"My people hath been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray, they have turned them away on the mountains: they have gone from mountain to hill, they have forgotten their resting place."Jeremiah 50:6
It is easy to cast aspersions upon the Insane Clown Posse and their loyal flock of paint-faced fans, known as juggalos (or juggalettes, in the feminine). Shit music aside, juggalos attract ridicule with their mode of dress, seemingly random love of Faygo soda, and misunderstood teenage demeanor. Asserting their "clown-love" through various symbols and rituals, Juggalos stand out and almost demand an opinion be made of them. Bound by a common appreciation of ICP and fellow Psychopathic Records Artists, a bastard society has emerged grinning dumbly through clown paint at the contempt it arouses.To get a sense of the juggalo culture, one must familiarize oneself with its architects, Violent Jay and Shaggy 2 Dope, collectively, the Insane Clown Posse. Backyard wrestlers and recidivists as young men, the Detroit-based duo began building what was to become the Insane
Clown Posse during the mid-80s, invoking supernatural imagery in their lyrics and progressively more and more elaborate stage shows. ICP was able to attract a loyal following despite harsh reception from critics (a trend that would continue through much of their career), but it wasn't until 92, that the word juggalo was coined, and the culture really began to gel. Following the feed-it-where-its-hungry approach of fire-building, Violent Jay and Shaggy 2 Dope moved quickly to flesh out and market their infant subculture.And people seem to be buying. The Gathering of the Juggalos, an annual festival for the self-proclaimed family, has been growing by leaps and bounds, from 5,000 attendees in 2004 to 20,000 this past year. As the numbers swell, the requirements for participation seem to blur. For instance, there exist juggalos out there that are not Insane Clown Posse fans. There are juggalos who don't listen to anyone on Psychopathic Records for that matter. The significance of the fan eclipses that of the artist.
So what draws all of them together? What makes someone want to be a juggalo? Let's go straight to the source:
Still a little confused? Me too, let's see if the vlog community can shed some more light on the situation:
That was something alright...And now for the other side of the dumb coin:
The Internet is filled with this crap, as prolific as it is puerile. Juggalos and juggalo-haters might as well be Sharks and Jets for all could care. But I am attempting to add not detract from the discussion, so here's my two cents:
I believe people see themselves in the the story of the ICP as a group. They feel that ridicule and anger from the rest of the world, and see it mirrored in the experience of these bigger than life characters. Being among juggalos ("the family"), one participates in the acceptance that can elude us in the world at large. Knowing my own need for acceptance, I tend away from begrudging others the means by which they fill that void. It's a fucked up world, and we all weave our own weird way though it. That said, the whole thing reminds me all too much of "The Sneetchs".
One of Suess's finest stories, "The Sneetches" explores trends and their effect on a community. A traveling business stumbles upon the egalitarian sneetch community, and introduces a machine that puts a big star on the customer's stomach. It becomes all the rage among sneetches to the great profit of the businessman, until it is inevitably becomes overexposed and the trend reverses, allowing the businessman to market the star removal business, again to his great profit, and the division of the community.Through this lens, Violent Jay and Shaggy 2 Dope, like the traveling businessman, could be viewed as villainous, and the juggalos as innocents swept away in a cash-hemorrhaging tide of horseshit. As much as I would like to let go of some of my vitriol, blame it all on The Man, and give these yo-yos
a pass, I couldn't do it, not with a straight face at least. We don't live like the sneetches, and we never did. We grow old and die in a world brimming with traveling businessmen--a world where snake oil comes in more subtle forms than stars on stomachs. There is nothing easy about trying to lead dignified existence in such a world, but what worth doing is? Putting on fucking clown make-up and blaming all your problems on the cool kids not liking you is a cop out. Everyone worth a damn gets their own dose of pain in this life, and the ones I admire are the ones who weather it with grace and a sense of self. In finding their own refuge from mockery, the juggalos sharpen the divisions they seemed to be reacting against in the first place. Viewing them as victims in this situation has the dual effect of both disguising their own agency in perpetuating a dynamic (in/out, cool/lame...) they claim to transcend, and validating their own weak-minded approach to life. Juggalos are not absolved of their sins, hiding behind some cultural-relativist, commie perspective (apologies to Theodor Geisel). "Victims of commerce", "symptoms of the rootlessness of a diseased America". I don't buy that shit for a minute. Playing social outcast in a large homogenized group of people is a sham. They might as well all be wearing khakis and varsity sports jackets. It's a hard life and we should try to stand it our own two feet and heal what divides we can, not relish in them.Since originally posting, I have scoured the Internet for different perspectives on juggalos, and encountered little more than chest-thumping and ranting leading me to believe, as I've secretly suspected, that by simply participating in this conversation one's credibility goes right out the god damned window. I will not apologize for my tone or views, but I will say people should do whatever the hell makes them happy. And right now, to me, happiness is a mind blissfully empty of all things juggalo, a belly plumply packed with carnitas tacos, and this video:
