The Morality of Losing Yourself on a Dance Floor: How a Rave Scene Delineates Belonging based on Intention

A rave scene in Halifax, Nova Scotia, has re-emerged after the COVID-19 pandemic, reconnecting with the original ethos of peace, love, unity, and respect that was lost when unlicensed raves merged with commercial clubs in the 2000s. Based on ethnographic research, participant observation, and interviews, the paper traces how these underground events differentiate themselves from commercial nightlife through participants' intentions, drug selection, and behavior. The author introduces the concepts of “moral” and “immoral” ravers to model these differences, and argues that raving has anti-fascist potential in moments of collective forgetting on the dance floor, offering a glimpse of subjectivity outside dominant power systems.

Study at a glance

Abstract

When raving emerged in the early 1990s, it promoted a clear ethos: peace, love, unity and respect. Raving soon entered a decline when the parties became commercialized and governments took various measures to quell unlicensed events, losing their original ethos. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, Halifax, Nova Scotia, in Atlantic Canada, has experienced a rebirth: an emerging rave scene appears to be reconnecting to this original ethos, which many thought was dissolved when the unlicensed rave scene largely merged with the licensed, commercialized club scene in the 2000s. Following ethnographic research, participant observation and interviews with participants in this local, underground party scene, this paper traces how these events differentiate themselves from the commercial nightlife scene through a unique set of intentions, and how participants' attitudes, drug selection, and behaviour illustrate a choice to pursue these intentions. I introduce the concepts of “moral” and “immoral” ravers as models for understanding these differences, and ultimately argue that raving has anti-fascist potential in certain moments of collective forgetting on the dance floor, by allowing a momentary glimpse of a subjectivity outside dominant systems of power.