John Perry Barlow on Burning Man in 2003
Coincidences… I was having brunch with Dr. Trix on Saturday and commenting that I felt Burning Man seemed to distract and redirect our friends’ energies — energies they could otherwise direct toward important issues facing our lives today. That in this election year, how awesome would it be if burners spent their energy and dollars to travel to battleground states to campaign for the Democratic candidate (or Green, or whatever)? I know BM is supposed to help people rejuvenate and inspire their lives in such a way that they take their renewed selves and energies back into the world and create change. I’m dubious.
The good Dr. Trix asked me if I’d ever read the commentary JPB had written on this exact subject back in 2003. I said I hadn’t, and Trix said he’d try to find it for me. Imagine my surprise then to see it coincidentally posted today on Lady Leblanc’s blog. (Update: Actually, Dr. Trix did post it on his blog, I just saw it on Lady Leblanc who cross-posted from Dr. Trix. Head over to Dr. Trix to read his very interesting commentary.)
Here’s a taste of JPB’s commentary. Read the rest here.
If someone like Karl Rove had wanted to neutralize the most creative, intelligent, and passionate members of his opposition, he’d have a hard time coming up with a better tool than Burning Man. Exile them to the wilderness, give them a culture in which alpha status requires months of focus and resource-consumptive preparation, provide them with metric tons of psychotropic confusicants, and then… ignore them. It’s a pretty safe bet that they won’t be out registering voters, or doing anything that might actually threaten electoral change, when they have an art car to build.
Indeed, Burning Man strikes me as only one of many reality distortion fields within which the counter-culture, myself totally included, has sought self-ghettoizing refuge. On reflection, I realized that I felt much the same about the massive protest marches that failed to impede in any way the Administration’s unprovoked assault on Iraq. We all had a grand time gathering ourselves by the millions, but we were up against opponents far more practical and smart than Dick Nixon or Spiro Agnew. The current Dick knows that the best way to deal with dissent is give it a spectacle to exhaust its energies on. He knows that we’re suckers for a good show, especially one where we get a starring role, so he gives us unmolested stages upon which to mount our extravaganzas and goes on about his corporate affairs.
Also, as I watched the enormously inventive and sweet-hearted burners duct-taping together their creations, I felt a sinking sense of ineffectiveness. We’re up against an opposition that can get their machines to fly twice the speed of sound and do so reliably. Granted they do stupid and terrible things with those machines, but at least they get them to work. And yes, ours would probably work too with that kind of funding, but with our disdain for both wealth and the tedious processes of democracy, we have conceded those resources to the thin-lipped monotheists.
Of course, my pal and Mondo 2000 editor R.U. Sirius made a solid point when he said, “It stands to reason that self-righteous, inflexible, single-minded, authoritarian true believers are politically organized. Open-minded, flexible, complex, ambiguous, anti-authoritarian people would just as soon be left to mind their own fucking business.”
You bet we would, but can we afford to any longer? And, if not, how can we shake off the confusion, poverty, disarray, willed hallucination, paralysis, denial, and cultural isolation we’ve created over the last half century and run these overgrown hall monitors and out of office?
coincidence? check your RSS feeds. lady leblanc lifted the JPB essay from my blog reflecting on my coversation with you.
May 20th, 2008 at 1:31 ami’ve written about this before a handful of times, quite heatedly, but don’t know where the writings are and don’t have time right now to re-diatribe, do briefly:
i continue to strongly feel that, while i don’t disagree that burners could and should put more attention on global issues, we continue to foster a brand of civic activism and engagement that is perpetually undervalued by those who only see the benefit of action through more ‘normal’ channels. having lived a more ‘normal’ activist lifestyle in the past, i feel that i am accomplishing just as much, if not more, NOW.
i’m focusing on creating local community; i’m staying very informed about local poilitics; i’m setting my sights on accomplishable goals.
i’m part of a huge, relatively tight-knit network of like-minded humans who have strong presences in a growing number of liberal, influential urban areas, and am therefore able to see the results of my effort spread across cities and the country.
i’m constantly finding new opportunities to contribute to very worthy causes, and seeing success stories of groups who’re leveraging their community’s support to create change. i see people without health insurance get their bills paid for after surgery for cancer. i support burner-organized non-profits that build solar panels and homes in new orleans. i watch san francisco projects and policies and priorities change based on burner presence.
this issue is not black and white. i don’t want to encourage rampant consumerism or waste or inaction that comes from excessive partying. but i don’t like being made to feel like our choices to engage on a local level and enact local change are ineffective. especially since i’m not convinced that the type of activism we could realistically be achieving would be any more effective than what we’re doing now. take the year that the burn was during the republican national convention– would the presence of 15-25k more protestors in nYc have created MORE good than the gathering of those people to celebrate? sure. but would it have created more good than the resulting efforts of those 15-25k people–rejuvenated and newly re-amped from their shared experience of community and art–in their local communities? i doubt it.
these things, they are good to think about. but i wish there was a little less judgment attached to the way it’s discussed sometimes.
May 20th, 2008 at 1:37 pmThanks for the comment Orange. I guess my critical judgement comes from a place of having been a multi-year burner and failing to see my friend group’s ability to extend its reach of influence beyond the party scene community. Don’t get me wrong… it’s great that BM fosters and rejuvenates tight-knit communities in ubran liberal bastions. I guess I’d just like to see that collective rejuvenated energy reach a little further. In my personal experience, almost all of that energy is dumped right back into preparation for the next burn.
So, while your experience of and defense of BM are absolutely valid (and I respect your experience and sharing of said experience immensely), so is my personal experience with and resulting criticism of BM and its (lack of) effect on the outside world.
And finally, is it really so bad to be critical of an institution or social system? It seems to me that it’s through critical analysis and assessment that we determine whether a system needs to be adjusted to better meet its goals. Isn’t it even somewhat possible that BM has slowly ceased to accomplish its goals over the years (whatever those may be)? It seems to me that constantly and aggressively evaluating a system (whether BM, city government, local government, marriage, etc.) is the best way to keep that institution honest, adaptive, effective, and vibrant.
May 20th, 2008 at 2:43 pmcriticism is necessary
i just think that the anti-bM rhetoric devolves towards bashing a little too often. and, in addition, it often ends up striking me as overly judgmental as well as hypcritical–or at least indicative of a lack of insight into one’s own personal decision-making and priorities.
but then again, most of these discussions also involve parties–such as myself–who get very defensive ;P
so! talk on…
May 23rd, 2008 at 11:31 am