What is the purpose of the goth culture?

Question

What motivates a kid to join this subculture? Is it merely a more aggressive rebellion than is usually experienced in adolesence?

Answer 1

Real Goth? Or the pseudo-Goth that attracts teenagers like crap attracts flies?
Fake Goth, the culture of fifteen year old boys who obsess over Marilyn Manson is a mere pseudo-rebellion, a way to be "cool," to be "differant," to be "anti-mainstream" whilst not putting too much effort into it. The purpose of this is just a sort of pseudo-rebellion.
The above is the anti-thesis of all that is Goth.
True goth is first and foremost, a music type, it encompases classic Gothic rock (Bauhaus, Sisters of Mercy) Deathrock (45 Grave), Industrial - my favorite type (Grendel, Assemblage 23, Leaetherstrip), to modern Gothic (Bella Morte, Cruxshadows). Let me clear up two common misconceptions about Gothic music.
1 - It is not all about sadness, darkness, gloom, distruction, etc. Topics can range from any amount of things, most Goth music is however, suprisingly upbeat, The Cruxshadows are a perfect example, 99% of their catalogue is fairly happy sounding.
2 - Goth is not metal.

The subculture can best be discribed as punk, but a little macabre, Gothic musician/comedian Voltaire put it best when he said "Punks are angry that they live in such a sad world, Goths are sad because they live in such an angry world." Is this to say all Goths are sad, depressed, or in a state of bland disintrest with the world? Absolutly not, as someone who would consider themselves a Rivethead (Industrial Goth) I can say that most of my friends who would be considered "Gothic" are among the happiest of my circle of friends, which encompases people of all walks of life.
Is Goth rebellious? In It's formation, yes, just like punk, It's a counter-culture and by It's very nature-rebellious.
One does not become motivated to join a subculture, for me it was a case of hearing my first Gothic music, learning, and growing into it, I'd always had an intrest, even before I'd known a thing about it.
This is obviously a very basic explaination, if you want more detailed or a more specific explaination into a perticular aspect of the subculture feel free to e-mail or IM me.





Edit: Upon reading a couple answers I feel I must add on.

1 - Goth is not a synonym for depressed, as I said in my original answer many of my "Goth friends" are happier than what many would call my "preppy" friends.
2 - Goth is not only a teenager thing, a friend of mine, 40 something years old who is over in the UK, she was around during the original Gothic movement in the 1980s.
3 - Black clothing is not a mandatory dress code for "Goth," many prefer it, but anything is acceptable, for instance, right now I'm wearing blue jean shorts and a white shirt.

Answer 2

first of all, what would it be a rebellion against.

second, goths don't call themselves goths, they are themselves

third,the only rebellion i could think of is against the two stereotypes adults categorize us in:
complete and total idiot preps who are perfect in every meaning of the word,
and trouble makers who will get nowhere in life.

whats with "What motivates a kid to join this subculture?"????

its not a cult dude. ok?

they're either:

posers who think its cool,

people who actually are like that and have friends who are like that

or whoever was catagorized by rest of the world and outcasted so they had to fit in anyway


its not a cult, its a clique just like everything else, and people just are goths, leave them alone okay?!!!

Answer 3

Imagine that every person has a camp fire. Their job is to tend that fire. At night we see that some fires are better than others. Some are barely smoldering because the owner is not tending them properly.

Now if you want to achieve some status there are two ways to do it. You can work on splitting logs, banking and tending your fire to make it burn bright or you can go around and wet on everyone else's fire so that yours looks brighter than it really is.

Kids that buy into these weird sub-cultures are usually in the second category. Rather then become honor students, athletes or joining clubs; rather than fixing up their appearance and developing social skills, they find it much easier to just declair all of those things to be stupid.

They can reinforce in each other that they really don't want acceptance by the best and brightest. By declairing all worthwhile things to be corny, nerdy, shallow etc. they can wet on all those other fires that people have been working so hard to make brighter.

Eventually, their fire goes out. They just delude themselves that they never really wanted a fire anyway. Soon, this self fulfilling proficy takes its toll on them. They get older and life begins to pass them by. This is followed by depression and regret and sometimes drug abuse or alcoholism.

They are very troubled and very sad people. They never reach their potential. By the time they realize how much they have been fooling themselves, an awful lot of life has already been wasted.

.

Answer 4

To feel different I guess....
They see beauty in a sort of morbid way- not like most people do.

Answer 5

It's both fascinating and it pisses off the parents. Like, Buy One, Get One Free, what a deal.

Answer 6

Theyre depressed people that express thier depression by wearing back clothing.

Can't get much simpler than that :)

Answer 7

It is a cry for attention for those who are too pathetic to merit attention on their own personalities.