My next rant of sorts shall be me poking said fun at the “goths” of my school, spawned from the reading of one of these so-called “goths”‘ weblog.
Adorned completely in black, wearing any random items of clothing they found on the floor in the morning (provided it be the proper colour), they walk down the hallway, sauntering slowly and broodingly as they glare at any poor ignorant soul who would dare to look at them. Listening to their gothic music and death metal, they will then post a list of the people who looked at them “strangely” throughout the day on their weblogs, trying to show the world how lamentably pathetic their lives are in hopes of finding someone to stroke their egos a little bit instead of sympathizing with them like they claim they want others to do. Employing words they don’t know the meanings of but have seen once or twice in the Anne Rice books they read, they write poetry that their petty followers and cohorts deem “deep” and “philosophical” because they can’t understand the poem completely due to the use of the large words. It must be intelligent if we can’t understand it, right? They write about their little tragedies that are self-created, they wail about how life is unfair and how they just wish they could kill either themselves or everyone around them.
And then they label themselves goth, because goth, instead of being a sub-culture of punk, developped in the post-punk era (late seventies, early eighties), is really just an angrier, seemingly more meaningful type of emo in their minds. Not to mention, they apparently think that they are the “original”, and “traditional” goth–what with their black Marilyn Manson sweatshirts and such–and that any others who would even fathom calling themselves goth are fakes and need to hide in a corner and die.
Quite obviously, this makes me angry on so many levels that I don’t believe myself mentally capable of clearly expressing my rage. But I’ll try. Oh, goodness knows, I’ll try.
Since the people I’m speaking of are under the impression that they are the original form of goth, I’ll focus on it, and not on the various styles (fetish, cybergoth, etc.) that goth has developped into including over the years.Thus, my first problem with them would be their clothing. Goth, having been introduced in the late seventies with the arrival of bands such as Bauhaus and Siouxsie and the Banshees, used the two aforementioned bands heavily as influences on their fashions. Bauhaus, a group of four men, dressed in black suits–very intelligent-looking, very classy. Siouxsie and the Banshees saw Siouxsie Sioux (the leader of the band) as a pale-faced, dark-lidded, wacky-haired succubus who enjoyed dressing in outrageous costumes and styles (very typical of the time considering the fact that punk was still around). First, she’d dress as the Egyptian goddess Bast, next she’d be a Japanese Ronin, next an Arabic desert princess, next a leather-clad dominatrix. And these people? Yes, they’re oh-so-traditional goth with their Manson sweatshirts and their clothing from Hot Topic. I mean, I’m sorry, but you don’t buy clothing with a brand mark on it if you’re goth. One of the fundamentals of the gothic culture (that makes it partially a sub-culture of punk) is a divergence from mainstream, consumerist culture. Having people see a brand mark on your chest, your ass, or other various places doesn’t convince them of your originality and “gothic-ness”. Besides, things at mainstream designer stores are expensive. That Ralph Lauren shirt you’re spending fourty dollars on? You could just as easily have spent the fourty dollars on eight shirts from Value Village–shirts without brand marks, as well.
But whatever. Truth be told, the clothing isn’t even what’s the worst part about these little goths. What’s worse is that they think they’re actually more intelligent than the “drones” they have to spend their time surrounded by. What’s worse is that they think what makes them more intelligent is the fact that they read Anne Rice–this oh-so-amazing and oh-so-intellectual writer all others must bow down to. Quite frankly, if they think Anne Rice is the best writer ever, they haven’t read much vampire literature (since vampires are just so gothic, you know?). Candidly, I’m quite sure that more than half of them don’t know who Polidori was. Nor Byron, nor Goethe, nor Baudelaire, nor Keats (John Keats, that is–the one who wrote Lamia), nor LeFanu, to name a few of the generally “famous” authors and poets of gothic literary culture. Either that, or they do know them, but haven’t read any of their works. Since memorizing a few quotations so that people think they’ve read them when they haven’t and all suffices, I suppose they don’t see the need in actually reading them and learning something. Nope, their meagre little claim to being literary gothics resides in Anne Rice. Honestly, it’s no surprise that the particular people I’m talking about aren’t doing very well in school. Though that may also be due to the fact that they parade around town during the classes they skip to get high.
And then they pretend they can be like the greats they’ve never read by writing their angsty poetry with the big words that are thus very a la mode. We’ll keep this short: the fact that this group; with all of them working together, probably wouldn’t be able to properly spell (nor pronounce) “Your little spiel, which you had intended to make persuasive, simply seems drab and apocryphal, in my opinion,” is testament to the fact that they know nothing about English or writing at all. To write, one needs to read. Period.
With that as the last leg of this morning’s rant, I’ll be off with this message: if you think you’re goth but know nothing about gothic culture beyond what you’ve been told on the various “dark” and “vampiric” message boards you probably frequent, do the world a big favour and educate yourself. Either that, or just go about your business and don’t think you have the right to decided what’s goth and what isn’t. You don’t. So just get off your morbid little soapbox and shut up. No one wants to hear it. I’m not goth, I know I’m not; but you’re not, either, so you can just go die (ah, the veritable words of a cold-hearted, cynical bitch–how I adore being back to my old self again).
Pretend goths need to die.