Side by Side Ethics, Practicality or the Road to Hell?

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Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 02:17am PT
Learn from our trad brothers the Czech climbers.....BOLT THE CRACKS.



Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 02:30am PT
Brits don't want to spoil most of their crags with bolts...so they come to America where it's O K. Brit Nic Conway at Joshua Tree on Badger's Choff Piece, FA (Damn 1/4 " bolts to....shit the bed, no nose.......)

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 02:35am PT
NOTICE: ALL FIRST ASCENTS SHOULD BE DONE LIKE KURT SMITH DOES IT. NO RAP BOLTING.(FA Black Out, Tuolumne Meadows...ground up, bolt on the lead, no TR, no electric drill, no BS) .......

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 02:43am PT
Even Third World Countries bolt up their crags.....Suesca, Colombia: Get over it......


Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 02:54am PT
The Euros were leaving us in the dust....thank God for Alan Watts.....he saved America Climbing and brought back the respect.

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 02:56am PT
We'll bolt anything here in America......

Mighty Hiker

Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
May 17, 2008 - 02:57am PT
Shouldn't that be COLOMBIA, not Columbia?

Not that we don't have such activities up here in one of the alternatively-spelled Columbias. :-)
Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:02am PT
Learn from the French. (The best climbers in the World)


(Thanks, Mighty Hiker;...I can change 25 diapers a day, put sport bolts and convience anchors in rock, but can't spell worth a damn......and me am a teacher too!)
Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:10am PT
With bolts, we carry our courage in our rucksacs. Everything is now possible......

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:12am PT
Bolt wars get out of hand....

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:15am PT
I have a solution to confusion at the crags as to which route is which.......


Spraypaint around each bolt makes them easier to see too....)
Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:23am PT
Al Gore says, put in a sport anchor;....then you won't have that braided climbers trail from the walk off back to the packs at the start of the climb;....it's the right thing to do. Think Green.....

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:26am PT
With Freedom, comes responsibility.....(My father's favorite quote...)

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:28am PT
You know where those rap bolters eventually end up .......

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:30am PT
Quit your whining;...just be thankful you have ROCK to climb on...not everyone does...

Todd Gordon

Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
May 17, 2008 - 03:32am PT
Sleep in the bed you make for yourself....

bob d'antonio

Trad climber
Taos, NM
May 17, 2008 - 09:47am PT
The devil wears lycra..
bob d'antonio

Trad climber
Taos, NM
May 17, 2008 - 09:51am PT
From the good/bright side..

to the dark and dank side....how did it happen??

bob d'antonio

Trad climber
Taos, NM
May 17, 2008 - 09:58am PT
There still hope and time for salvation in the dark depths of the Black Canyon.
Ed Hartouni

Trad climber
Livermore, CA
May 17, 2008 - 12:00pm PT
is the "trad only" school of thought noble or merely selfish?

interesting way to ask the question, now that I look back on the OP. I guess the view is that the "trad only" school is seen as restricting and/or inhibiting climbing by adopting a set of rules that are no more valid than any other set of rules. It is sort of "post modern" way of thinking about it, that is, everyone brings their own experience as part of interpreting the rules.

So what are the rules, anyway? I think Frank Smythe's [url="http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=588524&msg=589666#msg589666"]Expediency[/url] article essentially hints at it in the last sentence:

It is essential to the well-being of mountaineering not to overburden it with mechanical aids but to keep it as simple as possible.

Now we could agree that this is the right way of doing things, but realize the relative nature of the statement and the variance that arises out of the particular circumstances of individual climbs, or even climbing areas. We could even fit rap-bolting into the picture and still believe that the way things should evolve, ideally, would be to keep it as simple as possible.

It was a very sobering thought, while watching Brearshear's Storm Over Everest Frontline program, just how far from Smythe was the idea of guiding clients to the summit of that peak. I suspect that Smythe would reject the notion that such activities had anything at all to do with mountaineering, aside from appropriating the techniques and the equipment.

Similarly, one might propose that there are really two very different cultures using the vertical rock resources: one using it in the manner we would recognize as in line with the traditional rules, and one using it as recreation. As in the guiding world on Mt. Everest, there are climbers who make a living guiding, or putting in routes on rock (as the parallel activity) who have no problem with this activity. They do not claim that this activity has any relationship with "traditional" climbing. The people doing it do not wish to engage in the "traditional" ways, they just want to get up a climb, be it a difficult 80' bolted rock face or a 12,000' ascent from base camp to the highest point in the world.

So it is very easy to just respond to Ron's initial question by saying both, the "trad only" school is noble in that it upholds the original vision of mountaineering, and at the same time it is "selfish" in that it would impose a rather severe judgement on activities done in the mountains (or on the cliffs) as "not climbing in the traditional manner" when they departed from the "trad only" school.

What is interesting to me is that people who put up and do routes beyond the "trad only" school would object to being so identified... it would seem that they still feel the need that the climbing be validated by inclusion with that school. Why else would they be so earnest in their discussions here? What is the value of the association?
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