People of colour at Wacken

[liliarose666]

It was my first time at Wacken this year. I go to many festivals regularly and this is the first time I have ever felt out of place. There is a distinct lack of people of colour at Wacken and the press partners seem to go out of their way not to include poc in photos. Although I didn't experience negative comments I was stared at and made to feel uncomfortable by some individuals. This is not in the spirit of festivals or metal and I found it to be really disappointing...Hellfest for me next year

 

[Spartaner032]

There is a distinct lack of people of colour at Wacken and the press partners seem to go out of their way not to include poc in photos.

What is a "Lack" of PoC? Is there some Kind of threshold you need to have?

Do you have any Proof they didnt take Photos of PoC?

 

[EinfachLena]

Although I didn't experience negative comments I was stared at and made to feel uncomfortable by some individuals. This is not in the spirit of festivals or metal and I found it to be really disappointing...Hellfest for me next year

That sucks, but unfortunately there are idiots everywhere. This can also happen at Hellfest. Wacken has guests from all over the world, so exclusion is usually not a problem.

There is a distinct lack of people of colour at Wacken

Apart from the fact that I've seen a lot of PoC, that can't be a serious criticism? Wacken cannot influence who buys tickets.
Then do some advertising in the community

 

[Z13]

It was my first time at Wacken this year. I go to many festivals regularly and this is the first time I have ever felt out of place. There is a distinct lack of people of colour at Wacken and the press partners seem to go out of their way not to include poc in photos. Although I didn't experience negative comments I was stared at and made to feel uncomfortable by some individuals. This is not in the spirit of festivals or metal and I found it to be really disappointing...Hellfest for me next year

Maybe it was just a feeling you had? Neither do I ever exclude poc in my photos nor do my photo colleagues do as we all love the spirit of unity of those festivals so fuckin` much. There are so many people from Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Brazil ....from all over the world, colored or not, and we are riding in this boat together. It´s more like taking a cool shot of people from other countries as they had so many miles to go. Even Chris Cab from the Wacken interview team has south american roots. Just my 2 cents.

 

[Quark]

I exclude ALL people on my photos .

I don't discriminate, I hate all people equally.

As someone who has been to Hellfest several times, I can tell you, that I haven't seen many PoC in Hellfest either! And France may be "more coloured" than Germany, it's all got to do with colonialism. Think about that!

 

[liliarose666]

It was my first time at Wacken this year. I go to many festivals regularly and this is the first time I have ever felt out of place. There is a distinct lack of people of colour at Wacken and the press partners seem to go out of their way not to include poc in photos. Although I didn't experience negative comments I was stared at and made to feel uncomfortable by some individuals. This is not in the spirit of festivals or metal and I found it to be really disappointing...Hellfest for me next year

I'm not here to answer individual comments or argue with anyone, this is my experience and the reason for posting is awareness of this for people attending Wacken and the press photos to try and capture a diverse audience to encourage a variety of people to buy tickets. I'm sure it's easy to say that it isn't a problem when you haven't experienced something but as I have I chose to express this.

 

[Spartaner032]

I'm not here to answer individual comments or argue with anyone

meh

I'm sure it's easy to say that it isn't a problem when you haven't experienced something but as I have I chose to express this.

meh

this is my experience and the reason for posting is awareness of this for people attending Wacken and the press photos to try and capture a diverse audience to encourage a variety of people to buy tickets.

No proof given whats so ever

 

[MasterChu19155]

It was my first time at Wacken this year. I go to many festivals regularly and this is the first time I have ever felt out of place. There is a distinct lack of people of colour at Wacken and the press partners seem to go out of their way not to include poc in photos. Although I didn't experience negative comments I was stared at and made to feel uncomfortable by some individuals. This is not in the spirit of festivals or metal and I found it to be really disappointing...Hellfest for me next year

Well, I did not see many PoC either.
Of course there are ppl in Wacken from all over the world. But maybe not many Black people.
This applies in general to concerts in Germany, too.

Less than 2% of German citizen are Black. It is another situation compared to the US or France.
I'm not sure how popular it is to listen to heavy metal in the PoC community.
So I guess the lack of ppl might be partly due to few numbers in Germany in general and partly due to the feeling to not feel save or welcome in the metal scene.

It is hard to change feelings and create belonging when you are practically always a minority in sheer numerical terms.

But I'll present the feedback in the Rethink meeting and ask for more awareness on representation and photo material.

 

[luna.lunatik]

Als jemand, der des englischen nimmer so ganz so fähig ist, jage ich englischsprachige Posts durch den Übersetzer... nun, der ist seltsam "glatt" und sieht tendenziell sehr nach Rückübersetzung aus...

 

[luna.lunatik]

Nochwas:

die handvoll schwarzen, die sich in meinem weiten Bekanntenkreis tummeln (es sind eben weniger als 2% der Gesamtbevölkerung in Deutschland) hören ausnahmslos alle Hip Hop vielleicht gerade noch Reggae - aber eben keinen Metal.

Was soll(t)en die auf nem Metal Festival?

 

[Iron Madre]

to try and capture a diverse audience

The spirit of the festival is to capture the whole diversity of metal music and the festival is very good at that. If PoC do not feel attracted by heavy metal (due to whatever reason), it is neither the fault of the festival nor the fault of the audience.
As others allready pointed out: Only 2% (a matter of definition) of the germans are PoC and as the Wacken audience is not the youngest, it is in this age group even lower. So what do you expect? 2% of the pictures of colored people?

Especially in the metal scene, the approach should be "post-race", meaning that skincolor should be simply ignored and should play no role.

 

[Z13]

If you watch the latest episode of Harry-Metal (18) at wacken-tv on youtube, you see some PoC in
the crowd (front row) and even black vocalists on stage.

 

[Herr Jott]

Are you trying to troll or are you out of touch with reality?
Press partners most definitely are not trying to exclude black people from photos.

There's also a lack of ethnically Turkish people (a very large group here) at the festival, so what.
I have a certain multi-ethnical background myself. Most people with that background choose to listen to crappy music. That's their call and not our problem.

 

[Kolam]

Du scheinst es anders nicht zu raffen: Mach weiter mit solchen Kommentaren und du kannst dir ein anderes Forum suchen. Ich hoffe das war jetzt deutlich genug.

Hirnschlacht

 

[Ammerländer]

Ich möchte das nicht bewerten, aber mich erinnert das schon stark an Tampons...