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UNIVERSAL_GOTH

                                                  January 3, 2002
Every now and then, I get                         March  25, 2003
provoked to answer a question                     August 28, 2006
like "what is goth" or "why                Rev:   May    29, 2008
are you a goth".


A collection of some answers:
                                             GOTHIC
I grew up surrounded by dark images,
classic horror films, noir mysteries,
"Dark Shadows"....

One of the earliest dreams I can
remember (from when I was less than
five years old) involved my family         I've always really
being chased around a western town         enjoyed my "nightmares".
by an oversized Tyranosaurus Rex.
                                           Probably the weirdest thing about
                                           this dream is that I'd imagined
                                           this western town as having dirt
                                           roads, but with concrete curbs.
                                           Growing up in Brooklyn, I couldn't
                                           imagine a street without curbs...
My favorite outfit at that
age was solid black, save
for a white logo in the
center of the chest.  I           The white logo was a football in flight,
pretended I was a superhero       but I tried to ignore that.  I may have
named "Blackjet".                 been only five, but I already understood
                                  that sports were uncool.

                                                            TOADKEEPER
                                                            VILLON
There's nothing odd about any of
this, the entire culture was
drenched in this stuff, and still
is: the odd thing is that so many
people can't face that it's there
inside them, and have no good way
of dealing with the inevitable
contradictions.
                                      (E.g. most people
                                      you'll find on
                                      alt.gothic are clearly
                                      "white-hat goths".
                                      Does that seem weird?
                                      Yeah, okay.  So what?).


                                                 (March 25, 2003)

  Necrotrash dropped by alt.gothic:

     "The goth thing however, I can't relate to
      or wrap my mind around.  I've talked to
      several goths, and I even befriended a
      few, but none of them seem to be able to
      explain to me what they are about."

  Oh okay, well then I'll tell you.  Being a
  goth is about growing up drenched in images of
  horror and romance to the point where the
  monstrous seems friendly and you see a joy in
  darkness, a humor in disaster.  It's about a
  morbidly fanatical engagement with life and
  denials that you're serious about anything.            DECADENCE
  It's about raising a shallow style to the
  level of substance, conforming to a uniform of
  non-conformity to wave a flag of resistance to
  blandness.  And sexxy death chicks.


                              CLUBBED


                                                  (August 28, 2006)

  Panurge of alt.gothic once wrote:

  "Is it possible for it not to be 'ironic' on some level?
  To be aware of Goth is to be aware of the (potential for)
  irony.  To be unaware is to *court* the irony
  unintentionally.  (People keep trying to be unironic and
  Goth, but it seems to work out so seldom, y'know?)"


      Let me make myself perfectly clear.

      I think the irony component of goth is so
      bleeding obvious that there can't possibly
      be anything clever about being an "ironic
      goth", so that all goths with more than
      two brain cells, are authentically relaxed
      about their inauthentic aspects, they are
      sincerely affirming their right to be
      seriously silly: they have passed through
      absurdity into the sublime.



            We are all goths, some of us
            are aware of it, some not.



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