What caused this dangerous destruction of property and vandalism? Anti-everything metalheads looking for their fifteen minutes of fame? An angry mob mentality fueled by severely dehydrated, sleep-deprived drugged-out, drunken kids? High-energy bands exhorting the crowd to defy "the system"? Although these are some of the more popular explanations surfacing in the mainstream press, I'd suggest examining the following "recipe for trouble" for your answers: Assemble 220, 000 people on a desert-like, former Air Force landing strip, charge them $6 for a slice of pizza and up to $4 for a small bottle of water on four of the most unbearably hot and humid summer days in memory, enforce no restrictions on drug taking or alcohol consumption, and perhaps most importantly, employ a volunteer "peace patrol," consisting of youthful novices, as your primary safety and security force.

At the conclusion of the festival, the Red Hot Chili Peppers delivered a cranked-up, pounding version of Jimi Hendrix' Fire. Kids lit overflowing trashcans on fire in response and those fiery "statements" escalated into a mob-driven riot. The powerless peace patrol had no answers for the riot, so the police quickly stepped in to stop it.

This isn't about teenagers "gone wrong" again. Or the perils of "sex, drugs, and rock and roll." Many youth-oriented music festivals are held every year. They take place without major incident, many attaining the "peace, love and understanding" hoped for at Woodstock 1999. The lesson to be learned from this unfortunate incident is that promoters need to make the health and safety of their festival/concert audience their first priority. The promoters of this festival should never have placed the welfare of 220,000 people in the hands of a well-intentioned but woefully inept volunteer peace patrol.