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Burning ManAn Unintended Religious MovementBy Adam Kennedy

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Introduction:

Burning Man, and other festivals like it, are emerging as a new global religious

movement that seeks to undo the stifling nature of culturally accepted norms by instituting art,

freedom of expression, and liberation of sexuality, as the main tenets of their religious creed

!his movement serves to combat the social alienation that the participants feel exists as a result

of the dominator hierarchy and the prevailing socio"economic system !his alienation, which is

clearly spelled out in Karl Marx#s writings on social utopia, is a direct result of a modern rational

worldview taken to its# extreme !he capitalist system that is supported by the very framework of

this rational perspective is a structure that these $burners% feel they have, for lack of a better

word, been burned by, and goes counter to the very nature of creativity and self"expression, on

which these participants base their faith $Burning Man,% its# founders, followers, and allies, are

attempting to subvert this alienation by building a tribal community whose foundations precede

the modern perspectives of capitalism and ruling class systems, essentially creating the new out

of the old

According to Marxist ideology, the summum bonum of the liberation from this alienation

is the annihilation of religion, as well as, other systems of control !his begs the &uestion, is

Burning Man 'ust another religious movement that seeks to escape the reality of class structure,

or because of its propensity for liberating individuals from the more oppressive ideals of

contemporary society, does it actually personify Marx#s idea of no religion, thereby constituting

a religionless religion( )n this paper ) will examine Burning Man as a microcosm that

exemplifies, even temporarily, the idea of Marx#s utopian vision, and prove that it does in fact fit

the criteria that Marx spells out

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Burning Man is a weeklong festival held in the Black Rock desert in northern *evada

!his festival takes its name from the ritual burning of a large wooden effigy, which is aptly

called, $!he Man% Burning Man began in +-. at a /ummer solstice ceremony where 0arry

1arvey, the event#s founder, burned an -"foot wooden statue as a spontaneous act of radical self"

expression !his first event, which was held on Baker Beach in /an 2rancisco, 3alifornia, had

about 45 people in attendance /ince its inception the festival has grown from those few friends

on the beach to over 65,555 yearly participants !he festival as it stands today is a gathering

where artists, musicians and other creative individuals can gather and share their love of

creativity, self"expression, and community

7hat began as a yearly art festival &uickly turned into a metaphor for social evolution

!his temporary city in the desert was emerging as a community of like"minded individuals who

were experiencing for themselves massive transformative benefits

)t is not without significance that deserts have a long history as loci oftransformative possibilities8 from Moses to Mohammed and from 3hrist to

3arlos 3astaneda8 and Burning Man plays to these ideational sensibilities

9articipants today often speak of being $on the playa% in a way that referencesthis sense of environmental and cognitive otherness, helping to set the stage for

transformative experiences :;ilmore 45< !here

are also the elements of tribal dance, shamanic ceremony, artistic expression, and other"

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worldliness Along with these aspects, 0arry 1arvey founder of Burning Man has written and

enacted a set of guidelines known as the $!en 9rinciples%

$!hese principles were crafted, not as a dictate of how people should be and act, but as a

reflection of the communityCs ethos and culture as it had organically developed since the eventCs

inception% :1arvey, 7eb< !he $!en 9rinciples% are as followsD Radical )nclusion, ;ifting,

ecommodification, Radical /elf"Reliance, Radical /elf"xpression, 3ommunal ffort, 3ivic

Responsibility, 0eaving *o !race, 9articipation, and )mmediacy :1arvey, 7eb< !aken all

together, these components fit together and resemble the ancient earth worshipping religions of

early tribal cultures, even though the leadership of Burning Man claims that it has no religious

affiliation

espite its clear symbolic references to ancient transformative rites, the festival

remains explicitly unaffiliated with any religious movement )nstead, bothparticipants and organi@ers consistently re'ect any one fixed meaning for the

event, locating it outside the realm of doctrine and dogma But these refusals of

canonical significance notwithstanding, neither the Burning Man festival nor the

effigy for which it is named emerged out of a vacuum !he Man conveys allusionsto a wide range of mythological and prehistoric rites of sacrifice and regeneration

that can be traced to ancient sacrificial bonfires, carnivals, festivals, and other

similar cultural acts :;ilmore 44