Headed to an outdoor music festival like Bonnaroo or Lollapalooza this summer? Ben Coe, who runs The Artist Farm artist coaching and management agency, wants you to think twice before you drop your trash on the ground. Coe recently launched a grassroots initiative called “The Clean Concert Pledge” to “to keep concert grounds clean, to take responsibility for your own trash, and therefore to contribute to a cleaner environment for all.” And, the Pledge site asserts, aren’t concerts more fun when you can plop down anywhere without worrying about a plate covered in mustard possibly being in your way? (If you said yes to that question, we sincerely question your judgment.)
Tonic spoke with Coe about what inspired him to launch the Clean Concert Pledge, which has already been signed by 768 people and received support from some of summer’s biggest festivals. “For all of my adolescent years I was in Boy Scouts. I went on one weekend camping trip per month for 8 years straight. The leaders ingrained in us the ‘Leave No Trace’ ethic: always leave the site cleaner than it was when you arrived…. For all of the concerts I’ve attended, it always amazed me how the otherwise ‘conscious’ audience members would leave trash all over the ground. I don’t think this is fixed behavior though because I have been to Burning Man where there are no public trash cans and yet no trash on the ground. The difference is in the expectations set upon the audience. This pledge is an attempt to change this mentality — to change the expectation of the audience.”
With more and more members of society realizing that it is up to us as individuals to spur environmental change, Coe’s method of having audience members sign a pledge may just be the solution for litter-free concert venues. Placing the onus on audience members, rather than clean-up crews, gives festival attendees a feeling of personal responsibility for the outcome of what happens at the concert site at the end of the festival.
“I decided that going directly to the audience was the best especially given my belief in the power of an individual,” Coe writes on The Clean Concert Pledge site. “I believe strongly that we will never change the world if we don’t change ourselves first.” And really, what the Pledge is asking of festival attendees is quite simple. “The easiest thing to do is hold onto your trash until you leave your, then hang onto it until you find a trash, recycling, or compost station. You can go beyond this by picking up trash around you or encouraging your friends to do the same. It isn’t hard to do, it just takes a recognition that we all like clean ground better than trashed ground … so don’t trash it,” Coe told Tonic.
If you’re headed to a festival this summer, here’s the statistic to beat. Coe told us that after last year’s Burning Man festival, which was attended by 40,000 people and lasted for 10 days, a clean-up crew was able to fit all of the trash left on the ground in a 10 x 10 foot square. Burning Man is held on a Bureau of Land Management area, so one of the requirements is that the space be left exactly as it’s found. There are hardly any public trashcans, so for a 10-day festival, it was a true sign of respect that 40,000 people could be that conscientious about their environmental impact. The mentality and feeling of personal responsibility is definitely making a positive shift. Ideally, though, there should be zero trash left behind.
To sign the pledge and add a badge to your blog or Facebook page, visit CleanConcert.org. And remember, if you plan to attend a musical festival this summer, leave no trash behind and keep the site clean and green.
Photo by rieh via Flickr.