I live in Lancashire/Merseyside and I have to say, if you don't have a skinhead around here then you're highly susceptible to attack from the 90% population of violent shaven-head pricks wearing tracksuits, wondering the town drunk as skunks late as night with the only intention of getting into a fight.

I am so glad I went to uni down South.

Dude... it's bad down south. Here you get knifed for WEARING JEANS or BEING OVER 50 or something equally retarded (I mean sure I guess if you went really down to cornwall or somewhere it'd be ok but that place is so old fashioned sweet shops still have suffragette flags or some shit)

man, I can't come into general anymore without feeling like I'm surrounded by huge fucking idiots in every topic. people getting beat up and killed in the west for being christian hahahaha

i....i got flamed on digg.com for stating I believe in Christ...what is the world coming to...

Dude... it's bad down south. Here you get knifed for WEARING JEANS or BEING OVER 50 or something equally retarded (I mean sure I guess if you went really down to cornwall or somewhere it'd be ok but that place is so old fashioned sweet shops still have suffragette flags or some shit)

dude this is where I'm going to live

also doing an image search for suffragette flag gave me this which is pretty great, so thanks! http://www.theolddyke.co.uk/index.htm

Bristol, the place to be

here in america those two would be thought of as "cool" and the teenagers would probably proceed to stomp on the nearest homeless guy, a homosexual, or anyone wearing a christian cross around their neck.

hahaha you're kidding right

being a minority went out of fashion at the turn of the century and now emo and alternative is going out of style too.  the biggest fad right now is being a self proclaimed atheist  liberal that viciously satirizes and attacks anyone who thinks differently yet is too dumb to realize the irony in their actions.

hahaha come on stop with the fakeposts

here in america those two would be thought of as "cool" and the teenagers would probably proceed to stomp on the nearest homeless guy, a homosexual, or anyone wearing a christian cross around their neck.

haha what the hell are you talking about

edit: SEEMS AS THOUGH THIS POST HAS ALREADY BEEN COVERED so nevermind

Good, I hate Goths.

They need to grow up, everything they stand for is bullshit, and to top it off they look silly.

I fucking challenge you to show even a modicum of similarity between violence directed at homeless and gays and at christians.

Also I go to a college where the big thing is being counterculture (hipsters yay!!!).

Challenge taken.

Here's a list of 100 churches that were burned down from 4th quarter 2006 to 4rth quarter 2007.  Keep in mind that this was a SAMPLE and doesn't represent the total amount in the United States within that year (expect that number to atleast be doubled).  Note that atleast 90% of the total were a result of Arson; if you do a google search with the names of those churches, most of them were a result of a hate crime or vandalism/arson.

Everyone is susceptible to violence.  Everyone.  Saying Christians in America aren't stomped in the ground or killed over their faith is just as ignorant as saying Muslims in America weren't beat to death after 9/11.  If you rely on fucking CNN and FOX for your news, then you're going to get some one sided coverage on what's POPULAR.  The media only covers fads; churches burning down was news back in the 80s with the rise of Death Metal or whatever.  Nowadays, if you're murdered because your gay or whatever then it's instant front page but a backwater protestant church torched because some white supremist faggot or bored college kid hates organized religion?  Pfffft whatever, back page material.  Shit, I remember watching the news a few months ago and there were a series of drive by shootings specifically targetting churches when they let out on sundays.

EDIT: oh and b4 anyone takes my post out of context with "LOL U HATE GAYS" or whatever, my post is about how people of all faith/gender/denomination are equally capable of being the target of violence.  I'm sure there's lots of goths in America that get beat up/killed daily but if the media doesn't report it and it doesn't hit the internet then no one will ever know nor care.

EDIT2: Speaking about crimes against the homeless, it's amazing what you'd find on the internet.  According to New York Times there was 130+ reported crimes against homeless people last year which was an increase the year before that.  The National Coalition for the Homeless is a great website to find information on crimes against homeless that don't make front cover news. 

What is it with youngsters today and beating shit up?  This is generally speaking because it's increasing.  Back in my day, I was too busy watching X-Men and playing tonka trucks in the sandbox.

Marcus you are a pretty smart guy but you are still really biased whenever it comes to atheists!! if anything hip hop/cool2beblack culture is still way on the rise!

Anyway this is awful. Counter culture fads bug me, but still, this is taken way too far.

Good, I hate Goths.

They need to grow up, everything they stand for is bullshit, and to top it off they look silly.

Yeah, let's just kill all the goths. Teach them a lesson, a lesson about my nigga G-O-D.

Marcus you are a pretty smart guy but you are still really biased whenever it comes to atheists!! if anything hip hop/cool2beblack culture is still way on the rise!

Anyway this is awful. Counter culture fads bug me, but still, this is taken way too far.

well considering the internet is a breeding ground for REBELS 2 SOCIETY someone has to represent the opposite point of view without coming off as a one sided evangelist jerk.  fuck, i promote experimentation (so long as you're not like, killing yourself or harming others) and thinking for yourself but i'm like... one in a billion amongst the "conservative" society.

Suprisngly, a lot more people would wear goth if they knew where to find but then whatever. Personaly i feel trash like that get banged up for hurting people on the bassis of what they wear and how they choose to live. What does it matter how i choose to live which in no way effects you?
Its ignorant pricks like this that piss me off and make me a tad worried for my own saftey (yes, i'm a goth, don't like it? BITE ME) but in the end it won't stop me from living my life the way i want.

Is goth really a "lifestyle"? I mean like, isn't it just people who wear dark clothes and eeevil accessories like studded bracelets? I don't really see how that's any more of a "lifestyle" or "culture" than wearing a hat or gamer clothes to stand out. I'm not saying that trying to stand out is a bad thing, its a natural feeling to want to be recognized as an individual and all that jazz (though its debatable if just dressing differently is the right way to do it, aren't you a little more than just a set of clothes? Your different clothes might be overshadowing your actual personality, which is, I hope, much deeper than "I wear dark stuff cuz I'm dark".)

That said though, uh, attacking someone for having a "lifestyle" like this is pretty silly. Were their parents killed by a goth, and they swore vengeance on their kind?
N..never again... goddam goths...
Its pretty obvious that the kids didn't really care for them being goths. Either they were particularly violent kids who were looking for victims to harass and this couple conveniently stood out of the crowd to them, and harassment escalated into violent aggression (like maybe one of the kids was particularly violent in his harassment, and it pushed the other kids to mimic his enthusiasm, which pushed him to be even more aggressive, and so on...) or they actually knew that couple and attacked THEM as people, and the media just assumed that because they had a striking clothing style, it was some sort of cultural bigotry.

A third possibility is, maybe they had some pretty intense fear mongering where they lived about goths and how they "shoot down people at schools". Maybe goths arn't very common where they live, and that somehow suddenly seeing a couple of them was like OH SHIT THEY'RE HERE, TO ARMS. Like, if goths are really really uncommon where they live, maybe they assumed that goths arn't just a style and is more of a kind of ORGANIZATION like the KKK, and that the clothes are really some sort of uniform, and that these two people, no matter how non-threatening they looked, were really dangerous terrorists. That might seem like a very silly approach to the event, but think about it: Imagine you have never heard of goths before, not even once, and the very first contact you have with this "culture" is through stories of school shootings. Add to this the whole evil darkness pale faces part, and its not too hard to imagine them as a cult or a terrorist organization or whatever.

Is goth really a "lifestyle"?

In the defense of Goths it is a lifestyle that's no less legitimate than punk or alternative or wigger or whatever.  Out of all the "lifestyles" Goth probably gets the most bad rep because any mall rat and hot topic shopper can proclaim they're goth and it really pisses off REAL goths.  Being goth in itself is having a fascination over the morbid and macabre but other than that it's just about people who wear a lot of black, party and hang out, and read poetry to each other and shit.

Yeah, getting killed over being yourself is pretty gay.  I bet the guys that stomped them where skat8r bois or wide boys or yard boys or whatever gangs/groups britain has.

I didn't actually believe anyone would post such hateful things about Goths.

My plan worked to ween out the haters.

In the defense of Goths it is a lifestyle that's no less legitimate than punk or alternative or wigger or whatever.  Out of all the "lifestyles" Goth probably gets the most bad rep because any mall rat and hot topic shopper can proclaim they're goth and it really pisses off REAL goths.  Being goth in itself is having a fascination over the morbid and macabre but other than that it's just about people who wear a lot of black, party and hang out, and read poetry to each other and shit.

Yeah, getting killed over being yourself is pretty gay.  I bet the guys that stomped them where skat8r bois or wide boys or yard boys or whatever gangs/groups britain has.

this kind of attack is really, really common in britain. i've been attacked lots of times by different versions of the same people who were involved in this attack. i don't dress in black or anything like that, but my hair is usually longer than the buzzcut these guys will tolerate and i don't wear tracksuits or brand names like ben sherman or lee. but it's the same kind of attack because it has nothing to do with being a goth or whatever the person is, it's just because the target looks easy and weak, and the target usually is easy and weak.

there is some level of resentment over goths or a guy with longer hair, whatever the specific item is, but that's just cos it isn't what they have decided is how people are going to decorate themselves. there is no trace of being against The Gothic Lifestyle because none of these people think that far, they just get fucked up and attack. 

if you lived in britain you would see the topic title and already know the whole story, but it's not a complicated thing to understand. it was another attack by a gang of chavs, neds, asbos - they've got a bunch of different names in different regions but the reasons are always the same.

Everyone is susceptible to violence.  Everyone.  Saying Christians in America aren't stomped in the ground or killed over their faith is just as ignorant as saying Muslims in America weren't beat to death after 9/11.

that's not the point. everyone knows some Christians are killed for their faith. the point is that you are out of your fucking gourd if you think Christians are some kind of persecuted class. good luck running for public office and not being Christian!

I didn't actually believe anyone would post such hateful things about Goths.

My plan worked to ween out the haters.

Yes, you seem to have missed the whole sarcastic nature behind a good portion of the posts here at GW.

My words are lost on you dumb goths. (JOKING BTW)