In reply to samparsons:
I came to climbing from the world of surfing. Surfing is and always will be my first love. Ethics can be strong in all activities, including surfing.
Who owns the sea? Who owns a wave? Is any one style of surfing (long boarding, short boarding, SUP) better than another?
The point is, nobody owns anything. Nobody is more entitled to anything than anyone else. Nobody is better or more important than anybody else (ever).
However, ethics exist; in surfing: you don't drop in on someone, you don't steal waves, you don't litter the beach; like they do in climbing: you don't hog routes, you don't chip holds, you take your rubbish home.
They are all common sense principles applied to enhance everyone's enjoyment; enhance our own without spoiling others.
If a large group of people object to having a gritstone crag bolted, then, morally, you shouldn't bolt it. If you can't ride that wave in good style, nobody is stopping you going to another wave. I'm not saying you CAN'T do these things, I'm just saying that if you knowingly drop in on some one and get a kicking on the beach, it's definitely your fault.
It's good that discussions like this happen, so we all know where we stand and how we can all enjoy our passion without unnecessarily upsetting our friends.
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Glencoe, Snowdonia, The Lakes, Pembroke, Peak and Northern Grit... some of the best trad climbing in the world. It's in our country! We should be respectful, even proud of that. Heck, some reckon that 'climbing' was BORN here.
Now sport climbing... Ceuse, Kalymnos, Catalunya, Arco... yum! Where's my passport?
Post edited at 14:43