Lisa Christiansen sent me an interesting essay from yesterday's Toronto Star speculating on whether or not the internet has made underground social movements a thing of the past.

I don't think so at all. The underground is alive and well (trust me, I was just there), and if anything, the issue isn't that there are no new movements, so much as there are so many that it's impossible for the media to easily name and define any one as being dominant.

I think the big movements like hippie, punk, and grunge (was grunge unique enough to be called a movement?) were mostly media constructs. Really, these were just subcultures that went big, and the reason they went big is because the media picked up the story, and ran with it, thus further swelling their ranks.

Far from killing subcultures, the internet allows individuals to connect with the subculture that most suits their tastes, and so part of the reason we're not seeing any super-groups form is because there's so much choice.

As to whether or not virtual participation has less value than fleshy participation, who can say? So long as people are actively taking a role in the culture versus passively consuming something handed to them, there's probably value in it.

What do you think? Are we all just spinning our wheels or what?

ETA: I realized after writing this that I'd forgotten about rave culture (possibly due to going to the damned things). It was kind of a big deal. Probably at least as big as Punk in terms of the way participants embraced a truly counter culture approach towards social interaction - probably largely due to the drugs everybody was taking.

The politics of that culture were radical enough for many governments to work towards its eradication. The British Government went so far as to create legislation specifically to deal with, and contain raves in the passage of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994.

And seeing as the whole rave thing really only died out after the turn of the century, it's not like we've been without a huge scene for as long as this piece implies. (now I'm all steamed up!)