legion23 wrote:
Not being naive, but I think more exposure might help blow some myths that middle England believe about the party scene out of the water, i.e. that we’re an army of drug-addled degenerate criminals just waiting for the opportunity to take over their land and destroy their property, ravishing their daughters along the way (OK, the drug-addled degenerate bit might be true – speaking for myself – but the rest is bollocks). Depending on the scope of her project, Louise might be better off seeking permission to use footage filmed by partygoers themselves. Better yet, take a look at stuff like Network23’s ‘World Traveller Adventures’ dvd to show what a positive impact soundsystems have had outside the UK since the CJA (I’m thinking of the Desert Storm mission to Sarejevo in particular) – a bit dated, but still relevant.
in the end though she didn’t use the rave idea (it was going to be only 5 minutes in a 28 min programme anyway, and it seemed she (rightly) decided it was too much hassle for both her and the ravers to carry on.
I understand what you say, but much of the media are inherently hostile to unlicensed raves and its dangerous playing the spin game unless you have the same amount of power and resources.
The problem is also that she was a freelancer on a short term contract, and its very easy for those with more power to lean on people like her as she’s always fighting for new work and jobs without a permanent job she needs to please her bosses (who may not be as sympathetic as she wanted to be).
The other bigger problem is the mainstream media is extremely negative.
Lets say for instance that there was a change of heart and World Traveller Adventures was TX’d on channel 5 in peak viewing time despite a flood of complaints to C5 duty office and Ofcom about “encouraging illegal behaviour” from the Daily Mail lobby.
Now as you say that film is rather old. Allegedly, a number of people featured on it since become addicted to class A drugs, and aren’t doing much postive nowadays. A rival TV channel like ITV or C4 – would simply find these people, expose them, and pay their former friends to take part in a hatchet job programme…..
OTOH do I think there could be a media outlet for something like a ravers version of “channel U” (the low budget grime channel)- not rave footage for legal reasons but music videos, animations, short films and other stuff from people on the scene – a bit like a pirate station on the telly.. Afrter all if the grime scene is being allowed airtime (and it is the most dysfunctional form of urban music I have ever come across), why shouldn’t more positive forms of rave culture get media exposure?
