culture of Hedonism!

introspective | 14.01.2004 12:17 | Sheffield

UK alternative politics seems divided into two camps. While domestic issues such as poverty and housing (for example) don't get the support of the activist community, international issues benefit from the huge amount of creative resources available - where protests are often seen as having more sex appeal - how much of this is due to the hedonistic culture of our time?

If you have any thoughts/ comments/ ideas/ experience of how this "pleasure seeking" may get in the way of politics - or even if you consider hedonism as a positive, essential ingredient for the task in hand - we're looking for people to share their experiences to be printed as a future publication (once known as collectableanorak - a handfull of south yorkshire folk feeling the need to resurrect this project as a one off!) In time for those hedonistic riots the working class so love i.e. the long hot summers (around end of May start of June)

If you can send us a piece on this subject (in no more than 500 words) please email us
or leave a comment below if you'd prefer.

Some might not consider this article to be news but it's quite generally felt that this kind of subject needs to be debated.

email

actfourpeace@yahoo.com

introspective
e-mail: actfourpeace@yahoo.com

Comments

Hide the following 10 comments

oh please

14.01.2004 16:27

oh god its people like this that are killing romanticism. if you're doing activism out of duty or out of guilt then you're doing it for the wrong reasons...do it for the world you want to create. work on things that you percieve to be important but more importantly than that, fulfilling and FUN. do we want to end up with a diminished buch of bitter and burnt out cynics as a movement?

as some great person (maybe emma goldman?) once said...if i can't dance its not my revolution...

unlucky richard

it is true

14.01.2004 17:19

i do agree with you and i would like to write something not sure about the number of words but i will see what i can do.

translator

hmm

14.01.2004 17:46

Ever thought that those actually campaigning on poverty and housing might not have time to write 100-page navel-gazing articles about whether or not we are engaging The Real True Authentic Gritty 100% Guaranteed Genuine Working Class?

;-)

!

14.01.2004 18:03

emma goldman said: "if I can't dance..." almost a century ago.

It was only a couple of years ago when someone express an opinion to me that:
"the only political thing that you can do in this day and age, is to have fun"

I strongly feel that the latter quote's not gone out of date yet!

...

one of the anoraks

14.01.2004 18:15

oh please, see http:image.lowtech.org and you will no doubt see from there i smoke far too much weed / eat far too many mushrooms.. so the whole anoraks are not anti drugs and i can say this we would legalise all drugs (given the chance).. the point being we feel the state introduce drugs in alternative cultures.. look at e years ago they was £20 a tab, now they go at average of £2.50 a tab? do we understand the long term implictions of e? likewise crack has hit the streets of the uk big time.. another means of keeping the working class in their place and fighting each other? i have used smack years ago and if it was legalised and pure then i would again.. just the fact it is full of shit and it is the shit that is addictive not the drug itself, if pure..

yes politics should be fun and enjoyable and that's what i think people like rts were making a move towards? in the last few years there has been the introduction of white powder to the alternative culture? why would this be? oh lets think. yes - divide, rule and fuck up a positive i would guess?.. been in this world for 40 years, know me shit.. you might desire to call me old and cynical.. idd prefer to say i'm just seeing shit from another view point and wisdom having used all known drugs to man and suffered likewise due to that use.. having seen people die in front of me from overdose etc.. fuck i watched a realative at the age of 9 die from an overdose of smack.. smack aint new just more fucking prolific, why would that be? the powers that be have no longer the means of social control ie work so pump up the drugs supply? nuff said i guess you now get where i, as one of the collective that is urbanparanoia, is coming from.. of course this is my view - you should be at our (non)meeting, grand argument but common agreement does arrive in time.. translator, an e mail is on its way, thanks for your offer..

mozaz..

one of the anoraks
mail e-mail: actfourpeace@yahoo.com

happiness

14.01.2004 18:18

i think local stuff is really important and always being seen to be going for the big picture can make us seem disconnected. Two things though, i'm not so sure we do live in a hedonistic culture, its consumerist, sure but thats not necessarily the same thing. and also since when was the average protest sexy? more like chilling your arse off in the rain, 99% of the time.
clearly, i'm going to the wrong protests. time to get out a bit more selectively, i think.

and i like...

play politics, collective happiness is subversive.

(theres nothing they hate more....)

heather

hmmmm

14.01.2004 18:21

The Culture of Hedonism _was_ politics for a while back with the criminal justice act hitting activists travellers and ravers together. There was tons of shit then about that hedonistic culture being rooted in way older pagan ones, a lot of which I think was pretty spot on.

A lot boils down to the task in hand. If it's taking to the streets to register numbers or an opposition then for pans sake do it with some joy in your heart and inspire each other, don't, just please don't, walk from a to b and go home. The same is true to an extent if the protest is a blockade or occupation - why do it in a glum way when you can enjoy it, oh and silly costumes can still help public perception and the media vultures vision.

That said, housing does get a fair bit of attention but yes poverty less. Hmm wonder why that is then. Could it be that the solution isnt really helped by cavorting in the streets and telling people that there is poverty. The people working on it are those who spend their time working with either alternative schemes like LETS (local exchange trading schemes) and housing co-ops or crisis intervention organisations.

flute

Correct me if I'm wrong but....

15.01.2004 17:05

I was under the impression that the various anti-capitalist protests were partly aimed at one of the main causes of poverty (i.e. 5% of the population owning 95% of the wealth) as well of one of the main causes of environmental damage, war etc.

Do you have to demonstrate against a symptom or against a root cause for it to count?

Afinkawan

out of ideas

16.01.2004 20:24

shit...call it writters block but hedonism is not why i am angry at the moment and therefore i do not consider it number one target and have not got the motivation to write 500 words about it. - soz
The top three targets at the moment are:
-the lack of direct action in the stop the war coalition and all their resolutions for the sake of it.
-the left/far left being stuck in the pre-thatcher years and ironicly being a tool of the middle classes
-the left posing as standing up for the working class through top-up-fees and actually ignoring the real social problems and the most marginalised loosing out - as always.

translator

more info..

21.01.2004 18:50

fuck being an artist is hard work.. truth being told i,m enjoying the hard work etc.. we hope to have a message board at

http://urbanparanoia.co.uk and there will be changes to that site in time.. meantime i have an exabition to get toghter a flyer for march 27th work out mpegs but

http://image.lowtech.org is looking good.. the reson for the message board is to continue this debate over there etc.. so book the up url and join the debate.. we hope to print by end of april mid may and the message borad to be working end of next week..

mozaz
one the anoraks

act four peace..