Living on the Edge of Today

The youthful malaise and unique angst generated by the broken promises of communism and capitalism is increasingly becoming a concern in eastern Europe.

Among the laments of the "good old days", older generations of eastern Europeans point to the fact that youth were much better behaved, and that the anarchistic manners and attitudes of today's youth is one of the "undesirable" imports from the West. Others, meanwhile, feel that the hopes and dreams of the young that were dashed with the social upheaval and poverty of the past eight years is responsible for the sharp increases in juvenile delinquency, drug abuse, and suicide throughout the region.

In both cases, what is especially worrying is the dramatic rise over the years of nihilistic and self-destructive teenage cult movements. In particular, the Gruftis are regarded as the most menacing. Named after the German youth movement ("Grufti" is derived from the German word "gruft" meaning "crypt") that gained adherents throughout western Europe and the US in the 1980s, the cult's eastern European incarnation mirrors the stresses peculiar to the region in the chaotic 1990s. What sets them apart from their western cousins, however, is their penchant for internal violence - drug abuse, dangerous sex, and self-mutilation.

In many ways, eastern Europe's Gruftis are paradoxical. Their black-clad dress and teased hair is reminiscent of the punk movement that spawned a musical genre in Britain and the US in the 1970s. Yet, lacking punk's assertiveness and braggadocio, eastern Gruftis focus their aggression not outward but inward. This often takes the form of death rituals - breaking into crypts where they consume alcohol and drugs (often the sniffing of glues and solvents), playing music, holding somber discussions, and reading spiritual books (often the Bible) by candle light.

The Gruftis are different from other dark European youth movements in that they are motivated by neither hatred nor a skinhead-like racism, but rather a feeling of hopelessness and despair for themselves and, by extension, humanity. According to Gabor Dettre, a Hungarian-born film director who released a film on the subject entitled "Tomorrow is Canceled from Lack of Interest", self-mutilation and death are avenues of escape for the Gruftis.

"They say they are not death wishers," noted Dettre. "They are not waiting for death. They are preparing for it, meaning that they are infatuated by it. It seems they are not scared of death at all. Most of them say that death can only be better than life because our lives, according to them, are really full of hatred, aggressiveness, and pain."

As Dettre and others see it, much of this hatred and pain is the by-product of the political transition that has taken place in eastern Europe. They cite that the angst driving the Gruftis is the downward mobility experienced by the lower strata of society. "During communism there was some dignity in coming from the lower classes," explains Dettre. "But after communism everything was taken from these families."

He adds that "these kids seem to be the most talented and sensitive of their generation. "Their questions are more sophisticated and reach deeper into what their lives are about. They are really questioning the craziness of the world around them."

The problem with the analysis of Dettre and others, however, is that it is too neat and simplistic. The Grufti movement is not restricted to those who hail mainly from the working classes; nor is the result from the fall in status of the proletariat and the extinction of the socialist values it once represented.

The Gruftis, like other cult movements, attracts followers on the basis of its image. Accordingly, just as many young people from the lower classes can be found to be part of eastern Europe's growing skinhead movement. In the end, it is not only a question of how an individual interprets reality, but the way in which they feel they can make an effective statement to society that determines whether they will become a Grufti, skinhead, or whatever other options are available and attractive.

Concerned parents, meanwhile, fail to even consider such issues. Instead, they see the root of the problem as being the rising influence of the post-modernist youth culture that has been coming to the east from the west over the past few years. They blame the nihilistic music and influential messages of pop bands like The Cure and Depeche Mode, whom the Gruftis emulate in style and dress, claiming that they are poisoning the minds of their children.

Unfortunately, when dealing with a complex problem it is far too easy and tempting to direct blame abroad. Despite the lingering propaganda left over from the cold war years, eastern Europe's youth culture was not hermetically sealed off from the west. The hippie and punk movements developed in the east at about the same time as they did in the west, albeit more discreetly. Thus, the fall of the Berlin Wall didn't herald a sudden influx of counterculture ideas.

In addition to this, not all western cult movements are able to take hold in eastern Europe. A prime example of this is with the Vegans of northern Germany. A unique blend of vegetarianism and anarchy, Vegans take their radical message to the streets by vandalizing butcher shops, spraying the steak dinners of customers in restaurants with red paint, and taking out eggs from the bags of shoppers and smashing them on the pavement. In a region where meat is the main staple of people's diets and the concept of vegetarianism is still in its infancy, eastern Europe has not proven to be a suitable breeding ground for Vegans.

What eastern Europeans have to accept is that cult movements is a sign of the times. Trying to appropriate blame or isolate its causes into neat and simple categories will lead nowhere, and only nurture a complex, growing phenomenon. 4

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