rituals will never reach their goal, because they are conceptually based - only when the human spirit is free to dance and optimise will the goal be reached - the world has plenty of cold religion, there is no need for any more.

:) PS

there will be a meeting for next years event in leytonstone the first week of october - i will post the exact details in the next couple of days [email protected]

    cheopfests 

From: "cheopsmate" 
Subject:  give us 100,000 pounds  and we will sell vegy burgers all night long
Date: 01 2002 July 01 22:51
I´m back bloody hell you lot seem to have scared every one else away
Still if anyone would like to see pretty bubbles go to-
http://www.phreak.co.uk/stonehenge/psb/stonecam.htm
or would like to share your memories of a free festival go to
http://festival-zone.0catch.com/free-festivals-menu.html
Stonehenge free festival was organised on love and peace and 35 
pound dole checks not 100,000 pound and 80,0000 people turned up.
and stimulated an unprcedented rise in the fortunes of EH concession
at stonehenge 100,000 seems a small price to pay to return the 
favour.The stones are karmically linked. Do good to the stones and 
good fortune will return to you.
cheop 


    debs-allowed 

  From: [email protected]
  Sent: Wednesday, June 26, 2002 8:09 PM
  Subject: [stonehengepeace] the stones
  Hi everyone
  Im a new comer to all this but would like to comment on some of the issues
  being bantered about.
  1. people not being allowed rucksacks, sleeping bags etc......I saw several
  people with sleeping bags, rucksacks and duvets. Is there some form of double
  standard going on here or is there an unwritten code of who can have and who
  cannot. We were denied a folding chair even though one of our party was on
  crutches with a broken leg!
  2. Climbing on the stones......Whereas I agree that this monument is the
  heritage of the people, and as such we should have free access to it, I must
  confess to being saddened at the sight of so many people having a total lack
  of respect for what is one of this countrys most important pagan worship
  sites. If so many people continue to climb on the stones in this way there
  will soon be no stones left to inherit.
  3. I was also gladdened to see such a diverse mixture of society all gathered
  together and having a peaceful time. Marred only by the occassional drunken
  bum, who fell over me. Or everytime I switched my torch on to pour a coffee,
  an average of six people decided that was a sign that I was selling drugs.
  4. Long live the summer solstice in its present form. With a little less
  jumping on priceless stones and people attending for all the wrong reasons.
  Blessed Be
  @->-Debs-<-@





    eden 
From: "deadpoets_uk" 
Date: 22 2002 June 22 20:21
1. eden was disturbed early on by two women with children turned away
because they had duvets not blankets
2. need to do something about those govt. satelites moving clouds
around so we can actually see the dawn sun




    gfirsof2002report 

 From: "George Firsoff" 
Subject: [stonehengepeace] 2002 report
Date: 29 2002 June 29 12:37

In order to open up our history file on the Solstice 2002, I have used
the following provisional report. I hope this will encourage you to send
in your accounts, by emailing me or the newsgroup.

Pictures of our Goddess project are also now online.

2002 Report
===========
An estimated 22,500 celebrated a night vigil at Stonehenge from 8PM on
20th June 2002 until 7AM on the 21st June, and had a jolly time, even
though dense high cloud ensured the sun was not seen to rise!

I thought that the crowd were more relaxed than before, and I thought
this as soon as I arrived and saw that people were not rushing in at the
opening but trickling in at a leisurely pace through the night and
building to the maximum at around dawn.

Nevertheless I saw that there still was a level of the emotional
contestation that we are aware from the anarchists and free festival
campaigners who express themselves on the newsgroup on the internet. At
the stones this expresses itself in a prolonged occupation of the Stones
by the sort of young people who identify with "the people" although of
course this rhetoric disguises the fact that they are just one
particular group of people, who by occupying the stones in this way, are
denying them to some other groups of people. Click on
http://www.greenleaf.demon.co.uk/tribes.htm
for further comments on this topic. Persuading people to give up an
emotional contestation is I would suggest, no easy matter.

English Heritage stewards did very little to prevent people climbing on
the Stones but this is for them the main area of anxiety. Not only are
the Stones subject to damage, so is the lichen, which takes a long time
to grow. There is a serious safety issue, if just one of those carousing
on a stone was to fall off, injuring a person or perhaps a small child
underneath. Not the very worst but the most immediate problem is that
English Heritage come under flak from critics who say they do not
understand how English Heritage can allow people to behave, basically
with such disrespect, or perhaps thoughtlessness. Resolving this is
again, no easy matter. But if the contestation can be reduced, by such
measures as providing a legal music gathering for the contestors to go
to, I think the climbing will also be controlled.

The story of how this years Peace Process Goddess, built of green hazel
branches, went round and into the Stones is told at
http://www.greenleaf.demon.co.uk/goddess.htm

The attempts to create activities outside the stones featured two solid
fuel braziers South of the Stones, which at least provided some refuge
for those who were cold, and at least one singalong session. The Hare
Krishna people set up on a high part of the bank near the Hele stone and
kept a crowd going with their music. The Kings Drummers were authorised
to move their dancers drummers and torches in a cordon around the site,
and close to dawn they advanced to the Hele stone. Shamus Joy held a
poetry corner.

It is a view expressed by others as well as myself, that the level of
confrontation is slowly diminishing and the level of celebration is
slowly increasing. But there will be a great deal of discussion about
the future management of the access, to cope with increasing numbers,
and deal with various irritations and errors which arose from the
necessity to carry out searches upon entry, for prohibited items, such
as camping equipment, glass, firemaking tools, knives and so on.

There were 11 arrests, representing 0.05% of the crowd.

This is very provisional report, and will be improved, when the TRC and
the Round Table have met to discuss the Solstice, which will happen
later in July. Meanwhile please send your comments to me in a plain text
email to:
[email protected]
or share them with everybody on the stonehengepeace newsgroup.

Happy Solstice Everyone!
George Firsoff

(Secretary of the RGG, PADRAS, SPP & TRC)


    kevfest  
From: "k.leonard" 
Date: 04 2002 July 04 19:46
my personal feeling is that we are 
the stonehenge festival in diaspora, 
and our return to stonehenge is only a 
matter of time and process
I just had to write and agree with you 
on this one brian
I see our return as inevitable
obviously there are others who don't
but only time will tell
man was never going to walk on the moon once
yet it has been achieved
and to be honest that seems a lot harder
than what we are hoping for
kev


    mark-ban 
From: "mark pryke" 
Date: 05 2002 July 05 10:34

Hi
Sorry if this has already been covered but we've just got back from
Glastonbury

1) Does anyone know why accoustic guitars and violins were banned from the
stones whilst drums and didgeridoos were permited? (I personally saw a
guitar and a violin denied entry)

2) Did the organisers agree to three separate searches?  Firstly at the
entrance to the carpark for sounds, then on walking to the stones and then
again on arriving at the stones for bottles and sharp objects.  The sharp
objects search involving looking wherever the civilian security wanted.  Any
disagreement or questioning of these procedures resulted in agression and
physical intimidation.  I was denied entry to the stones early in the
evening for questioning the security guards behaviour to some cellebrants.

    Mark



    moosickboy  
From: 
Date: 21 2002 June 21 16:37

    penny-respect  
Subject: Re: [stonehengepeace] re: ritual - elitist and conceptual
Date: 17 2002 September 17 10:59

I have had a strong feeling for quite a few years that what was happening in
the landscape of the Stones was in essence disrespectful and needed to
change. It is a shame we didn't hear and do something ourselves instead of
having it forced on us.

Ritual can so easily become obsessive behaviour ( Marquis de Sade!)
Having been involved in more organic activities, I am aware that everyone
bring what they want. Sometimes it is amazing and sometimes it just seems
not to work.  We are all fooling our selves if we think that any one person
can decide to make it work  It is true to say that the sum is greater than
all its parts (I know I haven't quoted it correctly, but I am sure you get
the idea.

Everyone has thei own definition of respect.  From having to like people or
treating them with deference.  My understanding is that respect means
accepting people for who they are and listening to what people say without
constant interruption even when you don't agree, that is what discourse,
discussion and dialogue refer to!
Best Wishes
Miss Penny Wyrd
[email protected]


    savestonehenge  
From: "Save Stonehenge!" 
Sent: Thursday, July 04, 2002 7:22 PM
Subject: Campaign update: Summer 2002

Dear Friend of Stonehenge,

The British government, which gave up building major highways about 4 years
ago after massive public opposition, has suddenly changed its mind thanks to
pressure from the construction industry and the roads lobby. One of the new
projects it has in mind is to widen large sections of a road known as the
A303 that runs between London and the west country. Unfortunately, one of
these sections goes through the middle of the Stonehenge World Heritage Site
near the world-famous ancient monument! Knowing full well that international
opinion would never sanction building a road in such a place, Britain's
Department of Transport has conceived a roadbuilding scheme that pretends to
"improve" the road as an "exceptional environmental scheme". It is, of
course, nothing of the sort.


The latest news is that the plan to bulldoze part of the World Heritage Site
is firmly on course to succeed. The official legal documents allowing this
to happen, known as "draft orders", are expected to be published in December
2002 or early 2003. The Department of Transport recently signed a contract
with two roadbuilding companies to try to ensure that the road is built more
quickly. (Anticipating a major international outcry, they try to ensure the
road is built first, then ask whether that is a good idea afterwards.)


( This is from the regular (once every few months or so) email to people on the
Save Stonehenge! email list  http://www.savestonehenge.org.uk).
 



    spread  
spreading the word well ive never seen so mutch fucking hassel in all mi days 
like i seen at stone henge this year and do you know why well ill tell ya cos 
some clue less fuck decided to gett a buntch of fucking gorrilas to do the 
fucking security at the soltice and thay were taking the fucking law into there 
own hands and getting away with it and the only edge or atmosphera was being 
caused by these pricks being allowd to ackt like 1942 ss storm troopers  and 
another thing how comes the druids were doing a ritual on the 22nd  surrounded 
by paying tourists    its a funny old world innit             
 ps, see ya next year


    steve-piss  
From: "stephen summers" 
Subject: [stonehengepeace] re taking the piss
Date: 11 2002 September 11 12:51
I for one respect the stones and understand those who wish to see a 
more, how shall we put it, a more special event within the stones. 
Unfortunately the ones taking the piss are perceived by many as the 
supposed guardians EH;NT the police etc who stomped on the free 
festival which catered for the majority who wanted to celebrate the 
solstice in a way that didn´t oblige everybody to enter the centre of 
the circle of stones.Many were happy to observe the druids from a 
distance and celebrate the solstice on the outside like the outsiders 
by Camus. Many couldn´t give a toss about the druids.or their 
ceremony´s others view them as intrinsic to the celebrations. My 
feeling is until there is some accomadation to allow both 
celebrations to exist in parralel both sides will have to suffer the 
mish mash with druids being elbowed out by new age ravers or vice a 
versa, protests and complaints all round and instead of building a 
cosmic energy of love peace and unity we are in danger of seeing an 
undignified scramble for the best vantage points to see the summer 
suns majestic,
clear skys permitting, progress over the heel stone.If your attention 
is only focussed on what goes on in the centre of the stones you fail 
to see the solution is what goes on, on the outside. 

 


    StonehengeDream  
From: "[email protected]" 
Date: 02 2002 September 02 18:52
Dear Editor,

    svenduv  
From: 
Date: 04 2002 July 04 18:08
Hi all,  

    tenfests  
From: "deadpoets_uk" 
Date: 30 2002 June 30 11:53
Why not have ten's of small festival happening on the same day, the 
Solstice maybe, each with several hundred people rather than 
thousands all cramming into the same place. This way the scene can 
expand almost infinitely, there's plenty of farmland going to waste 
all over Britain. You can get away with a hell of a lot more at a 
small festie too.



    trev  
From: "Judge Trev" 
Subject: STONEHENGE 2002 The full story, vids pics
Date: 23 2002 June 23 19:40
ACTUALLY BE AT STONEHENGE - MASSIVE COVERAGE!!!
19 VIDS - LOADS OF PICS
Where you there? - See yourself and friends on RFM
http://www.bolan.co.uk/rfm/stonehenge-summer-solstice-2002.html
RFM  Real Festival Music  www.realfestivalmusic.co.uk

     


 




    0karelia  
=== Letter From Karelia === 18sept2002 ===

2002 June Solstice night in Stonehenge was
another live acoustic rave where I was at -
grok musical empathy fluting with drummers.

I'm not one for gossip but whilst I danced
some rotter stole my bag and phonebook and 
writings and tools and stuff - paranoid?
   Was it another plot against me? No.
The problem's in their head not mine.

2003 again I'll leave my stuff and dance -
(or else I'd be a slave to my possessions
which'd be far worse than the losses,
annoyance, inconvenience and expense).

Easy to return and/or pass on negatives:
but "Eye for an Eye and Everyone's Blind".
Fight fire with water, lies with truth,
Fight paranoia with PRONOIA -
the feeling that everyone's helping you,
like our kids get at rainbowy festivals.
(Years ago when I got ambushed
my little old stony mutant heart
was warmed by those who got up, stood up 
for honour truth and love

=== dicegeorge.com = 07970-378572 ===