H.R. Porter

“There must be some kind of way out of here,

said the joker to the thief

there's too much confusion,

I can't get no relief.”

-Bob Dylan

Who are these youngster burning cars and making sure that parts of Gothenburg remain unruly at nights? Hoodlums, thugs or even Nazis? Is civilized society as we know it taking that faithful step from democracy to anarchy and lawlessness? Are we witnessing the breakdown of all that is Good and Proper?

Fuck no! Sure, there are some bad seeds amongst the youth but there are bad seeds everywhere, even members of Lion can be decadent and without morale. No, out there something new is happening, something Scary and Beautiful although Violent but then again to be clean we must be washed in the blood of the lamb, ey? Freedom usually comes after violence, not the other way around.

Study the words of poet and songwriter Mr. Dylan and you’ll soon see what I see; the words fit perfectly to the situation we have today in the concrete suburbs all around Sweden, yes all around the world. The loss of interest is a generally accepted fact in today’s society and there’s no place where it can be seen which such vivacity and sadness as in the young of today. Escapism becomes a way of life and life becomes an escape from society. Loss in interest and trust in the democratic process hits me hard today. I see the plight and the longing of something higher, something more perfect to believe in but there is nothing. They’re looking for a way out, there’s too much confusion all around them.

Relief. A simple word with so much crammed inside it. Relief for you is not necessarily the same as for me. On the contrary, our definitions of relief are worlds apart. Inside the youths of today a flame burns, a flame of democracy or as the older generation and those that are in good financial shape would call it: a Flame of Demo-Crazy. For so long we have been trampled and kept under control that we have almost forgot who we are.

There is no real way to answer the question of who we are, but there is a general principle I’ve discovered during my intense studies of life itself. We, the young, are individuals filled with an instinct that makes us seek Freedom. We seek it not for personal gain per se, but we seek it because we crave beauty and that instinct tells us that Freedom is the ultimate beauty. Like the hippies and Timothy Leary’s Truthseekers of the sixties we are realizing new truths about ourselves and the world around us and it scares us. Everything that scares us also fascinates us, such is the nature of the young, so we keep fiddling with it and try to experience it in as many ways as possible. This is not a crime, it’s a Inalienable Right!

But burning cars? Throwing Rocks? Are those Actions of Freedom or crimes? One burning car is an act of vandalism. Dozens of burning cars are the first steps of True Demo-Crazy! The same form of Demo-Crazy France saw in 1789 as the Bastille was overrun. The same form of Demo-Crazy that Prague and the world saw in the spring of 1968. The same form of Demo-Crazy we remember in China, only 20 years ago, at Tiananmen Square. Freedom and Democracy (as well as Demo-Crazy) is often born through violence. The world is filled with irony and the best example is beauty from chaos; Freedom from Violence.

The young of today have nothing to do; they are denied the search for Freedom and become disillusioned. The traditional outlet available for our fathers and mothers was politics and ideologies of all kinds. The selection withers away every year and some kind of ideal reality takes chunks of the options available. I use reality in a most ironic sense; it’s not true reality but rather ignoring the difficult parts of life much like all do in Huxley’s Brave New World. No one worries about Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) by Orwell becoming true in the near future but more and more are concerned with Brave New World becoming the Real Order soon enough. When everyone has learned to be happy and to love their life as it is and when they allow themselves to be numbed by TV and internet we are there. I for one am worried and mad about the future.

Some, a minority so far, have started to react; they’ve set up a counterforce, a shadow reality if you will to all of this. Burning cars is a way of showing the rest of the world that yes, there is a problem and no, you’re not doing anything about it. Many are misguided and the simplest and therefore purest form of expressing yourself with violence is easier than poetry, song writing or paintings. Violence has always been a form of expression available to everyone. The only form of expression that never needs to be taught. Violence is without a doubt the only truly democratic form of expression there is. Yes, it breaks laws. Laws set up by society, lawmakers and dogmas many wish to reject and therefore it’s foolish to quell this sort of violence with laws. A law without reason and logic is no law and shouldn’t not be followed but broken to point out the faults with the law. What if there’s something more wrong than just a law? What if there’s a flaw in the society itself? No what ifs; we are already there.

Far from everyone believes the validity of this argument. No, we are always a minority, at least at first, but we can scream and we can make a scene. Drama is a tool to be used when no one listens. Talking quietly has no effect. Screaming loudly scares too many. Actions combined with listeners and onlookers work the best; it grabs society by its foundation, shakes it and awakens people. The people who are awake then have to choose if they should listen or ignore the reality.

This is what is happening, we have turned to action and you will have to decide. Are you with us or are you against us? To echo the words of Huxley;

We are Claiming the Right to be Unhappy but we’re also Claiming the Right to Change It Ourselves.