Light in the Dark Side: The Gothic Manifesto

Once they were just people from Germany; then after centuries, they were used to refer to a kind of literature which has certain elements of such thriller, until some say that they are now known for their thick make-ups, black apparel, weird thoughts of mysticism, among others which can be described dark. But just to make sure, what really is a Goth?

There are no exact origins; however it is said that the term “Gothic” was first used in the fields of arts and literature referring to works which have certain elements which give thriller, but in the modern age, it was said to be coined by Anthony H Wilson, the band manager of the punk band Joy Division during the late 80’s through the description “Gothic as compared to the pop mainstream”. It then continued to diversify until movies such as The Crow and other bands such as Bauhaus and The Cure adapted the subculture and then came the rise of Goth as a surviving subculture from punk.

Goth nowadays refers to people belonging to a subculture who claim that they feel comfortable within each others company. Regarding the “dark” stuff which was mentioned a while ago, they say that there is no such thing absolutely needed for someone to fit in the scene for they all have different musical tastes; follow different religions; and have different occupations, hobbies, and fashion sense.

Most of them claimed themselves as Goths because the way they want their lives to be are not fit to the taste of the “normal” society, enabling them to think free and reject the moral rules of the society because of hollow dogmatic reasons told to them, such as “that is just how it is” and “that is the will of the Lord”. To them, another big proof of that free thinking is their open-mindedness.

Nowadays, some Goths are stereotypical nowadays through different fields such as music, literature, or even any occupation. Some of those kinds of Goths express themselves mostly through the fashion which consisted up of traditional medieval, Elizabethan, and Victorian apparel to the studded and buckled up regalia; but the others pair it with the heavy metal fashion using the black trench coats and corpse paint.

To be exact, they themselves said that the determiner of Goths is their common attitude which consist of their highly developed satirical sense of humor (which they would not give up, though it leans satirical, because of enabling them to learn to laugh at themselves and see the society at a different kind of light), tolerance (shown by dropping all aspects of prejudice regarding their gender and religion), and weird thoughts (appearing through their own stereotypes); however Paul Hodkinson wrote a book titled Goth: Identity, Style and Subculture to the truth regarding Goths.

Because of these attitudes, some are prone to misinterpretation and abuse. The Red Lake High School and other more related incidents are to be taken as examples, wherein the meaning of Goth is misinterpreted as a racist Neo-Nazi thinking. It was also misinterpreted when the cartoonist Jhonen Vasquez satirized it in his work Johnny the Homicidal Maniac, where it showed self-mocking which lead to murder and depression.

On the other side, the Goth culture had already contributed much through different means such as music, arts, literature, among others, in which it gave a “darker shade” which gave the world a feeling of thriller. Good examples could be the bands Evanescence and Lacuna Coil, Wave-Gotik-Treffen photography in Germany, and Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles.

Here in the Philippines, we have our own Gothic band – The Late Isabel. This band, though not so famous, introduced a new type of rhapsody in the Gothic community of the Philippines through their debut album Doll’s Head. However, Filipinos seem so creative because their Wawi Navarroza, their vocalist, stated that she would love to do if she could only put music, painting, and poetry in one package.

The Goths are truly unbelievable people despite the way they look and the way they appear in our society. They do not mean to haunt everyone else instead they let the creativity out of them to let those sleeping nerves work to be able to let everyone see the light amidst the darkness in our lives nowadays. They are never that violent and are not that dark for they just want to do everything which would fill their lives to let the grandiose out of them before they disappear on earth.