Opulent Temple vs. Green Tortoise

As most of you probably know, Opulent Temple was not given placement as a camp this year. The reason given was, quite reasonably, that they weren't going to be operating an interactive camp, as they had elected to take the year off from their normal giant stage setup, and operate parties based off other groups' mutant sound cars.

Whether it matters or not, they were indisputably popular, as always, in 2014:

Opulent Temple at Burning Man 2014. Photo: Duncan Rawlinson

They had hoped the BMORG might give them placement just out of respect for their fairly enormous past contributions (whether it's your thing or not, they spend an awful lot of effort entertaining a lot of us, and have for a decade+).

The org decided that wasn't worthy of placement and I agreed in a post on our Facebook page. You either contribute in the year you get placement, or you don't get it. Makes sense not to consider past contributions, as long as that's a universally-applied rule.

However, as the controversy has rattled on, I began thinking about it and realized - wait a second, that completely contradicts something the org said a few months ago when justifying not just permitting but actively supporting the Green Tortoise plug n' play camp, citing their past contributions as reason to continue to give them placement despite them literally selling $995 for-profit tour packages to Burning Man.

Here's what the BMORG had to say in a post about the Green Tortoise tour company:

"We’re continuing to make an exception to our approach to turnkey camping in the case of the adventure company Green Tortoise, with whom we forged a relationship in the year 2000."

"Beginning in 2000, Green Tortoise agreed to provide shuttle service to Gerlach."

"Over the years, we grew to know and trust the Burners running the company and their staff and customers made valuable contributions to Burning Man, so we allowed them to expand their presence by offering a trip to Black Rock City."

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"The current contract provides Green Tortoise with infrastructure for their camp, and the option to purchase up to 185 tickets (at $390 each) for resale to their customers only."

"Green Tortoise campers have made significant contributions to BRC over the years. [They go on to list a bunch of categories of contribution over the years.]"

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Now let's compare that to the reasoning the BMORG gave for denying Opulent Temple placement this year. They were very clear:

"What a camp has given the community in years past is not part of the consideration — it’s about what they’re offering this year. It’s that simple."

That sure sounds strange considering the org spent a lot of time justifying Green Tortoise's existence and placement by what they've done in the past.

So let's see here: When a for-profit, openly commodified camp wants placement it not only gets it, but it gets allocated blocks of tickets that aren't available to the rest of us. It even gets help with infrastructure from the org. 

And then you tell Opulent Temple, one of the most popular camps of the last decade, that they don't get any consideration whatsoever for their enormous past contributions? Whatever you think of Opulent Temple itself, that seems pretty unfair to me by comparison. Yes, their initial proposal was reportedly mainly about the fact that they'd just be running parties on other groups' sound vehicles with interactive activities at their camp not deemed sufficient for placement, but they submitted a follow-up proposal that they say addressed the concerns about interactivity, adding a whole bunch of things.

Let's sum up so far.

Green Tortoise camp:

• Gets blocks of tickets allocated to them by the Org to resell to their tour customers.
• Gets infrastructure provided for them by the Org.
• Is a for-profit tour company openly selling tours to Burning Man for $995+.
• Gets an entire Burning Man blog post justifying its special treatment based on past contributions.

Opulent Temple camp:

• Competes for tickets like everyone else, and like every other camp.
• Gets no help whatsoever from the Org in building their camp.
• Is a 100% gifted experience that has been so for a decade plus.
• Gets about a section of a Burning Man blog post explaining why their past contributions mean nothing in the placement decision.

This all seemed so openly hypocritical to me that I wanted to get the Org a chance to comment before running this article and they kindly responded:

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The Org wrote:

"Hey Matt, so we understand where you’re coming from on this. We just view it a little differently. We'd like to share our thinking with you a bit.

The difference is that Green Tortoise is providing the same service at their camp this year as they have in previous years, while OT isn't. If GT came to us this year and said they were just going to give people a place to crash and nothing else, they would not be placed as a theme camp. Their historical contributions were just used as evidence of why they're an acceptable type of camp at all, not as justification of why we're placing them this year. We see those as two different things."

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Ok, so that is a bit of a different perspective on it, and not something I had considered. Essentially, they're drawing a distinction between the criteria used to justify camp existence and that used to place camps. 

This gave me some pause, and I almost decided just not to make this post, but then I realized that I don't think that's really a valid distinction to draw. Here are the problems with that reasoning from my point of view:

1. Unplaced camps don't need their permission to exist. They can just show up. So, there is no such thing as needing to justify their existence as a camp. Unplaced camps simply don't have to do that.
   
2. It's only placed camps that receive any review from the Org ahead of time and so the idea that the Org made the post on Green Tortoise in order to explain why Green Tortoise is allowed to exist rather than why it gets placement (and special tickets, etc) doesn't make sense to me. 

Go back and read their post on why Green Tortoise is allowed placement despite offering for-profit tours to the playa. Virtually the entire thing recounts what either Green Tortoise or its customers have done in the past as justification for its special treatment by the Org.

Most importantly though, I think, is this thought:

If what a camp has done in the past doesn't matter, does that mean the Org is willing to give placement to any other tour company that wants to sell the exact same set of services? 

Under their stated logic it seems to me that they would. There's no difference between Green Tortoise in 2015 and Generic Adventure Tour Company's BRC Camp 2015 if both are selling the same services and what they have or haven't done in the past doesn't matter.

Except that I don't believe they actually would permit a new tour company to get away with this. The Org got stung so hard by the Caravansicle debacle that there is no way they'd start handing specially-reserved blocks of tickets to a new tour company, giving them placement, helping them build their infrastructure, etc. 

And that leaves me casting about for the reason as to why they'd continue to grant placement AND special blocks of tickets (not DSG tix...these are tickets normal non-profit camps don't even have access to) to a for-profit company whose actions fly in the face of the rules that apply to everyone else. Meanwhile, Opulent Temple gets zero consideration.

Here's what Larry Harvey had to say about plug n' play camps and fariness earlier this year:

"I think the current controversy over Plug and Play camps is not so much about equality, but concerns a very different though related concept: inequity – a basic sense of unfairness. Whenever a select group is allowed special access to tickets, especially when these tickets are in short supply, this can inspire ill feeling. This is doubly so if such a camp is widely perceived to be flouting nearly all of Burning Man’s Ten Principles. This is what has stuck and rankled in the public mind. It is as if these camps have been allowed to parade past the Main Sale ticket queue and insert themselves at the head of the line."

I could not have said it better myself, Mr. Harvey. 

Here's my thought process about all this:

• Opulent Temple is awesome. They entertain huge numbers of people on the playa every year. Whether you like what they do or not, they are a community-supported crew that has been giving to the playa for many years in a big big way.
  
  
• Green Tortoise is problematic. Yes, it's nice that it makes it easy for some foreign Burners to attend, but then, Caravansicle probably made it easy for some people to attend too. I don't see "making it easy to attend" as one of the criteria for placement anywhere. Ultimately, they are a for-profit company selling tours to the playa. And they get treated better than the gifted camps do.
  
  
• Opulent Temple is not bringing their normal stage show to the playa this year. Their original proposal called for them mainly to be operating a mobile sound vehicle out on the playa and some interactive activities in camp that the Org deemed insufficient, and it's true that Burning Man will deny placement to camps that aren't offering enough. However, OT says they re-submitted their app with a bunch of activities and were still denied.

• I don't believe that a war EDM by BMORG exists. I do believe they are trying to nudge the culture in particular directions, but I don't believe that actually has much or anything to do with this situation (as compared to creation of the level 3 sound vehicle zone in deep playa this year). 
  

Screenshot from the game Ghosts n' DJs, where you try to hunt down talentless DJs. I don't believe the BMORG intends to round them up and put them in camps, contrary to rumors. Really going out on a limb there, I know.

• I don't believe that "What a camp has given the community in years past is not part of the consideration." I just don't. It flies in the face of how they treat Green Tortoise, and  I am essentially 100% positive they would not treat GT this way if was their first year out there, or if another adventure tour company wanted to sell package tours to Burning Man for profit.
  
  
• So therefore I'm led to conclude that what a camp has done in the past does matter, or that there are other reasons as to why the owners of a for-profit camp are placed (AND granted special blocks of tickets to resell, even when ticket scarcity is such an issue) based on previous year's contributions but one of the biggest and most storied completely gifted camps at Burning Man gets no consideration, even after proposing a camp that does have interactivity in it. I don't know what those reasons are, but the reasons we're being don't make sense to me.
  

I love Burning Man. I think the Org does an overall good job running it, especially given that the people at the top largely just fell into it and had to grow as the event has grown. That is a hard thing to do.

But this pair of decisions is just a bit rotten to me. There is no way I can look at Green Tortoise getting not just placement but access to special tickets and even infrastructure built by the org, while Opulent Temple, which has given so many people so much joy (even if it's not your thing, you have to acknowledge that) over the years, totally for free, doesn't even get this small bit of help this year and think something is wrong with the decision-making process that led them to these twin decisions.

My conclusion:  If the Org can outright break its own rules and support for-profit Green Tortoise above and beyond other theme camps, there is no reason it couldn't bend the rules and give a camp that has done as much as Opulent Temple has the placement they deserve.

It's not about one camp being placed to me. It's about exactly what Larry said: Fairness. But beyond that, it's about common sense. Why not do such a relatively small thing to help a camp that has given so much to Burning Man over the years? Why not reward people who do so much for Burners with just a little extra consideration? Seriously, what's the harm? What's going to happen if Opulent Temple got placed without the same level of interactivity in the past, for one year?

What do you think? Should Opulent Temple have gotten placement this year?