Teen Gothic

It seems like Goth has become this cryptic over-mythologised monolith of a thing which none of us can emulate. All these users scrambling here with their lists and their questions about subgenres and fear of being seen as poseurs…

We need to ban these posts and ask the mods to make a pinned post saying "your goth is valid" or some crap because it's pitiful seeing people worry about whether they can consider themselves goth. Bro, if you're here, you're goth! Do what you like. But most of all, DON'T limit yourself.

It's concerning to see the term distorted by the internet (mainly tiktok) into something that makes me even question how well I belong here. Can we nip this in the bud and return to our batcaves, please?

Longtime lurker. Worried about the subculture becoming bigger than itself and putting off daunted newcomers!

Anyway, stream Five Ten Fiftyfold.

I didn't know what flair to use. I'm just looking for really depressing goth songs, something in the style of 'People' by Rosetta Stone and 'Disintegration' by The Cure if you catch my drift. I want to make a playlist with songs like that in it and I haven't had the best luck finding any with that specific vibe

that's all, just drop your faves

I've been to many concerts, goth music or not. But they had the best fucking performance I had ever experienced. Their music was crazy live. Headphones never did them any justice. I was simply smashed into a unicellular organism and it just made me appreciate so much being part of it all.

for me, it's swedish post-punk duo "dial m for murder!". they released 1 awesome album in 2009, but seems to have fallen into obscurity, unfortunately.

As the title says, I've recently gotten super into gothic fashion after admiring it for most of my life, and I finally built up the confidence to start buying and creating outfits from a local alternative fashion store in the past few months. I absolutely love how it looks on me and already have amassed quite a wardrobe of goth wear, from dresses to corsets to pentagram skirts, and have even started learning new makeup skills to match.

Through this I've ended up reconnecting with an old friend from back in school who has been wearing goth fashion for years and whose fashion sense really inspired me back in the day. Today I sent her a text with pics of some of my new outfits and was excited to want to talk with her again; however the response she had confused me.

She essentially told me while goth fashion is fun, "just don't forget to educate yourself on all the goth subculture too." I feel this is phrased weirdly as if it was more of a warning rather than an invitation to learn more about what being goth meant as I assumed at first.

This has left me a bit confused, and I can't tell if she's supportive of my new style or slightly gatekeep-y. Is she saying I can't wear gothic fashion if I don't understand the intricacies of goth subculture? Is this a suggestion that how I've gone about wearing goth fashion is wrong and that I need to educate myself on how to wear it properly? Or is it simply a friendly suggestion to look into the subculture that could help me improve wearing gothic attire?

Would anyone have some idea of what this could mean and how important educating yourself on the goth subculture is? Thank you in advance!