Rave Off: Politics and deviance in
contemporary youth culture
edited by Steve Redhead, 1993
Notes
from Ch 1 & 2 (both by Steve Redhead)
The End of the End-of-the-Century Party
Youth cultures:
-
many of them in succession in post-war Britain
-
“in this period a particularly youth ‘style’ became
commodified as consumer culture progressively swamped the advanced economies of
the West (and latterly the more ‘backward’ East).”
-
i.e., movement outward from Britain , manufacturer of the world
-
by the 1980s, youth culture was an industry unto
itself; no longer represented rebellion, but rather “merely a marketing device
and advertisers’ fiction”
The End of Century Party,
published in 1990 by Manchester University Press:
-
“a provisional theoretical account of youth and pop at
fin de siecle.”
-
“radically reworked what had become the orthodox
approaches to global pop culture by the end of the 1980s.”
-
“It questioned a particular ‘linear’ way of thinking
about the connections between pop and youth culture which was becoming ever
more difficult to sustain, and suggested fresh lines of enquiry.”
(“...working class subcultures have
been retrospectively mapped back onto British cultural history every few years
by fashion and music journalists and entrepreneurs eager to perpetuate some
enduring myths about spectacular subcultures.”)
The evolutionary account being
questioned was that of “an unfolding progression of youth style upon youth
style.”
“Music led styles such as heavy
metal boys (or girls), goths, new romantics, acid housers or ravers dominated
the 80s as cultural critics constantly sought the ‘new punk.’”
Acid house / rave culture was
misread in this fashion. It was in fact
“attracting a range of previously opposed subcultures from football hooligans
to New Age hippies”
“Hedonism in hard times:” describes
“a sea of youth styles circulating and re-circulating in a harsh economic and
political climate where youth is increasingly seen once again as a source of
fear for employed, respectable society and a ‘law and order’ problem for the
police.”
New youth subcultures (including
rave) revived debates about folk devils and moral panics.
The End of Century Party: “explains
at some length” that “neither 60s deviancy theory nor 70s versions of cultural
studies can satisfactorily account for global changes in youth and youth
subcultures since the punk era.”
Rave Off: analyses of
development of (since 1987) ‘acid house’ or ‘rave’ culture.
this culture is not representative
of the whole of youth culture,
but it is at “the cutting edge of
‘politics and deviance.’”
The Politics of Ecstasy
-
Discourse on drugs – particularly E – has been “drugs
as pathology.”
-
E is seen (in Britain , historically) as
“recreational.”
-
“associated with politics of pleasure” – “a pleasure
for its own sake.”
-
“it takes place not on a continuum of drugs/alcohol but
of legal/illegal substances”
-
“it is discourse on drugs which produce drugs as a
problem not the other way around”
-
(legal discourse (which “polices both the boundaries of
its own discourse and the boundaries
of other discourses”))
-
it is not “given” or “fact” that drugs are dangerous
Ecstasy in Britain
[timeline of Ecstasy history]
Arrived on the scene in small
quantities in early 1980’s (according to 1985 article in The Face magazine)
1987: first widespread use of
Ecstasy in major cities of Britain
[properties of E that make it ideal
for recreational use]
Is E for Ever?
-
“Research carried out in Brighton ”
concludes that “use of drugs is considered by many young Pleasuredomers as a
valid component of their leisure, along with their dress, style, choice of
friends, music and clubs.”
-
“Ecstasy has also made its presence felt in many
different ways...” e.g. its visibility in pop culture
-
E is becoming increasingly common as a
gateway/introductory drug
Not surprisingly, there have been
many fears expressed about E:
-
fears about its chemical make-up
-
about its after effects, both short and long term
-
about its involvement with escalation of crime activity
“However, it is E’s relationship
with ‘Acid House’ and ‘Acid House parties” that has produced the most alarm
about the drug, especially amongst the media.”
-
This follows on Stanley Cohen’s work regarding moral
panics
-
“It has been argued that ‘E’ and ‘Acid’ have produced a
moral panic in society. Users have been
attributed many of the characteristics of previous folk devils.”
-
late 1980’s: a “pretty” girl dies after taking E at the
club The Hacienda after allegedly taking E ... media uproar (local and
national) and consequent legal battle resulted in club being closed down...
“and condemned for the foreseeable future the character of both ‘E’ and
‘Acid.’”
-
Dissenting voices: certain doctors, therapists,
academics (R. D. Laing); and voices of E users themselves (club/drug
literature)
For many people, the pleasures of E
– ‘the friendly drug’ – far outweigh the dangers.
“Drug use amongst young people in Britain ,
especially Ecstasy, is now so widespread that it can no longer be adequately
explained by either sub cultural theory or traditional notions of deviance.”
“To decontextualize Ecstasy use in Britain from
its predominant setting with what has loosely been called rave culture is both
unrewarding and misleading.”
-
E and rave “it is clear” go hand in hand
-
May be open for debate which came first
-
to most ravers they are inseparable
The mass media have a “veritable
field day” with some of the key features of this apparently new youth
subculture (one to rival ‘punk’).
-
“An enticing shopping list was laid out for the
intending acid houser or raver” (1960s psychedelia, E & drugs, smiley
faces, fluorescents, pastel colours,
-
Newspaper headlines since the “second summer of love”
in 1988 have told “their own story of the law and order reaction which has
taken place.”
[ La Hacienda (London
Rave Off
Legislative positive regarding
parties – both legal and illegal – is complex
Even though “the law does not know
its subject,” laws/regulations have had considerable impact on development of
rave music / rave culture, including an attempted “ban.”
-
1982: in UK , the main law governing parties
was the Public Entertainment Act requiring anyone to hold a license to hold
public entertainment.
-
‘Private’ parties, particularly 1988 onwards, escaped criminalization
by virtue of being ‘private’ as defined in the courts
-
Therefore a 1967 statue was found: the Private Places
of Entertainments Act which “required that any private entertainment done for
financial gain must have a license.”
-
To date, many local authorities had not adopted the
1967 act (thus bringing it into force in their jurisdictions); “but once the
media publicity about Ecstasy / Acid House / rave culture reached overdrive the
situation started to change.”
-
1988: The Licensing Act. “Awarded the police greater
powers to monitor premises and increased the licensing sessions from once a
year to seven.”
-
1990: The Entertainments (Increased Penalties) Act – a
private members bill given full support of Margaret Thatcher’s government;
“without opposition’; came into force July 13, 1990.
·
increased penalties for holding unlicensed
public entertainment;
·
courts: power to impose a fine of 20,000 or to
sentence those responsible to prison for six months, or both.
·
“The effect of this measure, given the
restrictions being imposed on legal clubs, has been to potentially criminalise
a whole section of the youth population.”
E has “inevitably been placed in a
position of instrumental centrality (‘Ecstasy causes Acid House’ in the way
that some youth commentators put it, and so on’)” because it is associated with
“new psychedelia, ” “[...] in much the same way that LSD was viewed as a ‘mind-bending’
catalyst in the counter-culture of the late 1960s.”
Author Steven Redhead argues: “In
my view it is misguided to attribute Ecstasy such a deterministic role in this
‘new’ politics of hedonistic youth (usually compared unfavorably to the
politics of the 1960s psychedelia) of the 80s and 90s.”
E is for Enterprise
The development of the media
narrative of Acid House / rave culture has several significant strands.
- One significant strand is “the line that can be drawn from the early 80s warehouse parties which grew, eventually, from an illegal underground to a general reflection of ‘enterprise culture’ by the early 90s.”
- Coincided with Thatcher years, but it is not exactly free market ideology.
- Note: “the right to organize parties displaced the right simply to party in the “Freedom to Party” pressure group politics.”
Moreover, “the acceptance of the
profit-making motive in the organization of such events drew widespread support
from punters, especially in the wake of an increasing state moral
authoritarianism and constant media tales of youth in T-shirts being met by
police in riot gear at many raves.”
The Ecstasy of Politics?
One difficulty with applying the sub
cultural method to the Acid House / rave phenomenon is: “for youth subcultures
prior to the early 70s, there was generally held to be an authenticity about
their street-generated style.”
Subcultures before punk were “applauded [...] for their much-flaunted
signs of resistance and rebellion towards contemporary society”
“After 1970, however, manufactured
subcultures were constantly spotted as first Glam and later Disco took over the
night time economy of many cities and towns.”
Punk: a hybrid of manufacture and
authenticity; to wit, the debate about ‘whether it originated in art schools or
dole queues.’
“Post-punk subcultures have been characterized
by a speeding up of the time between points of authenticity and manufacture.”
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