Travellers are wonderful people.....stop press

[R1Geezer]

I've just been watching the BBC's latest propaganda film from last night and it seems that we've been unfairly maligning our itinerant brothers. Jolly bunch honest hard working just handing down their "culture". The ones I saw were a lovely friendly bunch living off the land and scavenging, helping us really, recycling, hunting hare etc. So can we now shed this ridiculous notion that they are trespassing, cr&p leaving scum who'd steal anything that isn't nailed down?

I feel that the BBC have converted me on the road to damascus!

[flip_flop]

My comments are purely from personal experience.

My Rugby Club had an experience pretty much the same as Geezer's club.

[plautus]

When I was a very little boy they were generally referred to as "Tinkers", and if you were naughty the Tinkers would come and take you away.

[sandyRoe]

Now they come and park on your lawn.

[B00]

And when they leave, they take the turf with them :-)

[R1Geezer]

The silence from nox and kromo is deafening!

[dave50]

There is always someone who will defend any so called minority group no matter what, who have a reputation of anti-social behaviour and criminality. They believe that because they are recognised as a minority, they must be victimised and therefore it's not their fault. There is non so blind as he who will not see.

[Ankou]

as said by 2shortplanks, i have met mostly decnet ones. of course there are also rogues, but not all of them.

i employ one as well.

[smurfchops]

Why are they called travellers when they live in houses ??

[Frank97]

I had to smile a few years ago when I went into my local there was a group of travellers arguing with each other, apparently they had bought a van load, including the van, of nickle plates of some chap for next to nothing thinking that the chap didn't know what he was selling, so the were going to have a nice little earner, well it all went wrong when they tried to sell them at the local scrap yard only to be told that what they had was nickle plated slabs of steel which were worth next to nothing. I assume the original seller new this so was in fact very happy with the deal.
I sniggered to myself all the time I was drinking my pint, thinking that's one back for the decent members of society.

[boxtops]

Was that the programme last night about the Scottish travellers R1G? I saw that too.

[supersuezy24]

A settled family of travellers rent a house down the road from me...well they did..However the landlord arrived earlier on and was chatting to my neighbour, he was absolutely livid as the house has been cleared out of everything!!! Suite of furniture, beds, kitchen table..EVERYTHING!! He is not a happy landlord at all...

[Postdog]

Surprised no-one has not described them as caravan utilising nomadic travellers yet, because they are.

Against my better judgement, I gave them the chance to do some work on my house rather than just accept a pre-conceived idea of what they were like.

A mistake believe me!

[Le Chat]

I used to have a shop and believe me, they would pinch anything...even the pencil and rubber from on top of my desk!

[venator]

In my experience, we had a building site under development some years ago, and one morning about 20 lorries and caravans arrived, with more coming daily over the next few days. Building materials and the metal from part built houses were stolen, and the guards we hired were overwhelmed.

A local farmer blocked off the access with a bulldozer and sprayed the area with chicken manure, which got rid of most of them, but I believe some only went when they had been paid to go.

The mess and damage caused was horrific. We found that electric cables had been dug up and manhole covers taken.

[venator]

It's worth spending £3 odd if you are really interested in the culture - it's a good read, too.

http://www.amazon.co....qid=1311190678&sr=8-2

[Kromovaracun]

@R1, forgive the lateness - I've not been on since I last posted.

I'm sorry, but your experience in Bournemouth is only evidence of the travellers in Bournemouth. Now, as I said earlier, I have no idea what the proportion of 'good' to 'bad' travellers is, but I refuse to use my personal experience as an indicator of it because that would be ridiculous. I've encountered one group of them in one area of the country at one time. But I'm afraid precisely the same applies to you. You are in no more of a position than I am to make assertions about 'all travellers' - which, please note, is exactly what you have tried to do in this thread. You speak very often of your intelligence R1 - this should be very clear to you. It's a basic principle of critical thinking.

What I will say is that one thing that's notable about the 'nice'/ordinary travellers, or at least the ones that I've encountered, is that if they didn't tell you, you wouldn't have any idea that they were travellers unless you actually visited their site. I wonder how many you've met without realising? What do you think? Is it possible? Can you prove that it isn't?

[Kromovaracun]

I'm sorry?