X-From-Line: nobody Wed May 5 10:11:11 1999 Newsgroups: uk.people.gothic Subject: Re: Slimelight People References: <372d59bf.0@silver.tay.ac.uk> From: Paul Crowley Date: 05 May 1999 10:11:10 +0100 Message-ID: <87u2tr51ap.fsf@hedonism.demon.co.uk> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/XEmacs 20.4 - "Emerald" Lines: 42 Xref: hedonism.demon.co.uk misc-news:666 X-Gnus-Article-Number: 666 Wed May 5 10:11:11 1999 OK, so let's suppose you've agreed to talk to the cameras about Goth a bit, to try and reassure people that we're not all crazed killers with a Hitler obsession. Not everyone would agree to do so - I for one have had my fingers burnt once - but it wouldn't be a mad or stupid thing to do. Things seem to be going pretty well, you're pleased with the way you fielded the inevitable vampire question, when suddenly you're asked if people in the Slimelight take speed. What do you do? You could deny everything. Goths are nice clean living people, and have nothing to do with any kind of dropout druggie freaks. There isn't really a way you can do this without reinforcing the general idea that drugs are well dodgy, drugs are the rare province of losers, sensible people don't even associate with drug takers. It's not hard to see how that could stick in the throat. You could directly refuse to answer the question. This can work in 'phone interviews if you're good at stonewalling, because in the end it doesn't make a very exciting story that you refused to answer it, though I suspect it requires iron will to do. But on a TV interview it would be pretty devastating. I wouldn't like to try it. Or you might be very tempted to answer honestly. Of course people take drugs; it's a club isn't it? Everything that involves lots of music and young people involves illegal drugs and has done for a very long time. If you want to find a music-centric culture that isn't full of drug users, you'll probably have to check out classical music, Christian rock, or the Spice Girls; even there, the performers could be on coke or beta blockers. I would take this last approach if I hadn't already been talking about a specific, named club. But my judgement has improved since I was 17. Let's not blame the individuals who said this: there are reasons that it was they who were being filmed rather than someone who could have fielded the questions better. We can hardly check everyone on the Slimelight door for ability to handle media types. It seems to me that we're already embarked on our best strategy for counteracting this: alternative channels of information such as this newsgroup. -- __ \/ o\ paul@hedonism.demon.co.uk http://www.hedonism.demon.co.uk/paul/ \ / /\__/ Paul Crowley Upgrade your legacy NT machines to Linux /~\