"expert" advice you should immediately ignore

Balzaccom wrote:

The Video is entitled "Fire 101" and is about "Building a Backcountry Fire." It is produced by Backpacker Magazine and placed in the "Survivor School" section of the magazine's website.

Personally, I do not build backcountry fires at all. In over forty years of backpacking, I can't think of even a single time I built a campfire. I don't like them. I don't need them. I don't really trust them. And I believe their value in an emergency is generally over-rated.

BUT. . .
I get plenty of practice building fires in my wood stove at home, and I've pretty well mastered the technique.

That said, I do not see any obvious violation of Leave-No-Trace (LNT) principles in the video linked. In all fairness to Backpacker Magazine, I think the denunciation of the video above is overblown. The LNT principle most at issue here is Principle 5: Minimize Campfire Impacts.

Bluntly stated: The title of this thread is wrong. It would not be wise to completely ignore the advice in the video. The video could be better. But it includes valid recommendations. As LNT does, I would prefer that the narrator, Casey Lyons, begin the video with several precautions mentioned in LNT #5 such as:

LNT says, "The best place to build a fire is within an existing fire ring in a well-placed campsite." That is the better practice — if you choose to build a fire. But LNT does not rule out building your own fire ring — depending upon your circumstances and the availability of a pre-existing fire ring. In an emergency, you may not have the choice of a pre-existing fire ring.

Some National Forests in the West do allow campfires up to a certain elevation. And it is obvious from the many threads we've had that some people want a fire — even when they don't need a fire. LNT does say that building a fire is an "important skill for every camper."

So inevitably Backpacker Magazine is bound to discuss the topic. And it has chosen a short video introduction in which I think the advice is generally sound — as far as it goes. We need to remember that magazine editors must be more concise than verbose posters to forums.

Whether I like fires or not, whether the fire danger is high in my area or not, whether the video utters all the precautions I'd like to see or not — I do not see any flagrant violations of LNT or forest rules in the video. Sorry Balzaccom, I think your criticism is way overblown and inaccurate.

This reminds me of something I thought of the other day.
The pros & cons to dismantling existing fire rings.
Certainly the true leave no trace act is to not build a fire or fire ring in the first place, but I have to wonder if dismantling existing ones does more harm than good.

Small rings (like the one in the video) I can understand, but I have been to larger backcountry sites where someone has come through and scattered the rocks of the one large fire ring for the site. Its blatantly obvious, because the entire site looks like a fire ring from all the scattered rocks on the perimeter.
While I can understand a strict adherence to LNT, I'm starting to think these large fire rings are just better left alone.