Want to feel completely rejected? Try Hardcore!
This article originally was meant to tell you all about how I went to a ‘Hardcore’ festival, met some really cool people and realised, that as a genre the fans were really inclusive and like a family. That was all very true and I did feel that way, right up until I was half way through writing the draft for this article.
Firstly, and this is rather fundamental. My knowledge of hardcore is rudimental at best, I went to Ghostfest as a birthday present to my boyfriend and found a handful of bands that I would see again, if I had too, and one band that I actually enjoyed.
Whilst writing this I decided it would be best to give a quick, brief history of the origins of hardcore. So I consulted the rather infamous Facebook page that is UKHC II-A group that has 2000+ members, all of which are very active within the Hardcore scene. I posted that I had a quick question and asked what bands would they say were the major influences on Hardcore as a genre. Firstly, I got good responses then along came someone who asked (quite within his right) ‘Why are you in a hardcore group if you know nothing about hardcore?’ I explained that I was fairly new to the genre and writing an article to reflect that. His response? He blocked me. Now, in general I like to play the ‘bigger man’ as it were and let things slide. I’m not one to dwell (hah!). So I messaged a girl I knew to be the admin and politely asked if I was blocked because I was new to Hardcore (I didn’t mention how fucking ridiculous this whole thing was, maybe I should of ) her response was far from polite. After a rather blunt ‘don’t know, don’t care’, rather reminiscent of a child’s response. I then saw that she proceeded to post our private conversation onto the public group. I then saw people refer to me as some not so PG explicates, all for asking why I’d be blocked from a group for asking a question.
Hardcore has always had quite a negative reception within mainstream culture and up until now I never understood why. However, up until now I was always within the ‘cool kid’ clique that they seem to desperately want to see themselves as. Hardcore culture in general has degenerated into nothing more than something you’d see on an American chick flick playground. They are a clique of bullying school children. Bullying school children that are ruining the genre that they so desperately ‘love’. By acting like children they are killing themselves from within. I was not the first person that they’ve ridiculed on that page, in fact they do it daily, and each time they do they alienate someone from hardcore. Soon, they be alone, and I’m fairly confident that their child like mentality will not be sufficient enough to save what once was a thriving Hardcore Community.
Bethan Brady – @bottledwaternom
