find a bin. Chucking stuff out of cars, why, there is about 20 square feet of seating around you to put it on you lazy sods.
In fact, it's not even lazy, takes no more effort, these people are just ignorant disgusting vermin. Cigarette butts don't even seem to be classed as litter by smokers, just lob them wherever you fancy.

I was on a plane a couple of years ago where a family of utter 🛎️➡️s basically made their seats an absolute midden of wrappers, food, cans, paper etc.. the air hostess asked them to tidy up the area and hand her the litter on their pass up the cabin with the bin bags and the family refused telling her that was her job, why should they etc.... rightly so she told them her job wasn't to clean up their mess after them (it was disgusting, smashed up crisps all over the floor, food everywhere, them mouthing off at everyone on the plane who backed the hostess up). I'd have happily seen them banned from flying for life, actually have some punishment for once, how often do we see shocking behaviour just allowed to happen with no consequences. Pilot even came out in this case and they didn't give a monkeys about what he said either.

It's people like that ruining it for the rest of us and the problem is these people usually make the most noise, cause the most trouble and think the world owes them a living so have a much larger negative effect on us than the normal people keeping their head down.

Yep, sadly you need to try just a little bit harder now to find the unspoilt areas, and of course the instagrammers and influencers won't be far behind and then the lazy journalists publishing click-bait stories about them, then the hoardes descend.

And repeat.

As a creature humans in general really aren't much better than locusts , all it takes is a percentage of the population to be genuinely a bit ignorant, multiply that across the whole population and you've got an awful lot of idiots out there ☹️

Absolutely, the increase in entitlement and disregard, for almost everything is staggering

There's quite a large minority of the population who are complete shits. They've always been there and to be honest in the past given how hard their lives were it was understandable. These days there's less excuse and more impact. The trouble is we tolerate poor behaviour with no sanction, people kick off if the rules are enforced and scream police state etc. Look at motor ing laws as an example. We can't have it both ways.

We even get this appeasement attitude on here, remember the Cardiff riots thread, for every person condemning the behaviour of the 2 victims there were plenty providing excuses. Poor behaviour is rife, passed a lad on the road today on a RonSur with a balaclava and no plates.

We should ask ourselves what "successful" tourism and leisure looks like for the visitors, for the "locals" and the tourism /leisure industry

We should ask ourselves what “successful” tourism and leisure looks like for the visitors, for the “locals” and the tourism /leisure industry

I like that.
It would stop me moaning...

Some really eye popping behaviour observed here

https://thepathlesstravelled.co.uk/2023/05/29/three-days-in-may/

Oh yes.
We are losing whole days to litter picking now and some of it is literally pretty s****y.
Vans and campers just leaving bin bags of rubbish behind that get torn open by rats, foxes and birds for us to repick.

Most of our sites are 4x busier than they were 10 years ago, probably going to have a million people head through our counters to one summit this year and that isn't all the access points.

Had 7 acres of pasture go up in flames 2 weeks ago because of a cigarette end out a car.

For balance though, less burnt out cars these days, not cleared up one of those for a few years.

Assault on Forest Ranger in Fife just for asking someone not to light a fire in a tinder dry forest a couple of days after the fire service had put the last fire out.

I like that.
It would stop me moaning

Oh I dunno I like moaning it's a necessary stage in identifying that something is not right. It's converting the moaning to sensible action that's the difficult part

Clown mask. Boiler suit. Shotgun.

I started the thread below about litter picking when out with doggo. Basically every time I go out with a litter picker I'm collecting a full bag each time. Same entitled shit every time.
Monster
Redbull
McD's
Bagged dog shit
companies that make enough money they could run campaigns and educate their customers that would end their littering - but they don't. Bagged dog shit? - 🤷‍♂️

https://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/spring-clean/

Disposable BBQs need banning now

I appreciate the reasoning but,

Great, that means that at a friend's barbecue the vegetarians are on buttered rolls and if they're lucky a side salad.

Disposable BBQs need banning now

I appreciate the reasoning but,

Great, that means that at a friend’s barbecue the vegetarians are on buttered rolls and if they’re lucky a side salad.

Not at all, and as a lifelong veggie I know exactly what you mean.
But you can get quite nice little BBQ units, cutesy things that cost not a crazy amount more and are designed to be reused AND also tend to keep the unit on legs, so off the floor.

£14 at Saino's.
Possibly costs nearly enough not to just leave it (though actually I doubt that) and clearly it's designed to be used again and again.
£2 for a 'disposable' one is too cheap.

It's also symbolic in a way. The word 'disposable' needs to be pushed aside because, well, people.

Disposable BBQs need banning now

There's quite a few large stores no longer stocking them, unfortunately this just means other places see a gap in the market judging by the massive stacks I've seen at some corner shops ☹️

Try living at a popular seaside destination. Its utterly unbelievable the volume of rubbish left on the beach, and near the overflowing bins.
Which the seagulls attack and redistribute across the car park.
Buried disposalable bbqs as the bins are designed not to take them is so annoying
Smashed or buried bottles are normal.
Such a shame

Absolutely, the increase in entitlement and disregard, for almost everything is staggering

The effect of 40 years of everyone for them self tory governments have possibly not helped but then they were voted in by the people so maybe the people were already like that.

Although as said above you are still seeing the actions of a relatively small number of people out the the 70 million that are living in UK.

The effect of 40 years of everyone for them self tory governments have possibly not helped but then they were voted in by the people so maybe the people were already like that

I definitely think there's something in all of this. When you're told there is no such thing as society then expect people not to care about society.

Yes, and it is a direct consequence of covid and lockdowns etc.

Most of the chavs have gone back to the town centre shops and pubs, but a sizeable number still get out more than before covid. I can't think of a way of discouraging them, unfortunately.

Most of the chavs have gone back to the town centre shops and pubs, but a sizeable number still get out more than before covid. I can’t think of a way of discouraging them, unfortunately.

There's probably no one solution but give people good prospects and reason to respect stuff that is theirs to use and you might have only half the battle.

Engage community in local projects; make them feel part of it. All the seed sewing stuff that gets undone with lack of big local spending.

Has to happen or ... Mad Max Fury Road etc.

you can get quite nice little BBQ units, cutesy things that cost not a crazy amount more and are designed to be reused AND also tend to keep the unit on legs, so off the floor.

£14 at Saino’s.

That's actually pretty neat. I might have to pick up a couple.

It'd feel pretty weird rocking up to a friend's barbecue carrying my own though.

Which the seagulls attack and redistribute across the car park.

I live close to a chip shop. Two days ago there was a walking stereotype 'wrong un' youth milling about outside, hoodie pulled tight over his head when it's north of 20'C. He sits down on the kerb directly outside my front window, I judgementally wonder "what's he up to?" until he turns and I realise he's got a tray of chips on the go. There's benches and greenery right across the street so that's a bit weird but, well, OK.

Suddenly, this bloody great seagull comes steaming in. Seagulls are bigger than you think anyway, but this one was a big sod by any measure. "I'm having those" thinks the seagull. Our hero leaped up and took boggarts down the road, chips flying everywhere, seagull in hot pursuit.

Hashtag shouldn't laugh but...

Haven't noticed it at all, and in fact my experience is that its getting emptier. I ride pretty regularly in areas (Peaks Calderdale North Wales) that are usually pretty busy, and recently I've noticed (conf bias possibly?) that I'm meeting fewer and fewer folks outside of say a 500m radius around popular car parks and they tend towards more elderly walkers. The thing I have noticed in the increase in e-bikes, and that folks now tend to notice that I'm not on one!

But I haven't noticed that the arsehole level has changed much.

It’s all down to education isn’t it.
The wild camping sites need to promote a more responsible approach. There needs to be clear advertising campaign in the areas where there are problems.
Look at what Sustrans do to promote cycling. They also seem to keep the cycle paths very tidy. Staffing and costs aside if there were occasionally people at busy areas encouraging responsible behaviour, it would go a long way to improve things.
My current beef is lorry drivers. Whole bags of rubbish dropped out the window. One roundabout near my work has a pile of lemonade bottles. Obviously same driver drinks one a day and deposits it in the same place at the end of every shift. Utter filth.

Anyone else seeing the Sur-rons?

They're the current menace in Sherwood Pines - as at least with petrol you can hear them coming.

Luckily they're expensive.

Cars parked on the entrance to bridleways. So the lazy arseholes can get their country fix. This was a rare thing, if ever, before the last couple of years. Now see it multiple times on every ride.

Anyone else seeing the Sur-rons

There's a cycling / MTB family near our street who have bought two for the kids. I've seen them setting off to the local woods with mum and dad on proper Eebs and kids razzing off on SurRon things. If I meet them on local trails then 😡

One roundabout near my work has a pile of lemonade bottles.

25p deposit on plastic bottles, if said scum still throw them away, kids will retrieve them and cash them in.

There used to be more on street (or in car park) garbage receptacles that would get emptied by the council, do they exist any more in the uk? can't remember noting them on my last visits back. I think our living environment is another victim to austerity and 40 years of neoliberalism.

Anyone else seeing the Sur-rons?

3 of them on the black/red trails at Hamsterley yesterday, passed me on a fireroad with the old 'u wanna get one of these mate, it's much easier' all 3 then got stuck trying 2 get up a not particularly technical singletrack climb, where I passed the 3 of them on a non electric mtb. F****n morons. Local woods where there have been unofficial trails tolerated for years, some pretty big jumps n berms etc have been torn to shreds by kids on them over the winter, and unfortunately I only see the problem getting worse in future

The hills are alive with the sound of ars*h*les.

Just as slight counter to this. We did the MTB Jennride last weekend, the weather was stunning and people were out in hoardes. We didn't meet a single arse, see lots of litter or any dodgy BBQing.

Not sure I would encourage kids to pick up litter in the middle of a busy roundabout. I get the Idea but still needs a re-education of said arseholes to not drop it in the first place.

Saw same at BPW. Bloke in nice well looked after modified car packing up his bike and kit. Fiddling about. Gets in car drives off leaving the McD’s wrappers from his car neatly left under where the car was. 5m from a bloody bin. If my wheels had still been on my bike he would have got both barrels!

Community service for litter dropping arseholes is what we need.

It's unfortunate that there's almost total overlap on the Venn diagram of the types of people most likely to drop litter and the types who eat the most fast food.

Classic this morning - in Clumber park. Someone had a campfire around the no BBQ sign and burned it to the ground.

It makes me go all retired Tory campervan slacks reactionary - for 5 mins.

Classic this morning – in Clumber park. Someone had a campfire around the no BBQ sign and burned it to the ground.

Sorry but that is pretty funny. I find the superabundance of signs, warnings and petty little notices a major irritant. More so than litter to be honest. Maybe if people weren’t constantly treated like morons they wouldn’t act like morons.

Just as slight counter to this. We did the MTB Jennride last weekend, the weather was stunning and people were out in hoardes. We didn’t meet a single arse, see lots of litter or any dodgy BBQing

True. Every cyclist we passed did smile n wave, all the people eating the ice cream were happy, we were passed by hundreds of cars - all happy (bar one..), but, somehow the few numpties are lurking and creating issues....

Sorry but that is pretty funny. I find the superabundance of signs, warnings and petty little notices a major irritant. More so than litter to be honest. Maybe if people weren’t constantly treated like morons they wouldn’t act like morons.

Trying not to burn the forest down in super dry conditions is not a bad idea.

Maybe if people weren’t constantly treated like morons they wouldn’t act like morons

I’d like you to produce a single shred of evidence for that in this country at the moment

The tedious, perma-outraged howls from the libertarians about the ‘nanny state’ etc could generally amount to cries of ‘how dare anyone try and prevent me from doing whatever the **** I like’

So in reality, the opposite is true.

Great, that means that at a friend’s barbecue the vegetarians are on buttered rolls and if they’re lucky a side salad.

Nonsense.

For nanny state outrage-ists read making it safer for the for everyone who isn't a 90s Clarkson cry baby.

Hasn’t Clarkson been eclipsed by Laurence Fox nowadays?

Somewhat implausibly, he’s easily managed to be even more of a bell end

Lozza Fox has a new type of confused DNA for mask-screaming freedoms than 90s Clarkson for sure - which was basically built around speed camera bed wetting.

Funny though these right-wing mouth horns are not actually that bothered about what I would call 'freedoms.'

Julia Hartley Sewer - also became a top legal advocate for human-rights ... when she was told to wear a mask.

Trying not to burn the forest down in super dry conditions is not a bad idea.

Well yes. Obviously.

Out of interest, was the sign installed due to the “super dry conditions” and explained the reason in a non condescending manner? Or is ir a year-round ORDER which doesn’t seem to make any sense outside of “super dry conditions”.

A bit like those NO BALL GAMES signs that we used to spend the summers smacking a football against as kids.

Out of interest, was the sign installed due to the “super dry conditions” and explained the reason in a non condescending manner? Or is ir a year-round ORDER which doesn’t seem to make any sense outside of “super dry conditions”.

I'm not 100% sure.

But without the signs people will just stick their BBQs on and do what the hell.

To be fair to your point the NT did use lockdown as an opportunity to fence up and sign up.

So I know what you mean - but fire risk to me is a whole different demon in terms of people being idiots. And it has been proper dry for the last few summers.

My favourite sign is one that’s on a bridleway up on to the moors behind our house, placed there by Greater Manchester Police that says this (in this instance turned into a t-shirt)..

It regularly gets nicked but is then replaced

We’ve lived here over 12 years and have never met anyone who has any recollection of any illegal raves having ever taken place here

So maybe the signs work? 😂

Have just seen a post on Wasdales MRT fb page that their stretcher box has been broken into and ransacked again last bank holiday. Items missing and litter left and you guessed it a disposable bbq left too. What can I say.

Not arguing chaps. We’re all in agreement about dicks being dicks.

Signs are just my ‘thing’. For some it’s litter, others it’s graffiti. Mine is signs, oh and spitting.

It’s a question of aesthetics. My lovely local park has become infested with a crop of peevish little signs that say: “If you brought it with you, you can take it home with you”. They make me want to upend a bin onto them and light it all up.

They’re aimed I guess at the huge amounts of students and young people who party in the park on sunny weekends and bank holidays. They won’t heed the signs. It’s dark when they leave. And anyway, the next day the council come and clear up the mess (they should be polishing every blade of grass for the outrageous amount of council tax they extract…). So hundreds of youngsters have had a great time and the mess gets cleared up the next day. No one ever takes the signs away… so what’s the problem? They could install some bigger bins maybe but oh no, they’d prefer to remove them.

I can see where you’re coming from with that, to be honest.

The people who actually need telling to not be a dick are the ones who’ll just completely ignore the signs anyway and carry on being dicks, thus the whole exercise in putting the signs up in the first place is completely pointless

Maybe if people weren’t constantly treated like morons they wouldn’t act like morons

Maybe if people didn't act like morons the wouldn't be treated like morons.

So hundreds of youngsters have had a great time and the mess gets cleared up the next day. No one ever takes the signs away… so what’s the problem?

Litter is the problem. There is no excuse. None. If you carried it in you can carry the leftovers out.

Reminds me: driving through North Wales recently all the bins in lay-bye’s had been blocked off. I mean, it worked for me as I just carried on and put my litter in a bin in the next town. But what’s the logic? Just cost cutting? I imagine a lot of people just hoy it into the undergrowth.

Needs a national government campaign every year that outlines how to be behave in the outdoors. This should also be pushed in schools along with anti-littering.

But some people will not change how much you educate them.

Comments about spitting. This needs to be addressed in sport especially football. If you spit in a game then you get a fine. More that 2 times in a season then it's community volunteer work.

I can forgive it in sport. Well, hard physically demanding sports like football, not snooker. But some cretin flopping out a huge loogie onto the pavement in a town? No. They need working on.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/series/britain-behaving-badly

Litter is the problem. There is no excuse. None. If you carried it in you can carry the leftovers out.

Yeah well, they won’t so... They’re too off their gourd on crack candles and ecstasy pipes to be dragging 72 empty beer cans and a smouldering bbq onto the next juke-joint of depravity at 1am.

I mean you can shout at the sky forever or get all extreme and have the park bristling with CCTV issuing fines by AI facial recognition.

Or just put out a few big bins and send in a team of council workers in the morning to clear up a bit. And maybe some education in the schools.

Sorry but that is pretty funny. I find the superabundance of signs, warnings and petty little notices a major irritant.

I have often wondered if the "no fly tipping" signs are in any way effective.