Burning Man

The desert is by definition a place prone to extremes and should be treated with great respect. According to Wikipedia, in 2019, 78,850 people participated in the event. There's a lot of hubris on display in the very concept of Burning Man, no matter how many port-a-potties and medical tents they set up.

Desert Blast, "the largest outlaw fireworks show in the West," was always the one I wanted to get to but never did.
https://www.wired.com/1994/12/desert-blast/

Climate change activists tried to block the entrance to Burning Man and attendees mocked them as they drove through and the organizers called the cops

projecting my distaste for BM or "hippies" or "tech people" while reading this

Burning Man yesterday after rain….double rainbow.
The Playa was dry and walkable tonight.
All the artwork,the Man and the Temple were on display
A memorable year. More rain. Less dust.
Discussions of whether eating vegans counted as keeping vegetarian were strictly hypothetical pic.twitter.com/aSAr732ny9

— Grover Norquist (@GroverNorquist) September 3, 2023

Just want to make Grover small enough that he can be drowned in a mud puddle

Norquist and his wife attended the annual Burning Man festival in Black Rock, Nevada in August 2014. Norquist explained that he wished to attend because, "There's no government that organizes this. That's what happens when nobody tells you what to do. You just figure it out. So Burning Man is a refutation of the argument that the state has a place in nature."

is he a full-on libertarian or something? fuck that dude

Burning Man is a refutation of the argument that the state has a place in nature.

Deep thoughts from someone who can't see past the end of his nose.

That's what happens when nobody tells you what to do. You just figure it out.

Never been to BM, but it looks like there's a whole bunch of someone telling you what to do, and what not to do

"Nobody tells me what to do! I just figure it out!"
- Ayn Rand enthusiast parked in Q4 A12 R33 #12

https://i.imgur.com/XQp3Ks0.png

Where Burning Man's money went (as of pre-Covid 2020)
https://www.rgj.com/story/life/arts/burning-man/2020/01/09/burning-man-money-t-tax-documents-black-rock-city-budget/2827709001/

IT Director Heather Gallagher: $183,000, increase of $46,000
Managing Director Heather White: $176,000, increase of $15,000

https://i.imgur.com/ze9TRgp.png

classic boston accent name

i went to school with a girl named heathah mcgwiah

heather ledger itt

what are the rival "purplish blooms" namewise?

i think crocus, catmint and purpletop vervain, i'm calling christian slater's agent right now

There's a lot of hubris on display in the very concept of Burning Man, no matter how many port-a-potties and medical tents they set up.

There's a lot of hubris in the very existence of the cities of Phoenix, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Mexico City, and Venice; not to mention a good dozen metropolises in India and China. Civilization is Hubris. If anything BM is at least a creative expression of a city that ends up appearing and disappearing over the course of a few months and has inspired a lot more positive things than negative, unlike a ton of other festivals and events that free passes for infinitely worse shit.

What happens to some of those aforementioned urban centers over the next 25-50 years is far more concerning than any environmental or even moral issues Black Rock City would offer up.

that get free passes

_There's a lot of hubris on display in the very concept of Burning Man, no matter how many port-a-potties and medical tents they set up._


There's a lot of hubris in the very existence of the cities of Phoenix, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Mexico City, and Venice; not to mention a good dozen metropolises in India and China. Civilization is Hubris. If anything BM is at least a creative expression of a city that ends up appearing and disappearing over the course of a few months and has inspired a lot more positive things than negative, unlike a ton of other festivals and events that free passes for infinitely worse shit.

What happens to some of those aforementioned urban centers over the next 25-50 years is far more concerning than any environmental or even moral issues Black Rock City would offer up.

the art is bad too, not even really art

engage in disgusting hedonism

okay, what's wrong with this exactly?

"I don’t care how exotic the drugs or how interesting the art is: once people such as Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk show up to your party, there is no longer anything countercultural about it. You are not rebelling against the man. You are the man."

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/commentisfree/2023/sep/05/why-all-the-burning-man-schadenfreude-where-do-i-start-

burning man is so lame that's the funniest part, just the dumbest, lamest 90s cyber cafe white dread bullshit

I mean let's just tell off Glastonbury, Sonar (which shows off very similar art) and everything else then. And I guess sex, drugs and having fun is no longer okay! Just because some huge assholes go to the same thing. Like all events and concerts too. Jeez I guess I'll never leave the house and just hate the world, okay? This outrage at BM is completely ridiculous. Should we make fun of all the regional burns too?

Wrt to my city comparisons, the very fact Venice is still around is hubris. Building any give urban center at any point in human history has profound impacts on the surrounding environs and even the weather. My point stands.

I'm grateful to burning man for luring the most annoying people away from the bay area for a week every year.

It'd be nice if they actually did try to establish a real city out there so we'd have more than a week's reprieve.

Also somebody has to burn that guy

Like so many things in human experience, it's an interesting concept made significantly less interesting by the people actually involved.

glastonbury and sonar can have some decent music and don't have inflated reputations as proof of concept of anarcho-capitalism

you're not allowed to buy or sell things, but fair point on the music

I feel a lot of the people posting above have never gone. Honestly, I felt similarly before I went in 2011, but I chose to go without expectations or cynicism. One of the best times of my life and gave me a creative energy I still channel to this day, hence my defensiveness. I also love watching and going to concerts and professional sports games so I'm used to being around large crowds non sober people sprinkled with oligarchs and massive dickheads.

Should we make fun of all the regional burns too?

I mean, sure?

xp I have tons of friends who go and even work there but it is def not for me, I do see the positives (although there are also negatives) and tbh nobody who is a regular there seemed the least bit put out by the weather issues

if they burned a giant straw goat at it these lads would be all over it tbf

OK yeah then I would go

i dont offer this as a criticism to be clear if anything its advice

it's always good advice to work in a big straw goat to burn somehow

Definitely don't go there for the music, but you can find some good shit. Those Tycho sunrise DJ sets were nice. My first year there I was putting on Tesla coil concerts with music I composed!

Jeez I guess I'll never leave the house and just hate the world, okay? 

thanks for understanding.

i particularly appreciated the logic of "you can't judge a ding dong infested ecologically irresponsible rave because Venice was created 1600 years ago"

if they burned a giant straw goat at it these lads would be all over it tbf

― close encounters of the third knid (darraghmac), Wednesday, September 6, 2023 4:40 PM (forty-two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

if half the people wanted to burn the man but the other half didnt

are you going to burning man
im going to man
*recognize each other as enemies*

friend who went said she felt like it was people searching for religion and it kinda had the vibe but ultimately fell short cause it was too much entertainment, modern life

Big Devil Sticks thanks god every night for Burning Man

silicon valley elite getting into drugs is def a very weird bad vibes situation, and now grover norquist and that evil lawyer too i guess

this Doug rushkoff book about the emergence of that kind of thing is pretty lol

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberia_(book)

When you consider so many of those guys have disruptions that are evil not good, it really does lend bad vibes to the whole no rules nature of the thing

thanks for understanding.

Likewise. I see scant nuance in the hate here. The same arguments can be used to tear down most of the shit everyone celebrates in this forum. It's very reductive. Perhaps I'm coming off overly optimistic, and trust me, there's a shit ton wrong with the event and many people interpret some toxic BS from it, but you can say the same for so many things in our lives that I feel much of the hate is projection of frustration around other shit (inequality, tech hubris, bs hypocritical libertarian ideologies) that it overlooks a lot of positivity. I'm just trying to balance the discourse. But I guess I'm online - in a world that has lost nuance or the ability to avoid putting a thing into a single bucket.

xp Bohemian Grove for the crypto bro's

And let's be clear - the inequality, tech hubris and much of what's wrong with contemporary society isn't the fault of Burning Man - it's the fault of a lot of other things, including neo-liberalism, eroding democracy and online misinformation (among many, many other things including basic human greed), but not Burning Man per se. Burning Man is just showing the symptoms of the sickness in a more dramatic way that makes it a very easy target.

If anything the event exhibits some political changes we'd all like: universal health care, collective infrastructure, and an economy focused on giving and community. The fact a number of people subvert or misinterpret these ideals and take away a toxic, unrealistic world view from the event doesn't mean the event is a bad idea. Part of the issue I feel is after 2012, tickets sold out and the event became a haves vs have nots that created more explicit hierarchy and exclusion.

My first impressions with the event back in 2011 made me feel it was closer to something like Pride in that it allowed a safe space for people to celebrate and explore their personal identities and express themselves in ways regular society wouldn't normally allow. I thought that was pretty profound at the time. But whatever I guess. I feel I'm talking to a wall here so I'll just bow out.