Best of luck to everyone attending the official Burning Man Commodification Man event this year. Look out for monkeypox! Hopefully everyone in the Orgy Dome is max-boosted and fully butt-masked at all times.
Burning Man hasn’t happened for the last couple of years…officially. In fact it has happened, and every account we’ve heard from those who attended the last two decentralized & decommodified burns said burning without the Org was even better than Burning with them – and the $250,000 hotel room camps that their leadership inspired [see Plug-n-Play Goes All The Way…to the Top of the Pyramid, A Sherpa’s Tale, Radical Sherpa Reliance, JT Finally Speaks]
Here’s what Burning Man looked like in 2021, without the Org:
Just like the last couple of years, Renegade Man is free once again, and completely decentralized. This time it starts on Labor Day, just North of the Commodification Man site. There are no tickets, organizers, or purposes. Yet there is a big fuck off glowy Man, portapotties, and all the other accoutrements of an epic Burn. Only: without the Org telling everyone who’s in and who’s out, who can Plug-n-Play in hotel camps next to them and who gets banished to the Outer Rim just for attending Renegade Man last year.
We hear some of the major art cars are very nervous about attending Renegade Man, fearing they will be punished by BMorg if they do; while at the same time there are Billionaire Burners who have their own Utopian visions who could care less about the rules of the Org. Sounds like all the ingredients for a fun time, with many less of the ingredients that can take away fun times.
If you make it all the way through to the other side of the Temple burn, congratulations: you managed to do more than 70% of your fellow Burners this year. Many didn’t make it past Monday, or show up at all. Now it’s Labor Day, what are you gonna do? Ready to go back to reality yet? Or do you really need just.one.more.dance…
Whether you partied like a rock star librarian, bailed out early, or didn’t even go to Burning Man at all…you might be interested in Black Rock Renegade’s free After Party, out past the trash fence. Join their Facebook group, if you have an art project that would need resources to bring out there hit them up for crowdfunding…there are definitely some high rollers involved, and the more art (cars) the better.
Here are the instructions from Black Rock Renegade on how to find the event, using the What3Words navigation app:
As a decentralized non-event, the exact location of the Renegade cannot entirely be defined either, however, some of it is expected to take place North of the Playa in the vicinity of what3words location fostering.stun.hopping or GPS coordinates [40.95161, -119.09563] (Google maps). For good form, we recommend avoiding camping at what3words location annual.harmless.substitute.
Some folks have created a “directory” map for dispersed campers wishing to indicate where they intend to camp.
There will also be a gated event temporarily privatizing 77% of the Playa and the 8 Miles Playa entrance, but the 12 Miles entrance will be open to individuals “traveling through, without stopping, the public closure area on the west or east playa roads” (section J.(1)(a) of the closure order) – see our info on getting there.
For more information see blackrockrenegade.org
Flashback 2016
The Scandals – Further Details
Plug-n-play has got out of control in recent years, ever since BMorg made a movie complaining about it called Spark. They moved almost immediately from throwing Playa)'(Skool under the bus for having RVs in their camp to promoting bus tour packages and concierge culture. We’ve seen the escalation of executive luxury from Chip Conley’s catered celebration camp to Billionaire’s Row with wristband-only cocktail bars and $54,000 a “head” swinger camps. Burning Man’s own airline now offers a VIP helicopter taxi service. Even the cops are cashing in, with BLM-branded art installations, multi-million dollar air-conditioned compounds and helicopter joyrides for their families to lavish dinners. We’ve had a War on EDM which saw long-time participants given the cold shoulder and resulted in the creation of a DMZ. And all of this is happening while Reno becomes the latest tax haven for oligarchs fleeing the Panama Papers scandal.
in 2022 at Commodified Man there will only be MORE plug and plays paying even more money. Some of the things we’ve heard are outrageous…but we’re sworn to secrecy. You’ll be able to spot them though…let us know if you see any BMorg big-wigs there enjoying the 7 star hospitality
Whatever happened to the new 2019, green, emissions-free Burning Man, anyway? World domination, as planned from the hot tubs at Esalen? Time is running out…maybe decentralized Renegade Man will lead the way by Leaving Less Trace than centralized Commodified Man does. Last year they created a carbon-neutral Burning Man out of battery powered drones.
Featured image: Josh Wolf, via brokeassstuart.com