Leave No Trace, Is Dead.

I photographed this amazing rock stacking artwork at Devil’s Lake State Park just a few years ago. It is cool, isn’t it!?

Today, talking about rock stacking is a “triggering” event. I mean, everyone’s triggered these days and that’s part of the problem, we can’t discuss anything when everybody’s too busy having an internet rager about whatever subject seems to tweak their typing fingers. But, we can’t avoid a subject simply because folks get triggered either. So with that in mind…

Take Only Memories

I think we all understand the concept of “Leave No Trace” right? We know that quote, “take only memories” et cetera, et cetera. I’m not going to preach here or go into full-on education mode. You can read all about the Leave No Trace ethic here. I’m also not writing this blog for people who don’t care. Jerks are jerks and not caring is just another pandemic of the day. What I want to address is the majority of us who do care and a good number of us who have carved out exceptions.

Leave No Trace, but…

So here’s the issue we’re facing; personal exceptions. We generally understand flagrant violations of the Leave No Trace ethic when it involves people trashing up our parks. Things such as vandalism, leaving trash all over, and those folks who leave their dog poo bags on the benches and trails instead of disposing of them properly. (Why do you bother to bag it, then leave the bagged crap along the trail?? That’s just… Sorry, I digress!) But we also have allowed ourselves to carve out our own personal exceptions based on what we want to do personally because, “they aren’t bad, they’re fun!”, well, because we just want too. The defense is something like; “Stupid snowflakes whining about every little thing!” But hey, that’s just lazy deflection and avoiding the adult discussion again…

But I Just…

We all know some popular exceptions. We’ve either seen them argued ad nauseam on social media or we’ve argued them ourselves. Here are some common ones (Now don’t get triggered!)

• Rock stacking doesn’t hurt anything!
• My kids love painting & finding painted rocks on the trails!
• Dogs need to be free, besides my dog is friendly.
• My music doesn’t hurt anyone!
• We needed a clear trail to our favorite spot!
• Chalk washes off the rocks in the rain.
• There were no garbage cans

I could go on.. (Feel free to share your exceptions below.) but the bottom line is that any of these things, whether you want to accept it or not, are not “leaving no trace”. They certainly have an impact on the environment, no matter how small we perceive that impact to be. They also add up. We all know it. We’re arguing that it’s OK because we enjoy it. We don’t want to sacrifice OUR thing so we justify, have a rager, or blame “whiners”.

Stacking Exceptions

I get the arguments and justifications. I’m old. I’ve heard them all. But there is a pretty simple bottom line here. If everyone is allowed their personal exceptions then our parks are screwed. (I’d like to fly a drone but I don’t!) Like the rocks, we can’t just keep stacking exception upon exception because when added all together they DO real damage and ruin the park experience for a lot of people as well. Again it’s not one person creating an awesome work of stoney art on a busy beach, it’s 100 people doing it all at once in a state natural area. It’s not one loose dog who is perfect with strangers and has no digestive system. It’s that one I saw last week on the west bluff who killed a chipmunk along the trail!

Call It What It Is

Look, the science is in. We have a whole history of the planet to go by. When humans do their thing and rearrange nature, they damage it. Maybe a little, maybe a lot. Often we don’t realize the damage we’ve done until it’s too late. The real goal of Leave No Trace isn’t to stop all damage. We can’t. There are too many people who don’t care at all. At best, we’re offsetting them, which is exactly why we can’t carve out exceptions. Leave No Trace does not rate or equate damage by impact done. There’s no scale. It says, “just don’t”. Doing your best to leave no trace, keeps our parks and wildlands a bit healthier for another day and preserving what beauty is left for as long as possible. And that’s sad when you think about it.

Let’s be real here, if your exception is OK so is mine, so is everyone’s. If this is so, then we’re screwed and Leave No Trace is truly dead.