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Critcher, C. (2000) '" Still
raving": social reaction
to Ecstasy', in Leisure
Studies, vol 19: 145 - 162.
Rave
culture seemed to offer a new experience, with an absence of 'Alcohol, confrontation and sexual
encounters' (147): male attitudes were initially softened,
'but subsequent hardening' took place, and
alcohol reappeared (147). Participants were agreed to be young, but the
extensive inclusiveness is disputed (by
Thornton in particular, who suggests that 'ravers
were primarily white, working-class and
heterosexual' page 147).
Above all though, rave varied according to its location -- upmarket in
the West
End, working-class in the East End, and with mixtures of students in
Manchester. Rave also became diffused into many sub categories '"split along fault lines of class,
culture, area, musical preference and drugs of choice"' (Critcher, page
148, quoting Collin). For example, 'hard
core' featured 'faster harder beats; white gloves; Vicks rub [what the
hell
for?]; working-class male [participants]',
while jungle appeared as the choice of
British black
people (148). Rave eventually became
incorporated into clubbing with the growth of specialist magazines, the
emergence of dance music on public broadcasting, and the investment by
brewers
in youth and clubbing. Rave imagery became well known, and Ecstasy
emerged as a
large scale recreational drug culture. Social
reaction soon emerged. The media gradually became hostile after
well-publicised Ecstasy deaths. Drug dealing became a major focus for
press
stories. Hostile media coverage declined and then re-emerged following
events
such as the appearance of 'harm
reduction leaflets in January 1992' [important implications for Glover's
preferred policy here], and the well publicised death of Leah Betts.
Incorporation into clubbing reduced hostile media coverage again. Raving
became subject to a number of increased attempts at legal
control. Initially, existing laws were used to attempt to forbid
licensing, but
this clearly did not effect private or illegal raves. The police then
resorted
to strategies to control public disorder, including intelligence
gathering
activities that have been pioneered during the policing of the miners'
strike
of 1984. Mass arrests already looked unsuitable given the scale of the
activity, so local authorities were urged to enforce health and safety
regulations and the regulation of telephone usage. Individual attempts
were
made to increase existing penalties for unlicensed public
entertainment. In
1994 the Criminal Justice Act and Public Order Act attempted to make
rave
illegal, along with other targeted groups, such as new-age travellers.
Raves
were defined as gatherings of more than 100 people where music was
played
featuring 'the emission of the
succession of repetitive beats' (150). Police powers to arrest
trespassers and
control traffic were substantially increased. These
unusually authoritarian powers were mostly used against road
protesters initially, while new-age travellers had declined anyway
[especially
after a police riot that attacked a new-age convoy heading for
Stonehenge].
Rave was specifically singled out by a 1997 Act which
'permitted local authorities to revoke night
club licences on the word of police that drug-taking or dealing was
thought to
be occurring on the premises' (150). Critcher
sees this legislation as featuring 'three
interlinked but ultimately distinct
sub-plots: those of new-age travellers, rave and Ecstasy' (151). The
effects
were probably greater for travellers, while raves were so popular and
sustained
that some accommodation with them was inevitable. They were licensed,
relocated, moved indoors. The authorities lifted restrictions on
nightclub
hours to permit this transition. Ecstasy use also remained unresolved:
massive
police action would have been required and would have resulted in
widespread
criminalisation. The
notion of a moral panic might be applied. Critcher cites Cohen's
famous definition, and tries to identify how it might fit -- for
example, the
necessary 'folk devils' were seen as evil drug dealers
(not the ravers themselves), and Cohen's
sequence can be used to describe media interest as it waxed and waned.
However,
Critcher points out that there were three interlinked moral panics as
above,
with distinctive action taken for each. Media reaction was more diverse
as
well, with only the tabloids fitting the classic pattern. Broadsheets
and
broadcasting took a more ambiguous line which 'forestalled
endorsement of a moral panic' (153): for
example,
broadsheet papers were more supportive of harm reduction and health
education
strategies. Overall,
despite criticisms (that social reaction is not monolithic,
and that the audience is more sophisticated and less manipulable by the
media)
[see McRobbie and Thornton] the notion of
a moral panic can still explain some of the main features
if
suitably modified. The case study of rave shows more sophistication,
including 'The pragmatic and compromised
nature of the ultimate solution -- incorporation of the rave into
clubbing',
and the sheer size of the recreational activity itself
(154). On this specific occasion, the police,
tabloid press and governing party did not operate in a concerted
campaign, and
there was 'some organised and
articulated opposition' (154). Another
option is to explore the notion of risk society. Certainly rave
culture is 'surrounded by the language
of risk': one source cited suggests that the risks have been killed by
Ecstasy
are 'around one in 7 million, about the
same level of risk as a fairground ride and much lower than other
mainstream
leisure activities such as skiing or parachuting' (154). Risk in
sociology has
emerged as a major interest, although analyses of leisure are much less
common.
Lupton (1909) attempts to apply these notions to
leisure activities. The emergence of risk is explained in the usual way
[in
terms of disembedding and the emergence of new risks, and the
centrality of
risk as a way to define self]. This work can be applied to
understanding social
reactions to rave culture in particular. Raving disrupt the usual ways
in which
risks are regulated, especially risks located in the body. Foucault is
used
here to explain the shift towards voluntary regulation and self
surveillance.
Drug-taking is seen as the abandonment of this form of regulation. This
also
explains the popularity of campaigns to reintroduce self regulation for
drug-takers, rather than punitive ones. Ravers also offer an
alternative to the
disciplined body --'the subversion of the ordered, restrained,
chemically pure
and self-contained body' (156) had to be met with a strong social
reaction [curiously, no mention of
hegemony in any of
this]. Raving
also challenges conventional views of the 'disembodied rational
actor' (Critcher page 156 quoting Lupton). The pleasures of
reembodiment or
collective embodiment are seen as uncivilised [no
mention of 'flow' here,
but
an interesting possibility to explore that state via Bourdieu on the
bourgeois
disdain for the body and the fear of the loss of self-control?]. Thus
rave
culture 'represented a symbolic dissent
from dominant discourses about the need to minimise risk through bodily
management' (156). However, this explanation does not match with the
perspectives of ravers themselves, who often underestimate risks rather
than
taking it as central. Other characteristics such as '"reflexivity"
and " individuation" which both Beck and Giddens see as... essential'
are also not reflected in rave (157). In
order to understand the participants'perspective, ethnography seems
better. Drug use has been rising among the young, and Parker et al are cited
here on the normalisation process. Ecstasy played a major part in
normalising
illegal drugs. However, the values of rave also need investigation.
Critcher
begins by summarising Young on hippy culture as a reaction to 'formal work values... Subterranean (leisure) values
comprised: short-term hedonism, spontaneity, ego
expressivity,
autonomy... new experience/excitement, activities as ends in themselves
and
disdain for work' (158). Rave culture focuses these values and
expresses them
and music dance and drugs, producing ecstasy (in
both senses). Thornton and Malbon are cited, and
Malbon is
preferred, especially his stress on the complexity of the relations
between the
self and the crowd, and the emergence of the 'oceanic
experience' which is still obtainable without
drugs. However,
this is useful description, but weak on explanation. Critcher
goes on to revive themes in the sociology of youth, which has
been recently neglected. He is hinting at the revival of the classic CCCS
work, perhaps? Postmodern analysis and the decline of the concept
of sub
culture has placed this tradition in decline, perhaps terminally, but
the gap
has been filled by examinations of 'changes
in transitions to adulthood' (160). These
structural changes,
basically involving the extension of youthful dependency, might be
connected to
cultural changes, focused on leisure in particular. Leisure Studies
should
replace other analyses of drug-taking, and the case study of rave shows
how
usefully it can illuminate broader issues such as moral regulation.
However,
more attention is needed on music, dance and drugs, each of which has
been
relatively neglected in Leisure Studies and in social science. Rave
culture
therefore poses 'a challenge to Leisure Studies' as well (161) .
Lupton, D. (1999) Risk, Routledge, London |