4 ms·
It’s always baffled me how the regard that the average Englishman holds for itinerant folk is wrapped in a big if statement: if (boat) … # All good el
by heads 3y ago
It’s always baffled me how the regard that the average Englishman holds for itinerant folk is wrapped in a big if statement:
if (boat)
… # All good
else:
raise TravellerAlert()
- mock-possum 3y agoDouble standards are practically a necessity to maintain bigotry. I’d be more surprised to find prejudice that lacks that kind of hypocrisy.
- JetSetWilly 3y agoThe narrowboaters thast stay near me don't seem to indulge in open air defecation everywhere around, they don't appear to litter and leave plastic and gas canisters in incredible quanties everywhere before buggering off, and they don't go door to door with dodgy schemes. The travellers that occasionally stay in the field next to my house do all of this and more. Pretending that this difference doesn't exist and that there's some "double standard" just means you have zero direct experience of the matter and just want to have some self-righteous "UK bad" moaning. Like it or lump it reputations are often deserved and caused by experience rather than by random prejudice.
- pachico 3y agoWow, all this escalated rather quickly...
- pasc1878 3y agoYou obviously don't have travellers near you. Our local parks are now much harder to get into let alone if you are disabled as they all have a small rampart across any flat entrance to stop cars and caravans being driven onto the park.
- pachico 3y agoI live in Spain, mate, I know a thing or two about this.
- sixothree 3y agoSince we're on the topic, are there regulations about sewerage for longboaters? Are there "hookups" available at mooring spots or is it more of a "well it all gets diluted when we dump it in the river" kind of thing?
- s3krit 3y agoYou're not allowed to dump any human waste in any of the canals or rivers (ignore the fact that plenty of companies in the UK do this...). There are two common approaches to dealing with human waste aboard canal boats; cassette toilets which you can carry to 'elsan points' placed frequently along the canal to dump semi-regularly (I hear anything from a week to a month depending on how many aboard). They look like [1] - you remove the bottom bit and carry that to empty. And secondly, pump-out tanks with a macerator toilet which chews up the excrement before being deposited into a tank. They're much bigger so need to be emptied less often (over 3 months for our 500 litre beast). They need to be done at marinas or the ever-decreasing number of Canal and River Trust-maintained self-pumpouts. Costs about £10-17 per pump-out. Elsan disposal is free as is covered by your license fee. Hundreds of thousands of words on forums have been written about the pros and cons of either of these approaches, and is considered on the canalworld forum to be a bit of a holy war. A much less common approach is composting toilets. There's not a lot of room on boats, so storing the waste long enough to turn into an effective compost doesn't seem too feasible. And then once it's done, what are you gonna do with it? You're on a boat, you don't have a garden. And recently CRT informed people that they cannot dispose of this compost toilet waste in their provided refuse bins. [1] https://marine-deals.freetls.fastly.net/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/1b2e871699de66caea4208e2cf16bd73/3/_/3_33_96.jpg https://marine-deals.freetls.fastly.net/media/catalog/produc...
- justneedaname 3y agoNarrowboaters don't have the same reputation for a reason though. I've only had a handful of experiences with those who choose caravans as their method of itinerancy but they've all been negative. Everyone I know has had the same experience. It's disingenuous to suggest people hold differing views about them for no reason
- actionfromafar 3y agobool boat = social_standing || affluence;
- JR1427 3y agoThis isn't really true. You get lots of people living on boats because housing is expensive (like my mother and stepdad). You do get plenty of "crusty" boat people, but generally they keep themselves to themselves. Maybe this is because people on boats are often in public and accessible places, where people will quickly complain.
- EdwardDiego 3y agoThey still own where they live though.
- JR1427 3y agoHow is this different to travellers owner their caravans? Most people who live on boats don't own a permanent mooring. They either continually move around, or rent a mooring.
- Symbiote 3y agoNone of us have ever seen a marina or mooring place covered in litter and human waste, or been subjected to petty crime by the boaters.
- s3krit 3y agoI have, however, seen the Canal and River Trust's assets stolen from their working boats (steel fencing, tools, the door or something off an excavator if I heard the guy correctly). Not by boaters, but by the nearby travellers.
- mc32 3y agoWhy? They are different populations that engage in different behaviors; one group engages in more antisocial behavior than the other. It’s natural to want to avoid troublemakers.