Your most controversial Glastonbury opinions

[Smeble]

19 hours ago, SGS said:

the number of volunteers is predicated on the number of punters - more punters = more volunteers. We have got by in the area I work with about 270 for years this year we have 299. The volunteers do an amazing job and help the festival be a success. And raise money for important charities which is absolutely at the heart of the ethos of the festival

No other festival seems to need so many people not doing a whole lot for 3 shifts as Glastonbury, it’s now at the point where the festival feels like it  is there for the benefit of those working at it rather than the paying public, as soon as anyone queries the numbers the wagons circle and the defences go up. Got to protect those jobs for the boys. 

[incident]

3 minutes ago, Smeble said:

No other festival seems to need so many people not doing a whole lot for 3 shifts as Glastonbury, it’s now at the point where the festival feels like it  is there for the benefit of those working at it rather than the paying public, as soon as anyone queries the numbers the wagons circle and the defences go up. Got to protect those jobs for the boys. 

It's difficult to make a direct comparison against other festivals, just because no other Festival is anywhere near as big or complex as Glastonbury, and that complexity often means whatever the opposite of economies of scale is. Having worked at over a dozen different UK festivals, I don't think Glastonbury is in any way overstaffed in relative terms.

The small element of truth in what you say compared to some of the bigger commercial operations is that essentially - Glastonbury is a lot more volunteer based than other Festivals, so there are situations where Glastonbury will need 2 or sometimes more volunteers, whereas say IOW or Boardmasters might simply utilise 1 paid staff member in the same spot. But I don't see that as being a bad thing at all - it'd be a lesser festival if those roles were replaced with paid staff.

I'm pretty sure if you compared the percentages compared to say Shambala (which while much smaller also doesn't have an arena, and relies quite heavily on volunteers) then Glastonbury would be considered understaffed based on the numbers we're talking about - Despite it being only 15,000 capacity, Oxfam take 500 stewards there to cover the venues and campsites and MyCause take a load more to cover the gates, Refresh West take a large crew to run the bars, etc.

[SouthbanKen]

41 minutes ago, SGS said:

I have a feeling that some of this is decided by mendip council and their approval of the licence, some is decided by the venuefor the security of the venue when not open - it is cheaper to have a team of volunteers patroling as a deterrent  than  paid security, and some by health and safety. No other festival allows you to have fires in the campsites- that’s a huge risk and absolutely needs some sort of monitoring. Venues leave tens of thousands of pounds of equipment unattended on site.  If you took the ribbon tower as an example depending on time of day you need 2 people at the bottom controlling the flow up, and 1 at the top to make sure no one does anything silly. Ribbon tower is open from wednesday to Monday that’s 4.5 days or 108 hours which equals 324 man hours = 13.5 people just for that 1 site - now think of the size of the festival. Not to mention the parking, gates, litter picking, and all of those things

Emily and Micheal make a great effort to include volunteers and it raises a ton of money for local, national and international charities and this is at the very heart and soul of the festival - they say every year that the volunteers are abn integral part of the “show” and it couldn’t happen without them . I’m sorry if you think it is just jobs for the boys and anyone that defends the structure is just making a wagon circle. But I hope I have explained reasonably why there are so many volunteers on site

Talking to Mrs SBK about this the other day. She has been to many other festivals, IOW, R&L, Standon Calling, Victorious ect. but 2019 was her first Glastonbury. Like many of us, she "felt" the difference of Glastonbury in comparison to those other festivals, and she put a large part of that down to the volunteers, and the fact that so many of the people you interact with are not just there for minimum wage, they are there to enjoy themselves. I have to agree with her, the atmosphere that this creates really is second to none. 

[Hugh Jass 3]

I was going to let it all go, just walk away and leave Neil with his rapidly crumbling empire, but there is something I feel the need to say first.

Neil,

You would do well to remember that you would not be going anywhere this summer without “idiots” like me and “c**ts” like ddiamond. For those who aren’t aware a number of us long term posters clubbed together to provide Neil with the means he needs to attend the festival this year. He has never thanked us.

Neil regards, in his own words, the contributors to this site as “customers”. He doesn’t give a toss about any of us other than a means to drive revenue and subscriptions, and that’s fine. Personally I would suggest that those of us, the very people he has alienated with his shite recently, have been the ones who have kept this site going through the dark times recently and produce the atmosphere that entices new people in.

However when we all put our hands in our pockets to help Neil when he needed it that was not a financial transaction, it was an act of friendship. An act he has thrown back into the faces of those who contributed, and that is what hurts (Neil you may want to question why two “trolls” would personally contribute to your personal well-being).

Neil, you are fucking ungrateful.

But anyway, and sorry for going on but I’ve never flounced before, we’re well beyond apologies now and I don’t believe one would ever come anyway. It’s a real shame because I almost enjoy the build up to the festival on here as much as the actual festival itself. Sadly my excitement for all things Glastonbury has died a little over the last 24 hours.

Not that it really matters anymore but Neil has been lying too. I have never posted under any name other than Hugh Jass, nor have I held “alt accounts”. My first account was deleted accidentally by Neil, and if proof is required please check the first reply to the thread below where Neil corroborated this. Rather than just be a man and admitted he was wrong he has lied and doubled down.

To you Neil I genuinely and sincerely hope you get the help you need. You clearly do not enjoy doing this so I hope you find something that makes you happy.

To the rest of you, take care. Have a fantastic festival and who knows? I might even see you at the meet (got a feeling it’s going to be a fun one this year)

So long. And. Thank for all the fish.

HJ (third best eFester of all time)

x

PS I know this is going to be taken down almost immediately, which is why I’m taking the liberty of posting it on a few other threads….

[ticketboy69]

15 minutes ago, Hugh Jass 3 said:

I was going to let it all go, just walk away and leave Neil with his rapidly crumbling empire, but there is something I feel the need to say first.

Neil,

You would do well to remember that you would not be going anywhere this summer without “idiots” like me and “c**ts” like ddiamond. For those who aren’t aware a number of us long term posters clubbed together to provide Neil with the means he needs to attend the festival this year. He has never thanked us.

Neil regards, in his own words, the contributors to this site as “customers”. He doesn’t give a toss about any of us other than a means to drive revenue and subscriptions, and that’s fine. Personally I would suggest that those of us, the very people he has alienated with his shite recently, have been the ones who have kept this site going through the dark times recently and produce the atmosphere that entices new people in.

However when we all put our hands in our pockets to help Neil when he needed it that was not a financial transaction, it was an act of friendship. An act he has thrown back into the faces of those who contributed, and that is what hurts (Neil you may want to question why two “trolls” would personally contribute to your personal well-being).

Neil, you are fucking ungrateful.

But anyway, and sorry for going on but I’ve never flounced before, we’re well beyond apologies now and I don’t believe one would ever come anyway. It’s a real shame because I almost enjoy the build up to the festival on here as much as the actual festival itself. Sadly my excitement for all things Glastonbury has died a little over the last 24 hours.

Not that it really matters anymore but Neil has been lying too. I have never posted under any name other than Hugh Jass, nor have I held “alt accounts”. My first account was deleted accidentally by Neil, and if proof is required please check the first reply to the thread below where Neil corroborated this. Rather than just be a man and admitted he was wrong he has lied and doubled down.

To you Neil I genuinely and sincerely hope you get the help you need. You clearly do not enjoy doing this so I hope you find something that makes you happy.

To the rest of you, take care. Have a fantastic festival and who knows? I might even see you at the meet (got a feeling it’s going to be a fun one this year)

So long. And. Thank for all the fish.

HJ (third best eFester of all time)

x

PS I know this is going to be taken down almost immediately, which is why I’m taking the liberty of posting it on a few other threads….

Thanks HJ.

I wrote a long and, quite frankly, beautiful reply to your post on the other thread and then everything got deleted.

In short, those that really care about this forum are feeling like crap. It's tough, but I think i'm not alone in feeling like I need to make a decision about whether this is still a community I want to be part of. 

I wish you well and will miss your posts here.

[tazbang]

8 hours ago, Smeble said:

No other festival seems to need so many people not doing a whole lot for 3 shifts as Glastonbury, it’s now at the point where the festival feels like it  is there for the benefit of those working at it rather than the paying public, as soon as anyone queries the numbers the wagons circle and the defences go up. Got to protect those jobs for the boys. 

I'm not going to take this personally 🤣 There are times when there are more stewards in the tent I work than paying customers, but at other times it is rammed and stewards are outnumbered 300 to 1. I'm sure the stewarding level dictated by the license is based on the venue capacity, and we can't just come and go as the tent fills/empties. This does mean there are times when it looks massively over stewarded though.

[Janaka]

23 hours ago, SouthbanKen said:

but also, in terms of increasing the representation from People of Colour. These are probably the largest under represented groups at the festival and so it makes sense to start there.

As a “Person of Colour” let me tell you I’m sure you mean well, but this statement is overflowing in well-meaning, do-gooding bullshit - and *that* phrase (and “BAME”) are just the most patronising, condescending sweeping generalisations (anyone see what I did there?) ever.

I actually came close to writing “virtue signalling”. But I didn’t 😉

Why does the festival need to “encourage” minority demographics? It’s f**king Glastonbury. If people don’t get what it stands for, whatever their creed or colour, that’s their loss. What do you want to change to encourage them and - given the ticket day clusterf**ks we all endure - how would they have any higher chance of ticket success anyway?  If you’re proposing minority skin colour should enable me to get a ticket easier than you, well I will support that 😉

In 25 years I’ve never looked round and thought “this place is too white!”. Did Jay Z/Kanye/Stormzy have any impact on ethnic quotients? Can’t say I noticed but then I missed them all cos I was elsewhere listening to someone who’s skin colour never even registered to me, not feeling under-represented at all.

 

 

 

 

[blutarsky]

On 5/17/2022 at 12:02 AM, SouthbanKen said:

Essentially, you are against affirmative action. Personally, I and it feels like lots of people on here, and indeed the festival itself support affirmative action in increasing equality, particularly in terms of female representation but also, in terms of increasing the representation from People of Colour. These are probably the largest under represented groups at the festival and so it makes sense to start there. I would also support it for disabled groups, working class groups, LGBTQ groups and potentially others if they were highlighted to me. 

All of these groups have been historically underrepresented in music, taking positive steps to improve their visibility at one of the worlds major music festivals has positive outcomes for all members of society inside and outside the festival and I for one hope it continues. 

if you are interested then this short article sets out some of the benefits that AA has had in the US college system, whilst it takes a little lateral thinking, I would imagine a study into AA in music would find similar individual and societal benefits derived from Glastonbury’s actions. 

https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/18/07/case-affirmative-action

I don’t take umbrage with much of your post, although the strawman about ticket allocation makes your argument weaker and belittles your overall position, but I do take exception to this point: “If you’re for quotas, you obviously think women are weak, are historical victims, and are unable to make it on their own.”

You are wrong, I don’t think women are weak, but I do know that women are victimised globally. It might not appear so in your nice little world, but here are some facts that prove we still have a long way to go when it comes to equality. 

71% of all human trafficking involves women and girls – mainly for sexual exploitation (source. UNODC, 2016)

Over 2.7 billion women don’t have the same work opportunities as men, with laws restricting the types of jobs they can do (source. World Bank, 2018).

Less than 15% of landholders worldwide are women (source. Food and Agriculture Organization, 2015; World Bank, 2019).

Nearly 82 million women around the world don’t have any legal protection against discrimination in the workplace (source. World Policy Analysis Centre, 2017).

When women are involved in negotiations the probability of a peace agreement lasting at least two years is increased by 20 per cent, and 15 years by 35 per cent (source. Preventing Conflict, Transforming Justice, and Securing the Peace: A Global Study on Implementation of Security Council Resolution 1325, 2015).

Anyone who posts on this forum knows that Glastonbury is a cultural icon, a global event that has the ability to touch people way beyond a field in south west England. Increasing representation isn’t about promoting one decent band over another decent band, it’s about making the world a better place for everyone. 

Out of upvotes - top post. 

18 hours ago, SGS said:

I have a feeling that some of this is decided by mendip council and their approval of the licence, some is decided by the venuefor the security of the venue when not open - it is cheaper to have a team of volunteers patroling as a deterrent  than  paid security, and some by health and safety. No other festival allows you to have fires in the campsites- that’s a huge risk and absolutely needs some sort of monitoring. Venues leave tens of thousands of pounds of equipment unattended on site.  If you took the ribbon tower as an example depending on time of day you need 2 people at the bottom controlling the flow up, and 1 at the top to make sure no one does anything silly. Ribbon tower is open from wednesday to Monday that’s 4.5 days or 108 hours which equals 324 man hours = 13.5 people just for that 1 site - now think of the size of the festival. Not to mention the parking, gates, litter picking, and all of those things

Emily and Micheal make a great effort to include volunteers and it raises a ton of money for local, national and international charities and this is at the very heart and soul of the festival - they say every year that the volunteers are abn integral part of the “show” and it couldn’t happen without them . I’m sorry if you think it is just jobs for the boys and anyone that defends the structure is just making a wagon circle. But I hope I have explained reasonably why there are so many volunteers on site

Still out of upvotes! Good detail to back up the point. 

[Jay Pee]

At the risk of flaming and I don't mean to but there are some terms being used which I am not that familiar with.

Is affirmative action similar to positive discrimination? 

I am not saying its a problem to do it I hasten to add but language is shifting but with similar intentions?

[TheGChild]

6 hours ago, Janaka said:

As a “Person of Colour” let me tell you I’m sure you mean well, but this statement is overflowing in well-meaning, do-gooding bullshit - and *that* phrase (and “BAME”) are just the most patronising, condescending sweeping generalisations (anyone see what I did there?) ever.

I actually came close to writing “virtue signalling”. But I didn’t 😉

Why does the festival need to “encourage” minority demographics? It’s f**king Glastonbury. If people don’t get what it stands for, whatever their creed or colour, that’s their loss. What do you want to change to encourage them and - given the ticket day clusterf**ks we all endure - how would they have any higher chance of ticket success anyway?  If you’re proposing minority skin colour should enable me to get a ticket easier than you, well I will support that 😉

In 25 years I’ve never looked round and thought “this place is too white!”. Did Jay Z/Kanye/Stormzy have any impact on ethnic quotients? Can’t say I noticed but then I missed them all cos I was elsewhere listening to someone who’s skin colour never even registered to me, not feeling under-represented at all.

 

 

 

 

Thank you. As a white male I would have been hung, drawn and quartered on here for offering this opinion. Finally someone calls BS!

[Twiggy553]

Quotas is such a misrepresentation.

It’s about spotting imbalances and questioning whether your practices - the things you have control over - are contributing to those imbalances.

If they aren’t then fine (pat on the back), but if they are then you can seek to improve your practice.

For example in recruitment, organisations i’ve worked at don’t say “oh we’ve got no women working here we need all our new recruits to be women” they say, “how come half the people we’ve interviewed were women and yet none of them got/took jobs? Are we doing something wrong?”

[SouthbanKen]

10 hours ago, Janaka said:

As a “Person of Colour” let me tell you I’m sure you mean well, but this statement is overflowing in well-meaning, do-gooding bullshit - and *that* phrase (and “BAME”) are just the most patronising, condescending sweeping generalisations (anyone see what I did there?) ever.

I actually came close to writing “virtue signalling”. But I didn’t 😉

Why does the festival need to “encourage” minority demographics? It’s f**king Glastonbury. If people don’t get what it stands for, whatever their creed or colour, that’s their loss. What do you want to change to encourage them and - given the ticket day clusterf**ks we all endure - how would they have any higher chance of ticket success anyway?  If you’re proposing minority skin colour should enable me to get a ticket easier than you, well I will support that 😉

In 25 years I’ve never looked round and thought “this place is too white!”. Did Jay Z/Kanye/Stormzy have any impact on ethnic quotients? Can’t say I noticed but then I missed them all cos I was elsewhere listening to someone who’s skin colour never even registered to me, not feeling under-represented at all.

 

 

 

 

 

My post wasn't about increasing PoC or indeed any group in terms of attendance / audience. It was about increasing representation and visibility on the stages, as that was the discussion we were having. Apologies if I didn't make that clear, although I would think that the statement "the strawman about ticket allocation makes your argument weaker and belittles your overall position" was fairly conclusive in this. So to be really clear, no one has argued for special rights for minorities to get more tickets. This is an argument made up by Megatronawhatsisname and now perpetuated by you because it is easier to win that the actual discussion we were having. 

Ticket day, I think we can all agree is equally horrible for everyone. The only group that are underrepresented as a result of fairness and ticket day would be those without internet access. 

Proactively increasing representation on stages, particularly for women, is already having a massive impact. Even on this thread people have highlighted a whole bunch of female led acts that are killing it at the moment, interestingly no one has connected this increase in female fronted acts with the fact that the BBC and Glastonbury have been actively promoting music by women for a few years now. Its not a coincidence. Same with football, 55,000 people were at Wembley for the women's FA Cup final on Sunday - why? Because it has been given a platform on main stream media. 10 years ago less than 5,000 watched the same match at the Keepmoat fucking stadium.  Positive discrimination, affirmative action, call it what you want, it works. It increases opportunities for groups who have in the past been overlooked and underrepresented because of their sex, race gender etc.etc. Redressing that balance is important enough to require intervention. Increased opportunities for everyone makes the world better for everyone. 

If the worst that you can find about my post was that it was "well meaning" and trying to "do good" then that's ok by me and if you want to go ahead, call it virtue signalling. You will be wrong, but hey you do you. I'm woke as fuck and proud - come at me. 

[SouthbanKen]

4 hours ago, TheGChild said:

Thank you. As a white male I would have been hung, drawn and quartered on here for offering this opinion. Finally someone calls BS!

No, you wouldn't.  

See also: "These days you get arrested just for saying your English don't you dave!" 

[SouthbanKen]

4 hours ago, Jay Pee said:

At the risk of flaming and I don't mean to but there are some terms being used which I am not that familiar with.

Is affirmative action similar to positive discrimination? 

I am not saying its a problem to do it I hasten to add but language is shifting but with similar intentions?

Yes - i think AA is the term used in the US. 

[stuartbert two hats]

I see the efforts to balance the lineup not in terms of booking an inferior female act over a superior male one to get the numbers up, but spending extra time searching for good female acts to put on the bill that are at least as good as the male counterparts that would have been easy to book.

That's why the lineup isn't full of crappy female artists, it's got loads of great ones.

[vardyvarvar]

For me, we’re in a very important point of recalibration and the needle has not yet settled.

We should be looking to make sure the acts are a proportionate representation of our society, as well as pushing boundaries and challenging the status quo (it IS Glasto afterall).

It’s not a question of superior male vs inferior female for me. It’s about a system where certain types (white, male, good looking, able bodied etc) are given more opportunity. What I see Emily et al doing is trying to combat the system that produces the same ole same ole. And I’m all for it.

To have a grime artist headline El Pointo in 2019 would have been fantastic for ANYONE that related to that genre. There will undoubtedly have been young people watching that set and inspired by what it represents. The fact he smashed it was even better proof that he was really ready! 

[TheGChild]

32 minutes ago, SouthbanKen said:

No, you wouldn't.  

See also: "These days you get arrested just for saying your English don't you dave!" 

Respectfully agree to disagree on this.

Dont know what that quotes about.

Have a good one!

x

[DeanoL]

On 5/16/2022 at 7:21 PM, MEGATRONICMEATWAGON said:

For clarity one last time: I’m not against women, or women in music, or I want less women on the bill. I said to one poster, that if the best musicians were 80% women and the festival punters was 80% women, I wouldn’t give a hoot.

But if the best musicians were 80% women, would you not wonder why? 

That's the thing, if you look purely on merit, I'd say there are more men and male-fronted bands in that top section. But that makes no sense right? There's nothing inherent about being a man that makes you better at music. So why are men so massively over represented in music?

There's lots of reasons, but one of the big ones is the opportunities afforded to them. They're more likely to be taken seriously, they get given more opportunities, and new people coming up know that, which is why more men give it a go in the first place than women.

By actively booking more women, you provide more opportunities and therefore help to very slowly address that issue.

Is the cost of that that you're not booking the objectively best acts that you can in every slot (as far as musical ability can be seen as objective) - yes. Does that matter as long as the acts are still good? Not really. And is it worth it? Yes.

[DeanoL]

11 hours ago, Janaka said:

In 25 years I’ve never looked round and thought “this place is too white!”. Did Jay Z/Kanye/Stormzy have any impact on ethnic quotients? Can’t say I noticed but then I missed them all cos I was elsewhere listening to someone who’s skin colour never even registered to me, not feeling under-represented at all.

Don't disagree with your post, but will say as a white guy that's grown up in and around Birmingham, when I first went to the festival in 2003 it's not that I thought the festival was "too white" but it definitely felt "very white". I think the acts you mentioned have had a huge impact, but it's been from having less than 1% non-white people to maybe about 5%.

So if that was the aim, it's worked to an extent.

[stuartbert two hats]

19 minutes ago, DeanoL said:

Is the cost of that that you're not booking the objectively best acts that you can in every slot (as far as musical ability can be seen as objective) - yes. Does that matter as long as the acts are still good? Not really. And is it worth it? Yes.

I'm not sure it is.  Perhaps not the most popular or well known, but "objectively best"?  The musical evidence doesn't seem to back that up.

[DeanoL]

18 minutes ago, stuartbert two hats said:

I'm not sure it is.  Perhaps not the most popular or well known, but "objectively best"?  The musical evidence doesn't seem to back that up.

Well it's weird because there is no "objectively best" really, but I guess my point is that if there was, lots of the female acts that should be in that group aren't, because they gave up early or never really started at all because it was so much harder to get there.

[stuartbert two hats]

6 minutes ago, DeanoL said:

Well it's weird because there is no "objectively best" really, but I guess my point is that if there was, lots of the female acts that should be in that group aren't, because they gave up early or never really started at all because it was so much harder to get there.

Exactly - they're not as big, but are making just as good music.  Emily isn't giving female acts a leg up despite not being quite as good as the equivalent male act, the most she's doing is booking smaller acts, but where musically they're judged (by the Glasto booking team) to be every bit as good as the easy man band bookings.

[Twiggy553]

1 minute ago, stuartbert two hats said:

Exactly - they're not as big, but are making just as good music.  Emily isn't giving female acts a leg up despite not being quite as good as the equivalent male act, the most she's doing is booking smaller acts, but where musically they're judged (by the Glasto booking team) to be every bit as good as the easy man band bookings.

My point exactly. The female produced music is every bit as good. This is about reducing lazy stereotypical booking behaviours.

[Janaka]

1 hour ago, DeanoL said:

Don't disagree with your post, but will say as a white guy that's grown up in and around Birmingham, when I first went to the festival in 2003 it's not that I thought the festival was "too white" but it definitely felt "very white". I think the acts you mentioned have had a huge impact, but it's been from having less than 1% non-white people to maybe about 5%.

So if that was the aim, it's worked to an extent.

Good points and agree. 👍

[TheGChild]

This years lineup is made up entirely of just 3 genres:

1. Whispery sad girls

2. Flavour of the month indie punk bands

3. DJs. So so many frikkin DJs

 

 

Disclaimer: Yeah i'm grossly generalisng 

 

Edited May 19, 2022 by TheGChild