T***@aol.com
2009-09-11 20:37:44 UTC
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/green/detail?entry_id=47049
Burning Man is uber-progressive. You free yourself of capitalism for the weekend and experience only art; you free yourself
of social roles and norms and enter a utopian world. Since Burning Man went...
Why I hate Burning Man
Why I hate Burning Man
Burning Man is uber-progressive. You free yourself of capitalism for the weekend and experience only art; you free yourself
of social roles and norms and enter a utopian world. Since Burning Man went green in 2007, what's not to love?
Looked at another way, Burning Man is the anti-ecology. But before I get to that, which is my main point here on the Thin
Green Line, let me first say that Burning Man isn't free of social norms at all. The Playa fills up almost exclusively with
20-40 year-old economically privileged white heterosexual people, the majority of whom exist on a fairly narrow swath of the
political spectrum: the place where hippie meets libertarian. If the festival were as effective as some believers think at
conjuring away normative biases, that wouldn't be the case.
Then there's the stuff they take: the labor- and transportation-intensive costumes created for one-time use, the DIY climate
control machines, the generators, the fire dancing, the drugs (which, with the possible exception of marijuana aren't
green...at all), the packaging, the bottled water, etc. Some of the art is made of reused and/or reusable materials, which is
great, but some of it isn't. I wouldn't expect DaVinci to limit himself to reused materials, but let's be honest: Most of the
"art" of the man is just "look at this cool thing I made" for the Man. And, really, watching a giant hunk of wood and
whatever else burn just for kicks is the epitome of wastefulness.
The festival's green proclamation, while an important step, is a substance-lite exhortation of the kind that I've read on
many a corporate website. Did I mention that Burning Man is a for-profit corporation? Whose leaders refused to take a stand
when Sempra proposed building a coal-fired power plant nearby?
Burning Man is, at heart, a partyand it's one that thousands of people drive hundreds of miles to get to. It's great that
they clean up after themselves when they're done, but driving that far to have a good time just plain ain't green.
So why do Burners drive out to the middle of nowhere to have fun, especially since so many of them hail from the same 2-3
cities? Because the natural world therewhich is flat and barrenwon't upstage their ego-shows. I don't mean that quite as
harshly as it soundswe all have egos, of course, and not everything that we do to feed them is inherently bad. But nature
offers a radically different perspective on the ego: It makes you feel like a small part of something much bigger, which,
empirical evidence suggests, does wonders for the psyche.
I'd venture that no matter how fantastic your costume, if you stand in front of Niagara Falls you'll feel silly. I'd further
venture that not that many people would stop to look at you.
I'm sure the Burners reading this would protest that the festival is physically away from the everyday world so that
participants can get psychologically away from the everyday world. But going outside of nature to do it overlooks the answer
that's been there all along. Our human and social norms seem limiting and arbitrary because, well, they are. What's not
limiting and arbitrary? The complex forces and landscapes and patterns and interactions of the huge planet that we live on.
The one that made us. And pretending not to see that is as silly as some of the costumes on display.
Burners: Ready, aim, fire!
Posted By: Cameron Scott (Email) | September 08 2009 at 06:31 AM
Listed Under: cars and driving, fossil fuels, gender and sexuality, green culture, packaging, race/ethnicity, transportation,
waste and recylcing
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/green/detail?entry_id=47049#ixzz0QpdyfuFC
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chad James' photos from BM 2009.
Burning Man is uber-progressive. You free yourself of capitalism for the weekend and experience only art; you free yourself
of social roles and norms and enter a utopian world. Since Burning Man went...
Why I hate Burning Man
Why I hate Burning Man
Burning Man is uber-progressive. You free yourself of capitalism for the weekend and experience only art; you free yourself
of social roles and norms and enter a utopian world. Since Burning Man went green in 2007, what's not to love?
Looked at another way, Burning Man is the anti-ecology. But before I get to that, which is my main point here on the Thin
Green Line, let me first say that Burning Man isn't free of social norms at all. The Playa fills up almost exclusively with
20-40 year-old economically privileged white heterosexual people, the majority of whom exist on a fairly narrow swath of the
political spectrum: the place where hippie meets libertarian. If the festival were as effective as some believers think at
conjuring away normative biases, that wouldn't be the case.
Then there's the stuff they take: the labor- and transportation-intensive costumes created for one-time use, the DIY climate
control machines, the generators, the fire dancing, the drugs (which, with the possible exception of marijuana aren't
green...at all), the packaging, the bottled water, etc. Some of the art is made of reused and/or reusable materials, which is
great, but some of it isn't. I wouldn't expect DaVinci to limit himself to reused materials, but let's be honest: Most of the
"art" of the man is just "look at this cool thing I made" for the Man. And, really, watching a giant hunk of wood and
whatever else burn just for kicks is the epitome of wastefulness.
The festival's green proclamation, while an important step, is a substance-lite exhortation of the kind that I've read on
many a corporate website. Did I mention that Burning Man is a for-profit corporation? Whose leaders refused to take a stand
when Sempra proposed building a coal-fired power plant nearby?
Burning Man is, at heart, a partyand it's one that thousands of people drive hundreds of miles to get to. It's great that
they clean up after themselves when they're done, but driving that far to have a good time just plain ain't green.
So why do Burners drive out to the middle of nowhere to have fun, especially since so many of them hail from the same 2-3
cities? Because the natural world therewhich is flat and barrenwon't upstage their ego-shows. I don't mean that quite as
harshly as it soundswe all have egos, of course, and not everything that we do to feed them is inherently bad. But nature
offers a radically different perspective on the ego: It makes you feel like a small part of something much bigger, which,
empirical evidence suggests, does wonders for the psyche.
I'd venture that no matter how fantastic your costume, if you stand in front of Niagara Falls you'll feel silly. I'd further
venture that not that many people would stop to look at you.
I'm sure the Burners reading this would protest that the festival is physically away from the everyday world so that
participants can get psychologically away from the everyday world. But going outside of nature to do it overlooks the answer
that's been there all along. Our human and social norms seem limiting and arbitrary because, well, they are. What's not
limiting and arbitrary? The complex forces and landscapes and patterns and interactions of the huge planet that we live on.
The one that made us. And pretending not to see that is as silly as some of the costumes on display.
Burners: Ready, aim, fire!
Posted By: Cameron Scott (Email) | September 08 2009 at 06:31 AM
Listed Under: cars and driving, fossil fuels, gender and sexuality, green culture, packaging, race/ethnicity, transportation,
waste and recylcing
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/green/detail?entry_id=47049#ixzz0QpdyfuFC
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chad James' photos from BM 2009.