Costuming is rather benign, however, compared to some of the more subtle stereotyping in the media. Writing of V for Vendetta, the New Yorker’s David Denby writes, “And the movie’s sullen, chain-clanking atmosphere connects with punk, Goth, grunge, and all the doomy tones of white teen rock for the past three decades.” (http://www.newyorker.com/critics/cinema/articles/060320crci_cinema)
Mahnola Dargis of The New York Times makes a similar association: “Mr. McTeigue, who probably received some guidance from the Wachowskis (they also served as producers), never manages to make this Goth dystopia pop.” (http://movies2.nytimes.com/2006/03/17/movies/17vend.html)
What is Goth about V for Vendetta eludes me. Making the association strikes me as being in the same vein as the considerably less benign association of Goth with school violence. I refer, of course, to the Columbine massacre in which the media used the fact that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold wore black as an excuse to portray Goth as the latest source of moral corruption.
Never mind that wearing black was the only thing the non-Goth Harris and Klebold had in common with the Goth subculture. The mere similarity was enough to lodge a negative stereotype in the minds of people already wary of Goths. If a black-clad Goth walking down the street elicited stares for seemingly dressing like everyday is Halloween, now the cultural Powers That Be could pat themselves on the back for identifying the latest way in which kids just weren’t all right anymore. Mere disapproval over aesthetics became a much weightier moral disapproval.
The whole thing has blown over to a certain extent. But the unfair, unjustified link between Goth and violence lingers, as Mr. Denby and Ms. Dargis show.
Though Goths are tired of the issue, and many people might not really be aware that there even is an issue, let me state it categorically: Goth is not about violence or terrorism.
The Substance of Goth
And now I can get around to answering a question I implied earlier, namely, what is the substance of Goth? What lies beneath the dark clothing and funereal aesthetics?
One problem is that different people will offer different answers to the question, making a consistent definition of Goth rather elusive.
A related problem is that the history of Goth as a subculture is somewhat challenging to pin down. But one thing is clear: it all begins with music. Bands representing a musical growth out of punk in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s — Bauhaus, Siouxie & the Banshees, the Cult, and others — brought with them a darker theatricality that carried over into their fans. The British music press perpetuated the label “Goth” to describe this burgeoning new style, while in the States bands like Rozz William’s Christian Death, somewhat independently of the UK scene, moved things forward under the loose label of death rock. It all converged in the ‘80s, which saw bands like Sisters of Mercy, Sex Gang Children, London After Midnight, and more, propel Goth music forward.
Along with the music, Goth as a subculture came to adopt under its big black umbrella gothic literature and other art forms from poetry to photography — all sharing a funereal aesthetic vocabulary. And I think we can include Goth fashion in this too; there is certainly some artistic merit to the imaginative ways in which Goths express themselves through their choice of clothing.
As to what it all means or what purpose it leads to, the answer is — and this should come as no surprise — not particularly straightforward. I could tell you that Goth involves an acceptance of death as a part of life. Or that, in the Greek spirit of catharsis, Goth takes what is tragic in life and adopts its trappings to tame it.
I could also tell you that Goth is a kind of counter-cultural rebellion, a refutation of the artificial cheeriness of pop. It could be a way to carve out an identity distinctive from the mainstream. Or maybe it’s just an aesthetic without a cause, something for people to thumb their noses at the bourgeoisie with while having a good time. In the end, it can be all of these things, or only some, or even none at all.
The appeal of Goth as a subculture lies precisely in its lack of organization, manifestos, or creeds. It has a core of attributes that are shared to varying degrees, but are also open to individual interpretation. True, Goths have their share of cliquish individuals, conformists, and people so caught up in labels that if something isn’t “Gothic,” it’s not worth considering. But this is true of any group, and as a strictly voluntary subculture, Goth offers a freedom and individuality not found in more pervasive, inescapable mainstream cultures.
Goths can be on their own or socialize as a part of a scene. Religion, sexuality, and more are strictly up to individual preferences. And it must be mentioned that not all Goths are particularly attached to the label “Goth” or any other label: it may be a convenient descriptor, but isn’t the sole or final word on an individual’s identity.
For my money, I view the Gothic subculture as an art movement, albeit one that hasn’t crystallized and aligned with a single purpose in the way art movements typically do. That kind of anarchic freedom is part of its appeal, though, even if it comes with the price that non-Goths are reduced to grasping at stereotypes because tangible definitions are so slippery.
My pet peeve may seem like a trivial thing, but this is really yet another manifestation of a culture that insists on judging people based on their appearances and, worse, defining their identity based on what group they belong to.
The fault lies in the politics of identity I’ve been harping about recently, in which individual identity is denied by a focus on group identity. With Goths are violent misfits we get blacks are criminals, whites are racists, women are hysterics, men are brutes, and Muslims are terrorists. It’s all related to the same flawed mindset, the way people not only define others, but themselves.
I’ll be exploring this in greater depth in forthcoming columns. Until then, when you come across someone equivocating Goths with Columbine-like atrocities, at least you’ll be able to say you know better.