***Serious Topic*** Joshua Tree site

[lilyercs]

***Serious topic***
If a you plan on visiting our scared Joshua Tree in the desert, please, please, please be respectful of the site and not damage anything or take items. Last week sometime between Tuesday and Thursday our shrine was ransacked by someone who destroyed ALL the rock formations as well as all the items that were left outside the suitcase. Some of them have been there for 10yrs without incident.

This site should be treated as if you are visiting your mother’s grave-site. You can leave a memento but only take a memory away with you. We want to preserve this site so others can make the famed pilgrimage for themselves. You can leave a special note in the notebooks. If we don’t preserve it then all we do is consume it and I like to think that U2 fans are smarter & more compassionate than that.

To the people who did: your time and money would’ve been better spent gambling in Vegas or chasing hot bodies on the beaches of LA. May guilt overcome and consume you.

 

[coolian2]

No.

You leave footprints. I have considered suggesting that as a website (even as an offshoot) we crowdfund a small plaque noting the importance of the site to us, and the untouched nature of the site is what created The Joshua Tree in the first place.

This includes communicating with the NATIONAL PARK services to see if it can be done as it will hopefully stop people leaving crap there or damaging the national park.

 

[coolian2]

Also whatever was removed was probably the national park services doing their jobs.

 

[corianderstem]

Please don't leave stuff behind at the site. This spot does not belong to us, regardless of what the band might mean to us.

 

[DreamOutLoud13]

Littering is prohibited in national parks. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent every year trying to pick up the trash that people leave behind in parks. Do not contribute to that.

The national parks program was begun 100 years ago to conserve our natural lands. Notes and trinkets and mementos do not belong.

 

[dan_smee]

Was coming to leave the same response as those above. Just because you are a sycophant, does not give you special rights to the location. I visited there last year, and it was an ethereal experience.... lessened by all the litter and crap left behind by people who think that they have to justify their fandom to others to make it real. Sad.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

***Serious topic***
If a you plan on visiting our scared Joshua Tree in the desert, please, please, please be respectful of the site and not damage anything or take items. Last week sometime between Tuesday and Thursday our shrine was ransacked by someone who destroyed ALL the rock formations as well as all the items that were left outside the suitcase. Some of them have been there for 10yrs without incident.

This site should be treated as if you are visiting your mother’s grave-site. You can leave a memento but only take a memory away with you. We want to preserve this site so others can make the famed pilgrimage for themselves. You can leave a special note in the notebooks. If we don’t preserve it then all we do is consume it and I like to think that U2 fans are smarter & more compassionate than that.

To the people who did: your time and money would’ve been better spent gambling in Vegas or chasing hot bodies on the beaches of LA. May guilt overcome and consume you.

the beauty of that particular tree was how it stood alone, rather than bunched together with a bunch of other joshua trees - the stark landscapes and untouched beauty of that region is what made it the perfect backdrop for the album formerly known as The Two Americas.

upsetting the landscape by leaving crap behind as if it were a grave site is the exact opposite of what people should have been doing. it should have been left untouched, the same way it was when the band and anton corbijn found it.

i haven't been to "the tree," but i have been to Castle Moydrum. As cool as it would be to be able to walk out on the lawn and take a picture right in front of the castle, you can't because it's fenced off by the property owner. at first it's disappointing, but then you realize that if they didn't fence it off people would be leaving crap all over the place, climbing on the walls and writing on the stone in some fucked up way to commemorate their fandom. and if that were allowed to happen, the castle would probably be in much worse shape than it is now, and people wouldn't be able to go visit it any longer.

the one thing you said correctly was "take a memory."

that's all anyone needs to do at the tree site; visit it, take a memory away (and maybe a photograph). but quit leaving crap behind that does more harm than good. writing in a notebook doesn't make you a real fan.

 

[beegee]

***Serious topic***
If a you plan on visiting our scared Joshua Tree...

It's not sacred, it's not a shrine, and it's not a grave site. It also isn't within the boundaries of any of the national parks that surround it but I agree with every poster who disagrees with you. Your sense of entitlement is astounding. It's not up to you to give people permission to "leave a memento." Nothing should be left out there but footprints. The rest is garbage, an eyesore, and damaging to the environment.

 

[TinKnight]

God damn, people, stop being assholes to OP.

Yeah, you shouldn't leave a memento or write in a notebook, but no need to be a pompous dick about it.

 

[usamilo]

***Serious topic***
If a you plan on visiting our scared Joshua Tree in the desert, please, please, please be respectful of the site and not damage anything or take items. Last week sometime between Tuesday and Thursday our shrine was ransacked by someone who destroyed ALL the rock formations as well as all the items that were left outside the suitcase. Some of them have been there for 10yrs without incident.

This site should be treated as if you are visiting your mother’s grave-site. You can leave a memento but only take a memory away with you. We want to preserve this site so others can make the famed pilgrimage for themselves. You can leave a special note in the notebooks. If we don’t preserve it then all we do is consume it and I like to think that U2 fans are smarter & more compassionate than that.

To the people who did: your time and money would’ve been better spent gambling in Vegas or chasing hot bodies on the beaches of LA. May guilt overcome and consume you.

What's the source of this damage report? Are there any pictures available?

I've been to the site numerous times since 2004. Earlier poster is correct that it is not National Park Service land. It's Bureau of Land Management land. I think the BLM tends to be a little less strict about what happens on their land vs the NPS. That's a good thing because the last time I was there I could not believe how much stuff has been accumulated over the years. At some point, some federal employee is going to deem it an eyesore and have it all hauled away along with what's left of the tree.

Not my place to tell others they shouldn't visit or leave stuff. But I would hate to see this come to an end like that very lonely phone booth in the Mojave National Preserve once that was deemed by officials to be problem because of all the people making pilgrimages to it.

 

[lazarus]

Yeah, you shouldn't leave a memento or write in a notebook, but no need to be a pompous dick about it.

I don't know, the pompous tone was already set with "Our sacred Joshua Tree", wasn't it?

Also, this person only has 4 posts, so not exactly a participating member of the community. And then does a drive-by to warn us, and chastise any of us who may be responsible for what they're complaining about?

I think the response was totally appropriate.

 

[BVS]

God damn, people, stop being assholes to OP.

Yeah, you shouldn't leave a memento or write in a notebook, but no need to be a pompous dick about it.

Ummm, are you ok Tinny? I think everyone has been rather civil to this poster and this thread so far.

 

[coolian2]

I think the response was totally appropriate.

I think the response has been far nicer than it could/ought to be.

 

[martha]

I've cleaned up the shit that people have left at the tree before. It's not a grave site.

"We" need to leave stuff there? "Our" shrine? It's a goddam tree in the desert. Yes, a special one; yes, one that means something to a lot of people, but there's no fucking reason to litter the desert you claim to love with a bunch of trash.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

 

[bono_212]

I'm of two minds on this topic, honestly. I don't mind the suitcase and the notebook. It's the tons and tons of other stuff that's so frustrating. I also don't mind when people make rock towers. There's plenty of them up in Griffith Park's Wisdom Tree and I think they're awesome. But there's also a lot of stuff up there that isn't anything but litter. It would be great if you could take the good with the bad on this topic, but it doesn't seem like that's going to happen, so probably better to leave nothing.

 

[EdgeFest]

I thought having the suitcase out there where everything stayed in one neat place was nice. However it's now becoming pretty trashy with people leaving coffee mugs with their kids pics on it and flags and one stringed guitars - agree 100% with you bono_212. I went once with friends and then again this past January with my husband, but I don't plan to go back. I don't need to make annual pigrimages to it. I left a small card in the suitcase when Edge's mom passed (was a few weeks before my first visit) and nothing but my name in a notebook on the second.

There is definitely a lot of shit accumulating now though and it's getting to be an eyesore - people writing "U2's Biggest Fan" on plaques and stuff is just bullshit.

I am pretty tired of fans trying to be famous with whatever it is they need to do to prove themselves - it's getting pretty tedious.

 

[Edge_Orchestra]

There is definitely a lot of shit accumulating now though and it's getting to be an eyesore - people writing "U2's Biggest Fan" on plaques and stuff is just bullshit.

I am pretty tired of fans trying to be famous with whatever it is they need to do to prove themselves - it's getting pretty tedious.

It was beginning to look trashy out there. Now it looks less trashy out there. I'm okay with that.

 

[Max_theHitman]

I miss the TREE

- https://meandu2.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/p061111_1903.jpg