Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - Crag & Route Beta

Crag & Route Beta

Area	Location	Sub Location	Crag	Links
VIC Grampians	Halls Gap	The Watchtower	(General)	[ Watchtower Guide \| Images ]

Topic Date User

Watchtower new bolted line. 6-Mar-2014 At 5:52:06 PM davidn

Message

On 5/03/2014 Damo666 wrote:
>Maybe. Or, like the majority of users of most climbing forums, they never
>actually post anything and certainly never want to get involved in the
>endless argy-bargy of forum slanging matches. It doesn't mean they don't
>care, they just have to make a choice and (at least by the stats of a few
>years ago) when it comes to it they choose not to post.
>
>Their dislike of (in this case) excessive bolting very much exists,

Sorry, but your UK-based statistics and the inference to the Australian population are logical fallacies.

'argument from ignorance'. Proof of non-responsiveness is clearly not proof of support of a particular ideology. Bolters could as well claim that the 80,000+ non-respondents per week in the UK climbing forums support bolting wholeheartedly (let's not even talk population skew - I think many of us, myself included, privately applaud UK for its love of gritstone and boltless tactics, suicidal as it can be at times).

Equally, it could be concluded that 80,000+ potential respondents are just reading the forums while taking a crap and are unable to exercise fine motor skills so are therefore unable to respond.

Referring to later posts and not related to your particular post, I am concerned at the concept of a 'silent majority'. This is a term that has sprung from the condemnation of abhorrent practices that were, at the time, considered acceptable. A silent majority opposed slavery. A silent majority opposed various wars. A silent majority opposed the inability of women and Indigenous people to vote. I don't believe climbers comprise a silent anything - we are vocal about our various peccadilloes, whatever they may be.