Post
by This Woman » Mon Feb 06, 2012 11:00 am
Many veterans have always had a sense of entitlement - like those here that won't even hear concerns without trying to shut down the talk with words invented specifically to shut down talk, like whinging. But there are also veterans with valid concerns (now being played out) who are being accused of selfishness and entitlement when they are thinking of the event that ALL OF US love currently, as is, for various reasons. Someone uses the large scale sound camps as a perfectly valid example of the issue, and the response is immediate assumption that this one guy is pissed because he can't get his sound camp out there. Funny, turns out he doesn't even have a sound camp; that he in fact has an issue with the lack of diversity among sound camps. Turns out, he's just representing for sound camps because, ahem, they are part of the community, and an affected part at that. But by gosh, it is possible to empathize with a community member you don't particularly have any interest in.
But there is also entitlement about vetran's wanting special treatment with the tickets, as accused. In my camp, one core member specifically said that the older theme camps should get first rights to tickets. Personally, I disagree, but I'm not that surprised by the attitude. After all, vendors do that work for more traditional events, and they get profits. Volunteer theme camps' only rate of return comes in feelings: feeling good about helping to build a community, feeling appreciated by the community for the work you do to entertain them and being appreciated by the infra-structure for your community work.
I think all the talk of newbies is irrelevant, and it's causing a rift tween new and old. Newbies have been a huge part of the burn since the mid nineties when it stopped being a mostly word-of-mouth event. Our "vetran" camp has always had newbies - last year they represented 60% of our force. I don't expect anymore newbies this year than than usual, because they have no time to get tickets. If I found out about Burning Man today, there's no way I'd come up with ticket money by March, and with the tiers, lottery and open sale, I'd probably be too daunted to try and unravel the process anyway. The newbies we will be getting this year are the ones that have been waiting to go for years and have been made privvy to the complicated ticket system, not the ones that watched the Oh The Places You'll Go video.
The volunteer theme camp structure won't work with the lottery. It IS a matter of scale, and it's pretty damn short-sighted to just look at the lottery as a cleansing of old, entitled, better-off-gone theme camps. Even if you are tired of Thunderdome, do you really want the burn to be limited in scale henceforth? A 100% virginal, off the scales, kick ass theme camp would be just as burdened with the lottery structure as would Thunderdome. Burning Man has to figure it out, and they should have figured it out before they changed the system.
The Liver's End ~ Where the locals go.
Less sound camps will mean less ravers and that is good! Maybe this will cut down on the Frat-children and tourists.
