Queen Nephie, subtle as ever, but more covered up here.
There’s been a lot of discourse of late of the seemingly ubiquitous commodification of goth. While I can accept that this is par for the course, and has been happening since the teddy boys were appropriated by the media in the 1950s, there’s a horrible sexualised element to this too. Characters like Queen Nephie (above) seem hellbent on reducing goth to a fetish. With her evil stalker “comedy” clips and oh-so-edgy outfits (just push your tits out, while simultaneously attempting to look 5) this anime bullshit is starting to feel like it’s detracting from, and negating, the original point of goth.
So, just to be clear: goth is not a fashion that normies can cosplay. It’s nothing to do with that Lolita Japanese underage- seeming shit. No shade to genuine kawaii fans, some of whom look wonderful. It’s a post-punk genre which emerged in the late seventies as a reaction to punk’s drab nihilism. It’s a velvet rejoinder to concrete urban decay. It celebrates life through a poetic dark manifestation.
Its roots are in art, literature and architecture. It’s not about making your eyes as cartoonishly big as possible, while acting like a paradoxical cute serial killer. It’s not a category on OnlyFans. We’re not about subs or doms.These fakes are hurting the real goth communities. This is my music, my lifestyle, my aesthetic, my literature. Get your capitalist paws off it, and try something else. Grunge was a thing- try that.
I’ll admit that what they currently are calling goth is not the Goth I grew up with. The music isn’t really my idea of goth. The fashions aren’t really my idea of goth. I don’t get the whole pierce-the-crap-out-of-my-face thing that seems to be modern goth. I also don’t recall my being so hyper-sexualized (hyper-romanticized, yes; frequently sexy, but not overly-sexualized — and there is a difference).
I think the idea of the subculture has died. One moment something is mentioned on the internet, five minutes later someone is looking to turn it into a commercial endeavor. Modern goth is just another thing they’ve enshittified.
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