On The Curious Incident of the Festival That Prevented Sleep

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Europe is in the middle of a heatwave where the afternoon temperatures reach 33°c or higher, but where night time temperatures are just 20°c or even less. Local governments are saying “Avoid strenuous activities in the sun” and “make sure to keep cool”. They also offer going to churches or museums because they’re nice and cool.

On the flip-side music festivals such as Crapibana (intentional spelling) choose to have loud banging music from around 1900 last night right up until 0300 this morning. Now, in the best of times this is a nuisance but during a canicule this should be treated as criminal.

It should be treated as criminal because for several nights, people in warm apartments and warm houses are unable to open windows to get fresh air and recover during the heat wave. They have to choose between sweltering heat, or noise pollution.

It strikes me as absurd that music festivals have such a reputation for heal the world mentality, environmentalism and more when the reality is horrifying. Imagine parking thousands of cars on fields for days at a time, where crops are grown. Imagine the carbon pollution that makes its way into the food chain.

The second pollution is from people littering all night long, several days in a row. Teams of people have to clean up after the litter bugs. It’s horrifying to see how dirty festival fields are, especially when you consider the “We want the world not to be polluted” refrain they keep chanting.

The final problem, and this is the most serious, and the one that gets to me, is that the notion that a festival with less than 30,000 people can make noise for five nights in a row without repercussions, especially during a heat wave.

Friday morning I woke at 04:30 to run at 6am to take advantage of the morning freshness. The next night there was a very high wind, and stormy conditions so the noise pollution from the music festival was silenced. Last night the apathetic sociopaths made noise from 1900 or so until 3am. I had planned to wake by 5 or 6 this morning but I was exhausted to the point that I slept in all the way to 9am.

The point is that music festivals are seen as boosting the local economy, and helping local businesses. In my vécu the opposite is true.

The same country that bans ULM for being too noisy, that tells people they can’t mow their lawns on a Sunday, that has strict rules about indoor plumbing and noise thinks nothing of a festival making noise all night long.

This meshes nicely with my Whatsapp conversation from a few weeks ago. A social network that promotes events through Whatsapp, especially events for alcoholics, locks the chat between recurrent events, and discourages sober online conversation, whilst encouraging giant piss-ups to use an English term.

The Crapibana is part of the same problem. Friday I went for a 6am run, despite not getting a full night of sleep. Stormy weather made it possible for me to sleep before yesterday’s 73km ride, but the restorative sleep that I would normally have, was impossible due to the Crapibana event making noise from around 1900-0300 am. In theory I was meant to wake at 5 to drive for another bike ride, and to be social.

I was so exhausted from getting zero sleep that I ended up sleeping in until 9am. This is rare. This occurs once every few years. The restorative sleep that would have made me feel fresh, that would have encouraged me to go out and do things that required spending money was mothballed, because of my very deep exhaustion.

That sleep deprivation also has a deeper social cost. How many of us, around the region of the festival are now stuck with either not doing any sports, or doing them right at the hottest time of the year.

5am would have been perfect for a morning run this morning, with air at 18°c. Now it is 26°c and we’re in heat stress and heat stroke running territory, all because 30,000 people needed loud music and alcohol for virtual fun.

“But wait, alcohol and concerts are real” to which I respond, if you’re drinking, your fun is as virtual as if you were sitting in front of a computer having a whatsapp chat. Imagine if social media had arrived before alcohol. Imagine if we saw alcohol as virtual reality, and social media as reality.

And now for a call for change. When a music festival takes place during a heatwave, at 2200 it should go into silent disco, to allow sports people to sleep, recover and be fresh for their hikes, walks, runs and bike rides.

Why should the alcoholic portion of society dictate their desires onto the rest of society? I’ve been to events that go into silent disco mode at 2200. Including the IFSC World Cup in Villars-sur-Ollon and the World VR7XR forum in Crans-Montana, several years ago.

During a heatwave measures should help people get enough sleep at night. This morning I saw that French festivals are banning alcohol during the heatwave from festivals.

In the end, I’m asking for empathy from music festivals. I am asking for common sense and decency. Sleep is important, and silence, for sleep is key.