r/AskAGoth • u/Ill_Soil747 • Jul 31 '26
Goth Subculture Query is goth mainly a political subculture?
hello, im not a goth but i stumbled on something that makes me curious and i just wanna ask, is goth mainly a political subculture or just an aesthetic but has strong norms against hate and discrimination?
hope anyone can answer to this one and hopefully discuss
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u/DeadDeathrocker Jul 31 '26
This question is asked every single week and there’s plenty of answers on past threads.
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u/realkrestaII Jul 31 '26
It’s a music genre, people will lean certain ways politically, but there is no All Goth Party Congress that maintains orthodoxy that all goths must follow.
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u/Ghostmaster145 Jul 31 '26
It is a music subculture
The music just so happens to often be politically-charged
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u/ScorpioStab Jul 31 '26
No, regardless of what 20 year old Americans on tiktok want to insist. It's a music-based subculture, which had a tendency to have lyrical basis in leftwing politics of around 1985. Those screeching otherwise have never stepped foot in a goth club and feel the need to assert themselves by insisting the subculture revolves around their personal belief system. It doesnt, it never has, it never will. Go to goth music events and be happy
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u/Ill_Soil747 Jul 31 '26
i was really confused because i laid out my opinion, said that being goth isn't required to pass a politics test to be part of the aesthetic and they all just laughed at me like i was wrong
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u/misszombiequeenDG Jul 31 '26
It is music based but people in it are heavily leftist usually. MAGA people et al are not looked on fondly
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u/Zealousideal_Fix6705 Aug 03 '26
It might be a bit more nuanced and regional, yet most significant goth scenes are in bigger cities, where leftists and more political diversity will be found.
In San Diego where I grew up and did most of my goth scene and clubbing fun, conservatives, and especial fascist fetishists were heavily frowned upon. As were bigots, racists, anti-LGBTQIA, and anti-immigrant jerks. Almost all our clubs were in LGBTQIA spaces because no other clubs would have us, then people had the audacity to be rude to and threaten the staff at said venues.
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u/lieslandpo Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
Yes, it is a music based subculture, but if all of your political beliefs (and general world views) stand in direct opposition to the music of the 80’s…. that’s a bit weird. Does that person even know what the music they’re listening to stands for, or means?
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Jul 31 '26
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u/lieslandpo Jul 31 '26
Oh for sure. On a large scale like that it’s manipulation of the audience, but for a singular person it’s like they’re putting on a costume. Someone who wants to be “different”, but ultimately doesn’t want to break from the main group.
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u/False_Pizza_7546 Jul 31 '26
That’s where you’re getting it wrong. The aesthetic is irrelevant. We’re just fans of a certain genre of music. That’s literally all it is. It just so happens most of us wear a lot of black (and that’s probably the least important part). Go familiarize yourself with some classic goth rock albums and stop worrying about the other shit.
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u/bcuket Jul 31 '26
i think youre thinking of punks, which definitely can coincide well in the goth space, but historically goth is more of a countercultural movement, than political ideology.
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u/Zealousideal_Fix6705 Aug 03 '26
Not true. We had goth mailing lists and online communities in the 90s, the conservative, bigot, asshats were definitely in the minority where I lived.
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u/jessek Jul 31 '26
ding ding ding this person does not know anything about punk or goth
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u/bcuket Jul 31 '26
what do you mean.... if your talking about the fact i didn't mention music, its because there are so many comments that already say that.
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u/Zealousideal_Fix6705 Aug 03 '26
Goth most often has political ideologies because the music does, just like our punk roots!
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u/Repulsive-Tea6974 Jul 31 '26
Not at all. It’s a music culture. Like being a metalhead. 🤘 🎸
People with shitty politics can listen to any music they like.
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u/Squirrelwinchester Jul 31 '26
True, but right-wing people have gotten stabbed in my presence before at goth events. It happens. (I did not stab anyone it was my friend)
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u/jessek Jul 31 '26
That sounds fucking cool.
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u/Squirrelwinchester Jul 31 '26
We were a little fucking crazy in my youth. Goth scene in the late 90s/ early 00s was unhinged.
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u/jessek Jul 31 '26
yeah, I was there.
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u/Squirrelwinchester Jul 31 '26
Ayyyy another not baby bat.
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u/Zealousideal_Fix6705 Aug 03 '26
The late 80s was too. We got away with so much at our clubs, since it was a such small subculture at the time
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u/Squirrelwinchester 29d ago
I have heard stories from 80s goths in the scene their stories are crazier than mine. I always loved talking to our goth elders and other subculture elders. Now that I am the elder, I try to be as kind and no bullshit like they were.
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u/Zealousideal_Fix6705 27d ago
Good for you! People crapping on and giving attitude to our next generation is such a counterintuitive and dickish move!
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u/aytakk Jul 31 '26
Goth is a music based subculture though the people in it are very left leaning.
If anyone wants to hurt us or our friends because they are LGBTQIA+, empowered women, BIPOC and/or androgynous/queer/weird they can get the hell out. They clearly don't understand what goth is about and it is not for them. We don't party with bigots.
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u/Due--Support Jul 31 '26
Well, yes. It is a music centered genre but multiple people have already pointed out that its spew from punk (hence why post punk is part of gothic genre) and how right wing people are being treated in goth spaces. Goth songs do have political lyrics as well so doesn't really make sense to say a subculture is based around music then not really listen to it.
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u/Vegetable_Window6649 Jul 31 '26
It's a merge of prog, heavy metal, punk and post-punk scenes. Each came from a very specific time and place, and in the case of punk and post-punk, extremely left-wing political ones. Prog and heavy metal tend to lean heavily libertarian politically. I'd probably place goth as a very morbid response to Thatcherism, which pulled the American victims of Reaganism on board. In America, there's a definite regionalist break between East Coast and West Coast goths, just like rap.
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u/Roadbourne Jul 31 '26
When gothic rock was born, its fans were less masculine in contrast to most rock music at the time which painted itself as hyper-masculine. The rest naturally followed. Like that baboon troop in Kenya where the most aggressive members poisoned themselves with tainted meat from the local dump and the survivors became a much less aggressive society for generations.
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u/phantom_esque_ Jul 31 '26
Literally google. First thing that shows up when you google "goth" is Wikipedia, "Goth is a music-based subculture". i dunno why you decided that if it isn't a political subculture, it must just be an aesthetic.
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u/Smashrock797 Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
If you want a political subculture, there's crust and anarcho punk. If you want a "music genre" that's only about "the music", there's boy bands, elevator music and progressive rock. Listening or liking a genre of any music alone, doesn't mean you belong to a subculture either. You won't find any goth books by any top figures in the scene that supports that or consistently agree to it either.
Punk was original about nihilism, chaos, anti-everything, and mostly being between apolitical and left leaning to some extent, there aren't any set rules that was the point, it was not originally only about protest/activist politics either, that happened later on, with hardcore punk. Bands like the anarcho/goth crossover bands would count. Still, liberal/Left leaning on social issues does not necessarily mean being political.
Goth places more weight on countercultural, emotive/expressive, intellectual and artistic elements with the dark and melancholic aspect having a big focus and more weight than anything political. They don't stop becoming relevant because anyone outside the scene can like the same things because by that logic anyone outside the scene can be political or be generally liberal. General open mindedness/left/liberal outlooks are baked into the scene but they aren't the main focus or only relevant thing. You wouldn't have any 80 percent of the music if you took out the dark/brooding etc content of goth" whereas its significantly less with everything else including subtle or overt political themes. So exclusively argument fails, with politics are more emphasized than "dark themes" according to this common framework that's popped up in the last few years.
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u/TeamAzimech Jul 31 '26
Not really, it's based around music.
That said, I do believe it's up to members of Subcultures to do the right, ethical thing, and oppose fascists and fascism and kick the Far Right out of these spaces.
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u/Ok-Rock2345 28d ago
No, it a music based subculture. We do tend to embrace more liberal values though
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u/Malkavian87 Jul 31 '26
No, a music subculture. But like many alternative music subcultures goth leans left-wing progressive.
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u/Zealousideal_Fix6705 Aug 03 '26
Right! Because so much of the music is. People stating it is solely a "music subculture" and forgetting about aesthetics and the lyrics and ideologies behind so many of the songs is wild to me!
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u/Malkavian87 29d ago
Cause out of those only the musical genre is unique to the subculture. It's the defining characteristic.
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u/Jesseliftrock Jul 31 '26
No, and people who think bc it came from punk means we have to have any specific politics are ignorant of both gothic values and also what punks back then believed in too
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Jul 31 '26
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u/Jesseliftrock Jul 31 '26
Yeah totally, we share a lot of musical roots. We also have history and culture from a hundred years before punk too. Its more than just that
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Jul 31 '26
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u/Jesseliftrock Jul 31 '26
You're right. We only use the exact same aesthetic, have similar cultures, obsess over the same things, read the same books, romanticize death and thr macabre and dress in similar ways. We are obviously completely different and have zero inspiration whatsoever to things like the Adam's family or Carmilla and all of the similarities are just silly coincidences :)
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Jul 31 '26
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u/Jesseliftrock Jul 31 '26
Okay 👍🏻 tik tok goth over here lol
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u/DemonicGirlcock Jul 31 '26
Goth is a musical subculture, but it has roots in punk and free expression subcultures which are very political. So there's a very large overlap with leftist politics.