Got benighted on Madame G's at the Gunks - left about 8 pieces behind!

Personally, I would give (and have given) all the gear back. But perhaps this apparent high-mindedness should be filtered through the fact that I have more than enough gear already, and am in any case gainfully employed and can buy my own stuff if I really need it. BITD I knew impoverished climbers who went on Monday soloing expeditions specifically to cull all the gear left in by stressed seconds on easy climbs late on Sunday. And this was just the way it was; I never once heard anyone who had abandoned gear speak of any sort of entitlement to get it back.

I think that the internet has contributed to changed attitudes. Now that you can broadcast your loss to the entire world, there is a much better chance you might actually get stuff back, and there is a far greater chance that whoever found the abandoned gear will become aware of who the owner is and how to contact them. Much of the impersonality of acquiring abandoned gear is gone. Add to this that gear has also gotten hugely more expensive once cams happened. The financial setback is much greater when you abandon cams, and the person who abandoned them will be far more motivated to get them back then they would have been for a wired nut, a piton, and/or a carabiner or two.

Another aspect of the sport that may be changing attitudes is the general retreat from the wilderness perspective that used to overlay climbing. If you left gear in the backcountry, it was gone, everyone understood that, and if you happened upon it, there was never any conflict about just keeping it. The country's crags were never backcountry of course, but the same perspectives held. As crags like the Trapps have become more and more like outdoor versions of the climbing gym, the idea that gear has been abandoned is being replaced by the view that is has simply been misplaced or forgotten in a commercial establishment. Left your belay plate on a mat or in a locker? There's a lost and found box for it and you expect to get it back.

In principle, I still think once gear is abandoned it is finders-keepers, even if, in general, I don't actually keep it myself. But my perspectives are the old-fashioned ones and it is clear on many levels that younger climbers won't be sharing them.

rgold wrote:I never once heard anyone who had abandoned gear speak of any sort of entitlement to get it back.

Rich, I think your points are well-taken, but I will say that the only comments I've seen on this thread with an attitude of "entitlement" are from those who consider themselves entitled to keep stuff they've found (in some cases, even if they know who it belongs to). Whether this is right or wrong is another question entirely.

JL

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gabeschwartz wrote:I always find these threads interesting. Every time I read through one though, the takeaways are always the same. Some people are assholes and will take the gear and not think twice about it, and others will return It because they see it as the right thing to do. Also, the people who justify taking the gear as an ok thing to do, tend to yell the loudest. Right or wrong, moral or immoral, ethical or unethical... whatever. I think we can all agree that returning the gear in a situation like this is the NICE thing to do. I tend to be happier when more people are nice than not nice. It seems pretty simple when you look at it that way. I hope your gear makes it back to you. There are plenty of people who would return it if found. Unfortunately, there are also plenty of people who would keep it if found. Stay classy MP. ~ Gabe

I think this is a pretty rational assessment. I agree it's the nice thing to do! I'd like to believe that there are more nice people than not-nice people, but who knows.

John Marsella wrote:I usually just have my partner lower me from the bail anchor and leave him up there. Sure you use up partners pretty quickly, but there's a never-ending pool of gym climbers wanting to learn outdoors climbing ;)

Oh crap! Who did I replace?!

I was in the Nears this fall, one of my main partner had never climbed Gelsa, except someone was on it and not moving fast. So we ran up yellow ridge with a different start variation (far left corner), rapped down to find the couple on Gelsa had bailed.
I linked up the first two pitches with four pieces of pro, on the way clearing 3 pieces of gear, she didn't manage the traverse, I found a full anchor at the second belay from where the leader had bailed, kept cleaning out someone else gear.
my buddy fired the last pitch and we rapped back down, I found the couple and handed back all his shinny new gear, there was around $200 worth, he was quite happy to get it back and embarrassed for his partner cheesing out of a 5.4 traverse.

saxfiend wrote: Rich, I think your points are well-taken, but I will say that the only comments I've seen on this thread with an attitude of "entitlement" are from those who consider themselves entitled to keep stuff they've found (in some cases, even if they know who it belongs to). Whether this is right or wrong is another question entirely. JL

Fair enough. I wrote from the perspective of many such threads in which there was entitlement enough to go around. And I do think there is a difference between abandoning things and expecting to get them back and finding things and expecting to keep them, but perhaps that distinction is too subtle for an internet donnybrook.

There are further distinctions to muddy the waters. Losing stuff is different from consciously abandoning it, for example.

As I've said, I give stuff back if I can. And I've put my money where my mouth was when the tables are turned. I somehow dropped a nice light locking carabiner in the dark packing up one day, when someone posted that they had found a locking biner, it became clear after some back and forth that it was mine. I told them to keep it, because I had lost it and they had found it and now it was theirs. However, had I lost a $5,000 camera (I don't own a $5,000 camera) and someone offered to return it, I'd be pretty happy to get it back, so I can make no claims to consistency in such matters.

The entitlement comes from expecting other climbers to clean up your mess (stuck gear, stuck ropes, etc.) Its like flatting a tire on your car and then posting a message to the internet for someone to go fix said flat and then deliver your car to your driveway. Maybe run through the carwash while you're at it and put one of those pinetree air fresheners on the mirror.

marty funkhouser wrote:The entitlement comes from expecting other climbers to clean up your mess (stuck gear, stuck ropes, etc.) Its like flatting a tire on your car and then posting a message to the internet for someone to go fix said flat and then deliver your car to your driveway. Maybe run through the carwash while you're at it and put one of those pinetree air fresheners on the mirror.

Another item that pops up in these discussions a lot (other than the obligatory straw man argument) is that those who think it is fine to take the gear somehow interpret the requests as entitlement. The vast majority of requests that I have read, I have interpreted to be some variation of "hey guys, this crappy situation happened, that may or may not have been due to my own mistakes/stupidity, it would be cool if someone nice got to my gear before someone not nice got to my gear". Never once have I seen "Yo peeps... I left some gear cause I was too lazy to get it down. Go get it for me. kthxbye."

Seriously, how can a post that ends with "Anyway...if anyone climbs this and retrieves my gear, I will happily pay for shipping as well as provide a thank you gift card!!!" be considered entitled?

~ Gabe

gabeschwartz wrote: Seriously, how can a post that ends with "Anyway...if anyone climbs this and retrieves my gear, I will happily pay for shipping as well as provide a thank you gift card!!!" be considered entitled? ~ Gabe

It doesn't matter what words you use, its your actions that count. If you got a piece stuck then it's your fault and nobody else. If another climber cleans your gear and returns it then that's fine. The problem occurs when the person leaving the gear behind expects someone they don't know to retrieve it for them. That is what I would refer to as entitlement.

Asking if someone would be kind enough to return your gear and demanding they return your gear are two different things.
It is in the way you word it.

He politely asked if someone retrieves the gear that he's willing to compensate that person. That's a fair request.
He can't expect, the person who does find it, NEEDS to return the gear.

I know that we in the climbing community have made up some standards of when we can keep gear left behind but, I believe that in many instances these rules may be contrary to the law. I would love to hear from some lawyers on this site as to what their opinion is about found gear and the law. If in fact the climbing communitty follows rules in opposition to the law why do we think that we are correct in our actions while the rest of the country is held to a different standard? Are we smarter and wiser than those that we have elected to implement such standards? If we are smarter than we should seek out those positions.
People do not leave gear behind expecting someone else to clean up their mess as well as getting it returned to them but, it would be the right thing to do just as it would be the right thing for the person getting the gear back to show their appreciation.
If it wasn't your gear to start with what is the big deal to be a decent person and make an attempt to return it?

marty funkhouser wrote:It doesn't matter what words you use, its your actions that count.

Well, actually, it does matter. There's a vast difference between saying "...if anyone climbs this and retrieves my gear, I will happily pay for shipping as well as provide a thank you gift card!!!" and "I'm entitled to get my gear back and I expect someone to retrieve it for me." If you can't see this difference, I think you have a reading comprehension issue.

JL

Whatever you decide to do, ask for gears back, write them off as booties, keep the booties, or return the gears, just don't call the cops when a good Samaritan is slow on returning your gears.

http://www.mountainproject.com/v/march-2014/108801194

marty funkhouser wrote:The entitlement comes from expecting other climbers to clean up your mess (stuck gear, stuck ropes, etc.)

It appears that you think that you're entitled to a climbing experience where you are never inconvenienced by encountering a stuck cam. At the Gunks. On a 5.6.

I'm not a lawyer, but NYS law is unequivocal about this, see codes.lp.findlaw.com/nycode….

Ya got ten days to turn the found property over to either the owner, the Mohonk Preserve (as the entity "in possession of the premises where the property or instrument was found"), or the Gardiner police. Failure to do so is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of not more than $100 and not more than six months in jail or both.

However, there is a catch which I'll leave to the lawyers. The property in question above is "lost property." There are different considerations for "abandoned property," which is why I used the term "abandoned" in my previous posts. If someone puts a file cabinet out on the street, you are not obligated to find the owner and return it. So I would guess that the legal issue revolves around whether the items in question can be reasonably viewed as "lost" or "abandoned."

Thank you Mr. Gold for your research and response. I do not think that property left behind under duress is considered abandon until a specific time period has expired. Still awaiting an opinion from a judge or lawyer.
By the way George H from the New England area says hello.

After the 121th time his phone has rang, the dude who started this thread is wishing he hadn't said shit.. Bahah..

bump to the cause-
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I'll go with #3

Em Cos wrote:Hauling is a major pain even under ideal conditions, and in less than ideal conditions can even be impossible without pulleys. A better solution for an able-bodied follower that is struggling with a pitch is for them to ascend the rope using prussiks. In the Gunks, where roofs are common even at low grades and taking a fall could leave a follower hanging in space, I consider rope ascension a must-have skill for anyone and recommend teaching it to beginners before taking them on any route where lowering will be impractical. Hope you get your gear back!

It amazes me how few people can ascend ropes that follow or lead trad. My reasoning for learning was self preservation. Not being able to pull a roof sucks, but being stranded out of communication (sound doesn't travel through those roofs) can be a real problem. And no one is hauling my ass over a roof with rope drag and any sort of traversing that is common in the Gunks.

But, the moral of this story, too me, is don't assume anyone can climb anything, and climbing in the dark is scary for most people. Very often on these forums people ask good routes to bring beginners up, and I think this plea is a good reason for such questions.

All that said, I'd have single rapped, cleaned as much of the gear as I could, and ascended 200ft (not fun without ascenders) or rapped to the ground and walked back to retreive the rope.