From: laural@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (laura.l.la gassa)
Subject: Re: Rave or Techno?
Organization: AT&T
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 18:58:38 GMT

In article <1993Jan11.004342.2499@rose.com> greg.ipp@rose.com (greg ipp) writes:
>
>Date Entered: 01-10-93 19:38
>Quoted From: hmo@wam.umd.edu (Hipno House)
>> 
>> I could care less about
>> acid, X, laughing gas, whatever, it's your perogative.  However, it's 
>> that shit that is ruining the reputation of raves.  What we need are 
>> clean drug-free raves.  If you can't dance without drugs, then that means
>> you can't hang with the music.  You should learn to enjoy it without any
>> additional help.  It's for your own good.  If you want to rave forever,
>> then decrease the drugs, the sooner the better.
>
>There is a point where I have to say you're taking this too far.  Come 
>on, isn't the idea to let everybody do whatever they want?  

The key to what Hipno House said, Greg, is that the raves' reputations are
getting ruined.

People should be free to do what they want, but some people go too far.  Would 
you enjoy going to a rave that brings the DEA down on it's head because someone 
was way too blantant and sold to the wrong person?  The "drug image" is 
bringing law enforcement in the US down on the ravers' heads.  If raving went 
totally straight-edge it would lose a lot of its fun and energy IN MY OPINION.  
However, some users are not responsible for their trips (X or acid or gas or 
alcohol), and so harm the scene by doing irresponsible things and blaming it on 
the drugs rather than on their irresponsible use of the drugs.  For example:  
it's one thing to get some bad X that makes you sick, and it's another to only 
buy from someone you trust, and to abstain when you can't get it from a 
trustworthy source.  I know some people that actually freak if they can't
find X at a rave, and then spend the evening pouting (and thus creating a
pocket of negative vibe, which has the potential of damaging other people's
enjoyment of the rave).  Another example, that might make more sense:  I know 
of a rave that got busted because some teen-agers were sitting out front 
drinking beer in full view of anyone who wandered by.  The cops wandered by, 
then wandered back to City Hall to see if the promoter had everthing in order.  Turned out the promoter didn't have a permit to sell food, and since smart 
drinks were being sold that qualified as food, so . . . no more party.

I'm 100% for letting people do whatever they want -- it's just that some
people don't know HOW to do whatever they want, and therefore get the
rest of us in trouble.

>How can you sit around and worry about reputations and that shit?  

Because it will only take a few people to ruin it for the rest of us.  For
the people that are discreet, and the people who are responsible for their
actions, and for the people that weren't doing anything illegal to begin
with.  The US is not always the land of the free when it comes to law
enforcement by metropolitan police forces.  

>[re people at clubs:] At 
>least most of them aren't on drugs.  

You said yourself they were drinking beer/alcohol.  Therefore, they *are*
on drugs -- and ones that don't tend to make you friendly and receptive to
strangers and strange ideas.

>But if I want to do E, or LSD, or 
>whatever, then in what way does this bother you?  Why do you think 
>the reputation of raves is so integral to how people perceive you?  

None, unless you insist on hugging me every 30 seconds without asking me
if it's okay first (unless I am hugging you back, but sometimes I don't
want to be hugged by strangers.  Call me rude, but I'm from New York
where everyone, even people on X, are suspect).  Or unless you proceed to
get very paranoid about your acid trip and start telling me all sorts of
shit that I can't see and don't want to hear about.  Of course, if you really
are having a bad trip I wouldn't abandon you.  I'd get you to a spot where
you could chill a bit untill the peak wears off.

BUT if you do anything that incites the cops to bust the rave, or further
denigrates the rave scene in the eyes of the pandering media (and thereby
indirectly inciting the cops to bust future raves), then I am bothered.
I don't care how people see *ME*, I just care about the bad rep that
raves are getting -- that this bad rep will cause their ultimate demise.

>don't care if you, or anybody else does or doesn't do drugs.

Neither do I, so long as everyone is (a) open-minded, (b) respectiful, and
(c) responsible about their use/non-use.

Laura
Newsgroups: alt.rave