This is racist propaganda that was published to fuel the xenophobia of Japanese conservatives.
There’s similar stories of tourists “kicking” the deer in their deer park, was literally the Japanese news media lying on behalf of right wing politicians.
Bamboo is a grass. Grass forest.
Same with tourists defacing and stealing bones from the Paris catacombs.
When we visited several years back they had to have guides trailing in the dark watching everyone to ensure tourists didn’t smash or steal or carve their initials into the old bones. We saw quite a bit of (what looked like) recent damage and defacing.
People who feel the need to vandalise stuff just for fun need significant consequences. I think reciprocity would work well. Carved your name on something? This is going to hurt. Kicked and broke a femur? Oh dear.
While I don’t like the state being the sole arbiter of violence, this is one use I might look away for.
On a walk through the woods near my house nearly every large tree has names or initials carved into it. I even found a swastika on one.
Disgusting and depressing. Humans can be so disgusting sometimes.
I think we all make impulsive poor choices sometimes. It really sucks, though, when that impulsive poor choice is permanent and publicly visible.
Reminds me when I went to the St. Louis Arch recently and saw all the markings all over the bottom of both sides. Sure it’s not exactly nature getting ruined, but the thing is a symbol of the area I love that brings many people joy and reminds us that we’re home. Seeing it treated like that was sad.
Lot of wisdom in that last paragraph, scars are bittersweet memories of learning opportunities.
Per Wikipedia:
Prior to 2015, there was a charge to access the forest.[2]
Maybe reinstate the entry fee?
According to a different source (german) I found, they plan to restrict access at certain times, cordon off some areas, and provide more active staff.
This is the way. Kyoto is incredibly rich and can easily afford to protect itself.
Call me crazy, but who cares? It’s bamboo. Those names will disappear in about a week. Reinstate the entry fee, have a guy water-bottle-spray teens carving up the grass too much, and call it a day. It’s not that complicated, nor a huge deal, it’s bamboo.
That’s not how bamboo works. Those names will stay there. Once a shoot is grown it’s grown, it doesn’t keep growing indefinitely.
I think I’ve got an even better idea, then. Make the carving the main attraction. Cut the shoots down after everyone’s done, let it grow until it’s tall again, and repeat the process.
You could make it play into some historical traditions of impermanence and cycles of death & rebirth
Why do people have to be shit?
straight to jail
I’ve been there - it’s a small theme park made for tourists and it’s absolutely packed unless you go really early. It’s a shame that tourists act shit but it’s a basic probability if you allow such masses of people without seriously investing into infrastructure and protections.
There really isn’t anything exception about this issue and the rise of “tourists bad in Japan” is making me really think about alt-right propaganda machine kicking into gear in Japan.
Doesn’t bamboo grow like insanely fast
depending on the species, eco tourism actually have damaging results for wild habitats.
Insanely
Take them one stop further to Hozukyō and throw them into the gorge.
Wait, what?
I suspect there must be an additional missing background information here, as the bamboo-knife-carving really is oddly specific somehow…It’s people carving shit on the surface of a plant. This shouldn’t have to be a conspiracy theory level mystery. People are fuck heads and that’s all it is.
