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stay safe and end gender violence – or watch this scene self-destruct…

Forums Rave Free Parties & Teknivals stay safe and end gender violence – or watch this scene self-destruct…

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  • by now most of you will have seen reports coming in from Europe – one young girl raped at a Tek, another dead in dubious circumstances in a Paris squat.

    Here in Britain, just down the road from me, our Crown Court is surrounded by reporters – the case being heard is the kidnap, serious sexual assault and murder of two young teenage girls (the Mary Ann Leneghan case). The two victims are known to raver friends of mine and were “happy go lucky girls who liked parties and music” – who simply just “got in with the wrong crowd”.

    And none of this is new. All these bad things were happening in the early 90s in the “old skool days” – but we didn’t have the Internet to report the incidents; and worse still a lot of people were in denial, and victims too traumatised to speak widely about what was going on

    Some will argue “this is just normal societys problem” – but thats no excuse. In fact in “normal society” those who abuse women/girls are more likely to be dealt with, as people who are not involved in things deemed illegal by wider society are obviously more likely to go to cops and report stuff.

    There is a culture of denial, and worse one of acceptance of gender violence on the “free party” scene.

    its unregulated nature sadly attracts predators, worse still a patriarchal attitude has developed – I’ve known so called “radical activists” to claim straight from the heart that “women shouud know their place”, and lots of girls in squats/protest camps etc were harrassed by blokes – the “hippy girls are easy” attitude (George Monbiot mentions this problem in one of this reports).

    Some blokes speak up against violence, but often its simply from a “macho perspective” because they want an excuse to beat up the outside predators (whilst keeping the women for themselves – a bit like chimpanzees) – I am aware of incidents where vigilantés who don’t even know the circumstances have dealt out punishment beatings when the female victims (and even their partners) have in fact wanted to have stuff dealt with properly by cops and courts!

    Another bad development is couples having their domestic arguments in the middle of raves – of course couples may not always agree but surely this stuff is for sorting out in the home, not a public arena? Often it just seems like it is the male trying to exert dominance over the female.

    I always thought people originally got into the underground rave scene to escape attitudes like this; after all you can see it in every commercial venue and on the high street, but thankfully cops / bouncers / CCTV ops often intervene before people are too badly hurt.

    Even at free parties incidents are usually stopped – but uninvolved and uninformed people take sides without the accountability that traditional authority figures have – and of course it ruins the atmosphere for everyone when these things happen in a party zone.

    And sadly, often the argument carries on where no witnesses are about (such as in the bedrooms of a squat or shared house) and far worse things happen.

    This must stop. the girls/women today do “not” have a victim mentality – they are prepared to stand up for themselves and/or use conventional authorities if need be – but why should it have to come to this?

    Some girls I know now are so disillusioned by the way things are going they no longer attend raves (unlicensed or commercial) for their own and in some cases their partners safety/sanity – or attend them less often – with every girl who stops raving thats one less person to support the cause.

    And why should they support a community which is being taken over by “angry young men” and treats them as second class citizens?

    Further, the female police officers, social workers and many other authority figures / professionals who often end up picking up the pieces of gender violence on our scene will think

    “these so called “autonomous communities” are dangerous to girls/women. They should be closed down or more strictly regulated”.

    it may no longer be “cool” for a straight male like myself to speak about “respecting women” (people think I am a sandal-wearing 80s hippy!) – but I do not care about fashion labels when this is attacking the existence of this scene.

    its worth remembering the party community is a “living organism” – and thus needs both genders involved to survive and grow…

    :horay:

    Dead on, theres no excuse for that kind of behaviour in any part of modern society, especially a part of it that considers itself as clued up as us.

    Spot on!

    To contribute to raising awareness of these important issues visit

    http://partyvibe.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=15103

    together we can make a difference

    I thought that was a really considered, and considerate, piece GL.

    As a woman who reaches her 30th birthday this year I don’t go raving nearly as much as I used to and when i do it tends to be with an “older” crowd (old skool I guess) that share the same mentality as me. I really don’t have much experience with the new crews coming through so it’s hard to comment on how the situation is changing.

    The reason I first got interested in free parties is that firstly living in the middle of nowhere North Wales, there was bugger all else going on – but the main reason was the sense of community – unthreatening and supportive – that was unlike anything else. I never felt intimidated or sexually threatened.
    When I went to my first techno club night a couple of years later (in manchester – the nearest place for a good club) I found the scene radically different – much more of a meat market. I understand that for some people that’s what its all about – and that’s fine if you have two willing parties, but all too often you see blokes being too over-bearing and too out of it to interpret any kind of signals at all.

    I’ve always felt that our scene has generally been a good place for women – (I’m not commenting here on the lack of female DJs compared to men) – and I hope that it will continue to make the effort to be so.

    Unfortunately though patriarchal attitudes permeate society as a whole and though I’ve always found the scene to be more egalitarian, and ravers in general to be a lot more open-minded, ravers are as influenced by society’s mores as anybody else – ideas about gender roles are deep rooted and it will take a long time to disembed some of these ideas (along with our ideas about homosexuality amongst other things).
    Though the most radical work on gender studies comes out of our universities, they can be some of the wost places for gender inequality (old boys clubs and the intellectual elite) – it’s something for women coming through today to work hard at dislodging.

    So why shouldn’t our scene lead the way? We’ve always prided ourselves on being different – on thinking differently from the mainstream and creating our own “autonomous communities” that should be first and foremost safe for everybody invloved.
    Women should feel that their community is supporting them and while this isn’t about protection through machismo – it is about women being able to express themselves without the threat of sexual (or physical) violence – and this can only come from within our community.

    another thing though – women in certain situations can be as violent as any man (particularly when you add drink into the equation) and I’ve seen some hellish fights that women have started with their partners – it’s one of the most depressing things you can witness, but unfortunately the personal spills into the public all too often and mixed with drink this can get really out of control.

    and GL: it IS cool to talk about these things and shaping our community from the inside – policing (although I don’t like that word) ourselves – has to be the way forward.
    Expressing these ideas on a forum like this is key – if people new to the scene can appreciate what makes it special and unique (as well as those who have maybe forgotten) then there’s a chance that the spirit of PLUR will live on and on for what it really means.
    The important thing is that we practice what we preach….

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Forums Rave Free Parties & Teknivals stay safe and end gender violence – or watch this scene self-destruct…