Informal groups as an escape from reality?
Experts say a mere 2% of Ukrainian young people are members of formally registered youth organizations, compared to over 25% in informal groups. Sociologists generally refer to such informal associations as the youth subculture. The latter reflects the younger generation’s attitude toward what is happening in society. Each such group has its values somewhat different from the generally accepted ones; they cultivate specific manners, clothes, way of thinking, and world views.
I first came across such informal ways of thinking in the Ukrainian capital. Our young people, living in a backwater Eastern European province, did not have much by way of belonging with a special youth environment. True, some boys and girls sported loose pants and blazers worn backwards; they said they were rappers and hung around clubs offering all kinds of pop music, waiting for a nod to gather those like them and impress the audience with some weird rapper dancing stunts. Still, I do not think that these people should be singled out as a separate phase in youth subculture. Rather, that was another attempt to parrot the West, something which we have unfortunately often identified with things advanced, avant-garde or, in other words, fashionable and progressive.
Incidentally, rap originates from the United States, in the 1970s and 1980s as a kind of music favored in Black neighborhoods, based on reggae and Afro-American rhythms. Almost immediately rap divided into the commercial and underground. Commercial rap music became popular all over the world, while the underground trend displayed an obvious tint of social criticism. In Ukraine, rap emerged in the first half of the 1990s. Dr. Alban and Hip-Hop were the first popular rap groups. Eventually, the Ukrainian rapper adopted his classical attire: diesel pants and outsized short blazers. The Ukrainian rappers formed an orthodox and a moderate category. The orthodox would only listen to rap groups, staying away from other youth gatherings, even more so from the rest of the world.
A genuine rapper had to know the names of some forty groups by rote. People of that category usually preferred smoking marijuana and consumed little alcohol. Unlike the orthodox, the moderate rappers could communicate with bikers. At present, they form a single whole, the distinctions being the ability of some to break dance and others to know about rap groups. These young people are characteristically eager to communicate with their cohorts. They most of all appreciated individuality and generally protest modern man’s seclusion and self-imposed limitations.
I was a college student in Kyiv when I familiarized myself with a colleague’s philosophy. It could be summed up as follows: Do what you can to make yourself stand out in a crowd, and see that you don’t get lost there. According to his logic, being original was probably the key thing in one’s life, and never mind how one went about it. One could appear in piano concertos, having no ear for music or unable to read the score. Or one could write obscene verse and say that life was so much crap and that death was the best one could expect. Men would be told that sporting long hair and all kinds of facial embellishments best suited them, and that women were generally clumsy things. Also, one could worship Marilyn Manson the way one does the Crucifix and consider his body (less several ribs) a model of masculine beauty. The main thing was to be different from everybody else. Honestly, I still do not know which of the youth gatherings my friend was rubbing elbows with, even which he thought was better than the rest. All I know is that he was commonplace, among other things because his determination to be original had precedents. In the 1960s, British and American streets and squares were filled with young people saying they were flower children and preaching love. Those were mostly college and university students, children of aristocratic families. They were hippies and they were eager to attract public attention, protesting the consumer lifestyle, overall snobbish attitude, mass society where the man in the street is ignored and values, conditions, even the very sense of life are duplicated — where depersonalization is prevalent, along with a lack of spirituality. The hippies proclaimed equality, joy, freedom, and love for one and all. They announced the New Age of Love.
Among the hippie obsessions at the time was the Rastafarians, a religious cult, originally from Jamaica, that regards Africa as the Promised Land, to which all true believers will someday return, and the late Haile Selassie, late emperor of Ethiopia, as the messiah. The crowning in 1930 of Prince Tafari Makonnen, also known as Haile Selassie, as emperor of Ethiopia, gave a fresh impetus to the Rastas, a broad-based national movement on the ideological platform of Ethiopianism and Marcus Garvey’s concept of a Black national identity based on race in the late 1920s. Its preachers urged marijuana, saying it was a grass blessed by God, ridding one of mental bondage, Western rationalism, and helping one get to the essence of things. Back to Africa was the motto. Of course, reggae music was the main specific of the cult. The aspect of social criticism in reggae singers lent their renditions was instrumental in spreading Rasta faith in the United States and Europe.
In Ukraine, Rastafarians appeared in the early 1990s. At the time the phenomenon was attributed to the popularity of reggae music with its exotic African requisites and smoking pot as a way to cleanse one’s soul. Latter-day Ukrainian Rastafarians seem to know little about the original movement, particularly the origin of the Rastafarians, identifying it with the hip-hop trend.
The skinheads are another trend worth being mentioned in this context. It dates from the late 1960s, originating in Great Britain. At first they urged fighting for one’s own class, not one’s race. Interestingly, there were Black adherents too. Mostly, the devotees were patriotic working class boys fond of reggae and soccer, taking little interest in politics. The British economic crisis in the late 1970s, and the influx of ethnic expatriates from the former colonies crowded out proletarian youth from employment. A wave of unemployment and lack of prospects for the younger generation spurred the skinhead racist movement. The neo-Nazi parties also played a role. A skinhead was supposed to wear a kind of clothes good for a street fight, including heavy army boots, a bomber jacket, and of course a shaved head. The first skinhead wave swept over Russia in 1994 when the right extreme organizations got their baptism of fire. The second wave, rising in 1998, emerged against the backdrop of the Russian regime combating separatism in the Caucasus. It was then the first Russian skinhead rock groups appeared, including the Russian Ghetto, Storm, and Kolovrat. At the same time, journals started being published, among them Russky Khozyain [The Russian Master], Pod Nol [Crew Cut], Otvertka [Screwdriver]... At present, Russia counts some 20,000 skinheads. The movement has spread to Ukraine. A very businesslike Ukrainian organization is taking shape, based on the skinhead group Bulldog (Perun’s Ax). In 1997, skinheads rallied round the Social Nationalist Party of Ukraine (SNPU).
Vyacheslav Kononov, leader of one such youth organization, feels rather skeptical about both the officially registered youth groups and all those informal ones. He says there are some 2,000 skinheads in Kyiv, mostly soccer fans sporting team scarves, in addition to bomber jackets and fatigue pants. Quite often skinheads, along with informal ones, are hired by various political organizations to take part in certain events. On such occasions, a rank-and-file skinhead may earn between 20 hryvnias and 30 bucks, depending on the leader’s generosity. Skinheads say they do not care much for any national idea, even less so for racism. Lviv skinheads appear more aware of their national identity; they speak Ukrainian, of course, shouting mottoes like Ukraine is the Best! They don’t drink vodka and support their local Lviv beer.
All told, the situation is understandable. Young people will always tend to get together and do something. Yet why we have only a certain group of young people uniting in this way remains to be explained. What makes them stage shock protest actions and keep aloof from the rest of society? On this there are various views.
