About community…

I believe in community. Or at least I believe in people caring for people. That isn't achieved by some people being on the inside and some people being on the outside, and the people on the inside calling it a community. I have a very independent spirit. I also have a strong sense of wanting to be with others. Some may consider this a sense of community. But I connect with others on my own, in my own way; I don't enter alienating scenes or so-called communities. These are often just closed-minded, self-interested social clubs. They only isolate me and those I care about. My community is one that I have built independently for myself, not one that others have built for me. Others cannot choose my community nor choose my friends. Creating an elitist group of so-called friends and leaving everybody else out and calling it a community doesn't sound like a community to me. So I look to my independent spirit to find community with those around me for myself in my own way.

Communities are often cliquish and that's not what a community means to me. Communities help each other out in whatever way they can. But some closed-minded, self-interested social clubs only help out specific individuals and everyone else is not cool enough or something. The child's part of a scene may be cliquish but so is the adult's part so two people involved in the same scene may have very different yet the same experiences with it. The kids may make those who are poorer or quieter feel uncool. But the kids are just kids. And when you are less cool than they are, or less cool than they think they are, than this cannot be as hurtful as being less cool than an adult is, or less cool than an adult thinks he is. To be a grown up damaged by a child's scene is pretty hurtful; but to be a child damaged by a grown up's scene is even worse. Some adults have been hurt by children and left out of their communities. But those kids are gonna look back on it one day and have a greater understanding. I was a child abused and exploited by an adult's community and they should have known better. They should have already had an understanding.

Elaine 07