The following may be of little interest to anyone not familiar with Burning Man.

A Little Prank at
Burning Man

Burning man is a place full of pranks and parody, where you often can't believe what you read or see. People play odd roles, enlist you into various schemes - nearly everything you hear or see is some kind of theatrical construction toward who-knows what end. The favored target the event itself; the larger it grew the more it was satirically ribbed. One year, for example, it seemed every other camp had a Larry Harvey impersonator preaching to the people from a stage, swaggering around in cowboy gear as “the hat.”

Being stuck far from any means of communication and information or news, the place is fertile ground for all sorts of misinformation and rumors; a bullshitters paradise. A favorite of mine one year was press releases that would appear daily on the bulletin board in center camp. Type written on small pieces of paper, they announced outrageous news that no matter how improbable was always just quite possible and always hilarious.

OTHER PRANKERY Two pranks, one concerning a bogus travel package to Burning Man offered, and the other about marketing rights for the event being sold to MTV are discussed in this Wired article. A good one involving a Larry Harvey (imposter) book signing is explained here: Cardhouse, and here: Deuceofclubs [this is a different account, longer with more graphics].

One year the rumor quickly spread through camp that Princess Diana had been killed in a car accident. I laughed -- that was a good one, some of us agreed, and the story was quickly followed by a few other celebrity deaths including that of Nancy Reagan.

Inspired by this type of disinformation, and countless leaflets and pamphlets (a couple of which I myself had made in the past) floating around dispensing bogus Burning Man advice, I decided to pull a minor prank at the 2002 event.

There are two official newspapers at Black Rock City -- The Black Rock Gazette and Piss Clear. The BRG is pretty standard stuff, mostly straight up information and news. Piss Clear bills itself as the alternative paper, and has lots of rants, advice and opinion and always a few good ad parodies.

A third paper would be fitting, I thought, something below these other two, something claiming to really tell the dark truth about Burning Man that the other two sources - bogus mouthpieces of the state - were afraid to approach. With time and resources limited, I decided on a one page photocopied newsletter format. Three issues would come out and have the appearance of being produced right there at the event (The BRG is mostly written and produced at the site; Piss Clear is made beforehand and its several issues distributed on various days) by a small group of earnest people intent on exposing Burning Man as a fraud, a totalitarian regime masquerading as a utopia. With an ominous, unrelenting tone, the Black Rock Inquirer would provide the investigative journalism the other big two were afraid to engage in. Some earmarks of the truly obsessive - Black Rock Rangers were never mentioned without quotation marks around “Rangers” for example - hinted that maybe the writers involved suffered some paranoia of their own. One morning I placed a stack of the first issue out in center camp:

 

[For a pdf of the three issues click here]

The Black Rock Inquirer
The only source of real information in Black Rock City

There are few minds to which tyranny is not delightful.
-- Samuel Johnson

Society is always diseased, and the best is most so.
-- Henry David Thoreau

 

WHY THE INQUIRER?
Black Rock City is a big mysterious place. It is doubtful many know anything about its origins, let alone how it truly operates in the present. And, it is even more doubtful that any one would stay in this place for more than an afternoon if he knew the truth about Burning Man and its “creator” Larry Harvey.

Why is the true story of this place known to few if any? Why are there issues the Black Rock Gazette and Piss Clear - the city’s “main” print “news” outlets - will not even touch? The Inquirer exists to do what these papers pretend to be doing, to shine the light on areas they avoid with a curious reluctance.

We think we have found some very good reasons for this reluctance of our journalistic peers, reasons that explain their good behavior. And we expect that when proceeding with our work there may be attempts made to stop us.

How far will we get in our mission? How long can we exist before our papers are confiscated by Harvey’s goons, and a dozen Black Rock “Rangers” arrive at our camp with some hastily constructed excuse to remove us from the premises? [One may laugh at this idea, but I have seen it happen before myself] We don’t know; we operate in full awareness of the risks involved in taking on such power. But we feel that, as the cliché goes, if even one person is enlightened, and awakened, to the true nature of this dark city then our work will have had worth. If we don’t perform this service, we fear no one else will.

Do we want to “bring down” Burning Man altogether? Replace it with something new? No; we do not feel that type of radical action is necessary. It should be more than enough to simply inform Black Rock City Residents.

We are driven in our publishing venture by nothing but love: we love Burning Man, and we honestly believe Black Rock City is the best place any of us have ever resided.

We are plain in our presentation; we are by necessity underground; we are limited in our resources and have almost no funds. We plan however to produce as many issues of the Inquirer as possible, to reach as many BRC residents as we can. We plan to spread the truth.

Read on, my Black Rock brother, and in so doing please remember that we are but the conduits for this unpleasant information that we can only but report to you what we have seen Direct your anger over these revelations not at those who wish to help, but rather at those whose repression, obfuscation and sleight of hand has contributed to your ignorance about this place and its most peculiar father, Larry Harvey.

Larry Harvey
To begin at the beginning, who is this person we “know” as “Larry Harvey.” He apparently started Burning Man years ago but where have you heard this information outside his talks in Black Rock City and on that ever-dubious source of information, the Internet? He has a way with words, and the comforting, intimate tone of perhaps a close uncle, spinning yarns about his days in the navy. One trusts him immediately; he seems so honest, so sincere. If Mr. Harvey gathered us all in the center of camp and handed out liquid in paper cups for us all to toast the Man with, who among us would not drink this liquid without a thought?

Image vs. Reality
Harvey likes to come across as a down to earth, folksy, straight ahead individual, but on closer inspection he is a man of contradictions. He states that Burning Man really has no “meaning” - especially not a religious one - that it is simply open for interpretation, that it is not a cult, but as we will see below Burning Man has about as much in common with a burgeoning cult as it possibly could.

He lives in the center of San Francisco (and apparently has an apartment in Manhattan), and yet he dons a cowboy hat and boots for his public persona in Black Rock City.

He claims to make very little money off Burning Man, and yet the ticket prices have risen drastically each year, sometimes more than one hundred percent. Where does this money go?

He claims to be anti-elitist in all regards and yet one of the biggest artistic events in Black Rock City - funded by Burning Man money - is the staging of an opera.

He presents Burning Man as a participation oriented event, but should one begin “participating” without first consulting the elaborate rules an regulations governing all participation within Black Rock City, one could find this participation quickly brought to a stop, or worse, could experience ejection.

Danger
How dangerous is Burning Man? At least one person has died here each year and where do you see this reported? Certainly not on the main page of the friendly, welcoming Burning Man website the uncanny duplicity of which equals that of Harvey himself.

A little digging has unearthed dangers far beyond those of dehydration and tripping over exposed rebar. During Labor Day weekend of 2000, a full sized tornado touched down in the Smoke Creek Desert (West of here). This was witnessed by some Gerlach residents and several Pequot Indians. This information quickly made its way to Reno and one would think the local Sheriff’s department would have immediately notified the huge encampment in their midst that such dangerous weather conditions had materialized only a few miles away. Yet talk to anyone who attended that year and they can tell you there was never any warning given within camp.

Farther north and within the Black Rock Desert itself lies the area where, in the late twenties, testing took place during development of the Little Hombre Project - the first atomic bomb. For good reason, this government site has been abandoned for more than fifty years. Under certain weather conditions, does dust from the radioactive soil blow down into this area of Black Rock? Unless someone has a Geiger counter, how would we ever know?

Do the event organizers harp on dehydration and other obvious dangers to throw up a smokescreen hiding more serious concerns? Is it feared releasing certain information could interrupt the cash flow at the gate?

Questions surrounding a dark, elusive leader and unforeseen dangers at Black Rock City are only part of the puzzle. In issue number two we explore these and more, delving deeper, assembling pieces to construct a picture of which many will doubtless not want to view.

WANTED
The Inquirer seeks contributors and writers. We need people with real grit who are not intimidated by the Harvey squad of event staff, and who are not afraid of confrontation with Black Rock "Rangers" or possible ejection from Burning Man. Can you investigate? Provoke? Ruffle feathers? If you are not afraid of the Burning Man authorities, and if you care enough about the people at Black Rock City and the futureof burning Man to take action and put something of yourself on the line for this, contact us (find your camp or make yourself known -- we will find you).

COMING IN ISSUE #2:
Burning Man as Cult?
Banned from Burning Man...are you next?
Spies
Government Funding
Mind your behavior
Confessions of a former Black Rock "Ranger"

 

The serious crew of the Black Rock Inquirer was clearly on a mission. A day or two later I placed out issue number two:

 

#2

Friday, August 30, 2002

The Black Rock Inquirer
The only source of real information in Black Rock City

Joyous distrust is a sign of health. Everything absolute belongs to pathology.
-- Nietzsche

What is man? A miserable little pile of secrets.
-- Andre Malraux

A Cult?
Much is made over whether Burning Man is a cult or not. IT is easy to dismiss the criticisms of fundamentalist Christian groups who have visited here and returned home to report the event as pagan, decadent and some sort of secular new age cult. It is no surprise that Bible thumping people are repulsed on many levels by the whole Burning Man experience. Several in our camp however who are not religious - mostly atheists and agnostics - have ourselves observed many cult-like qualities of Burning Man, some of which we feel are rather unsettling.

To be in Black Rock City is to be isolated, far from where one lives and far from what could be called civilization. Anything could happen out here, and if something bad did happen, how long would it take for anything more than the local sheriff’s squad car to get here? Event staff far outnumber local law enforcement.

The boundaries of Black Rock City are tightly controlled. For a space of complete freedom and autonomy it is awfully difficult to get in or out. Those brave enough to travel past the fence do so at their own risk. Sometimes leaving means not being able to come back in at all. Is it much of a stretch to think of the opposite being turned into a reality for many here?

Gathering a group around one belief, person, or symbol (such as the Man), isolating them in a place where there will be little or no contact with the outside world, and tightly controlling their ability to come and go are all qualities consistent with cults. A charismatic leader, a role Harvey fits perfectly, is the usual catalyst to attract and expand membership in the cult.

The Burning Man organizers have in effect created a town with one religion (one of their own choosing and creation), one undisputed and non-elected leader who commands an almost fanatic loyalty, and with a handful of media (the “papers” and radio stations that exist only in Black Rock City) which they control completely. If you wanted to build a cult of your own it would be difficult to find a better model for this than Burning Man and Black Rock City.

Banned
Several entire camps have been banned from coming back to Burning Man. What brought this on - theft? acts of violence? In the cases of camp members we have spoken with, “infractions” have been so unpredictably odd or seemingly harmless that those ejected have been in disbelief. Art cars with “inappropriate” bumper stickers and decoration, couples having loud sex even though enclosed in a tent, swearing at, giving the finger to, or otherwise being belligerent to those using video cameras. Sometimes just starting an argument with a Black Rock “Ranger” can be enough to have one escorted to the gate.

It is hard to get an accurate count, but by our estimates about three entire camps per year have suffered ejection, and maybe to of those have been banned from coming back.

How long till one’s own behavior draws the attention of “Rangers” who are not amused with one’s dress, behavior, or “attitude?” How can we relax and get into the Burning Man vibe if we are constantly looking over our shoulders?

Spies
The authorities here can sometimes pounce with a speed that would shame the most tightly run police forces in the country. Could there be event staff working “undercover” to keep an eye on Black Rock City residents? This seems hard to believe, but the response time we’ve mentioned is hard to explain if there is not some kind of surveillance taking place. We have looked at the greeters as one example that may lend weight to the “spy” theory. Greeters look and act just like other event participants, but it is a fact they have undergone training to hold their positions. Greeters smile and talk to you while poking their heads in your car and looking around. It would be hard to identify a greeter away from his or her post at the gate. Is it difficult to believe others could have undergone training to keep an eye on those in camps surrounding them?

[This remaining part was handwritten in a blank area in the third column]
A most disturbing thing has just happened, confirming some of our worst fears about the authorities’ response to our activities - Some “rangers” came into camp asking all sorts of questions and actually pushing a member of our camp to get out of the way - They insisted we prove that n one there was making a newsletter that “scared” people in BMan unnecessarily. I was able to hastily print this out, and take it away from camp without being seen, and it will have to go unfinished as a “ranger” or two continue to linger around the camp and are very suspicious of us. I hope that tomorrow I can get back in there, and some normalcy is returned so we can continue to work. I hope then to tell the story of this whole fascist incident. This is unbelievable.

 

Uh oh, trouble at the Inquirer offices! The “man” has recognized the paper as a true threat and will clamp down on it as he would anything else that questions his authority. Things were getting dangerous. Despite Big Brother’s attempts at censorship, number three came out the following day. But what happened? This issue was a photocopy of a hand-written page torn from a notebook, coffee stained and sloppy. Read on for the dramatic account:

 

#3

8-31-02

The Black Rock Inquirer

Society attacks early when the individual is helpless
--B.F. Skinner

Last night we found out just how serious Harvey and his goons re about keeping this place gentrified, clean, and free of dissenters. Several Black Rock “Rangers” arrived at our camp simultaneously and began throwing around accusations while actually searching our things and confiscating notebooks and other materials including a printer. Two law enforcement people arrived also - conveniently about ten minutes after the confiscation took place - and after some heated argument between camp members and the “Rangers” about how this raid took place, helped escort a good portion of the camp out to the gate. (My apologies in advance to John and Kari who were mistakenly implicated and ejected - they were not involved but were only sympathetic to what we were doing; guys - I owe you more than a beer when we get back.)

Two (?) of us avoided this ejection as we were hanging in an adjacent camp at the time and were able to quietly slip into an RV. But those of us remaining have had to disperse. I hate to have this as the last issue of the Inquirer but we obviously cannot go on - we have no way to communicate, we have no resources, we have access to a copier only thanks to an extremely generous individual who grants us this at great risk to himself.

I wonder if this issue will even get into the hands of more than 2 people before it is snatched up. I have doubts about whether I will be able to place the issue, period, without being escorted out. We had heard that most of issue #2 had been removed mysteriously from center and other parts of camp - now we know that was nothing to laugh at. I do feel that we have accomplished some of what we came to do, that we’ve had some impact. Hopefully in the future we can find a way to publish and get the word out without interruption. I vow to come back to Black Rock City and I hope the rest of the staff of the Inquirer is with me. Bye for now, and don’t let The Man push you around.

 

A raid, ejections, a last gasp! The paper suppressed.

It was a fun, minor prank. I don’t know how many people if any saw all three issues; I tried to place them out at roughly the same time of day and in the same place; they were definitely snatched up right away by people waiting in line for coffee. I assume it left some wondering.

 

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