In the late 80s
and early 90s, performer GG Allin tore through the underground club scene
dishing out his unique form of entertainment. Allin was known for his high
energy punk rock performances. His lyrics were filled with hate interwoven with
strong guitar riffs and machine-gun like percussion. At any one of his
performances, not only would one regularly see GG’s extreme antics but it was
expected with the price of admission. GG Allin was known to perform mostly in
the nude, generally wearing some sort of dog collar or leather bands and a pair
of boots. It was commonplace for GG to defecate and urinate on stage and smear
it on his body or even eat it. It was also common practice for him to throw his
excrement into the audience. He would regularly have sexual encounters on stage
with both male and female audience members, some willing and some not so
willing. Pedophilia and beastiality was not beyond Allin’s scope. GG Allen
lived his life with no boundaries. Time in jail and visits to the hospital were
regular occurrences in his life. GG Allin had a relatively small fan base,
although the fans that he did have worshiped him with cult-like zealotry. Allin
was vilified and detested by mainstream America (Hated).
To
the uninitiated, GG Allin would seem as a man out of control. His violent
tendencies, anarchistic lyrics and revolting behavior on stage seem nothing
less than psychotic. Within this paper, I will discuss Julia Kristeva’s
discussion of “the abject” and Bataille’s discussion on transgression. Using
the concepts of abjection and transgression, I will argue that by pushing the
boundaries of cleanliness and hygiene, GG Allin’s performances show inversion
of social structure as Allin lead his audience through his living manifesto of
transgression and abjection.
The
Oxford English dictionary defines Abjection as the state or condition of being
cast down or brought low; humiliation, degradation; dispiritedness, despondency
(Oxford Dictionary). Excrement, puss, bile, blood and the dead body (cadaver)
are just some examples of what society sees as abject. In Julia Kristeva’s The Powers of Horror, she describes the
abject as the unequivocal result of life. Expressed as a dichotomy of that
which disgusts is a necessity for life. “Such wastes drop so that I might live,
until, from loss to loss, nothing remains in me and my entire body falls beyond
the limit – cadaver” (Kristeva 3). This illustrates how the dead body is the
final abject that one could shed of one self’s identity. The various spectrum
of abjections which the body sheds sets boundaries by demarcating a series of
taboos. In effect, by pushing the limits of these abjections we are allowed to
explore personal growth.
During
GG Allen’s performances, Alan would defecate, both on and off stage, and then
perform various actions such as smearing it on his body and face, throwing it
at the audience members and even putting it in his mouth and eating it.
According to Kristeva, the abject was not necessarily the actual action but
what boundaries the action pushed. She states, “Any crime, because it draws
attention to the fragility of the law, is abject” (Kristeva 4). She explains
that by increasing the social severity by exploring extreme taboos, we heighten
our awareness of the fragility of law. In an interview conducted by Geraldo
Rivera, GG Allin was quoted as saying, “my body is a rock ‘n roll temple and my
flesh and blood and body fluids are communion to the people. Whether they like
it or not. I’m not out to please anybody. My rock ‘n roll is more not to
entertain but to annihilate and try to bring danger back into rock ‘n roll. And
there are no limits and no laws and I’ll break every barrier put in front of me
till the day I die” (Hated). Allin implies that he is not simply assaulting his
audience with excrement but rather initiating his audience through the abject.
He suggests that his performance is not a one-sided form of entertainment but
rather a cathartic moment for all involved. (Note: found it ironic that the two
definitions for the word cathartic
are 1. allowing you to express strong feelings that have been affecting you so
that they do not upset you anymore- and 2. [Medical & Healthcare] describes
a medicine that causes emptying of the bowels.)
When
interviewed, GG Allin would regularly not speak of “who” he was but more of
“where” he was. “The future, what are my plants? Stay one step ahead of the
law, I don’t know how to think about the future, I think about today. I don’t
know, it’s really not important if I don’t get arrested today. Whatever happens
today, it doesn’t really matter tomorrow. I get there when I get there” (Hated).
According to Kristeva, this is Allin’s way of controlling the space that he
inhabits essentially making his world “divisible, foldable, and catastrophic”
(Kristeva 8). This allows Allen a certain amount of uncertainty which he gains
satisfaction from.
From
his paper, Desiring Desire: How Desire
makes us Human, all too Human, Anthony O’Shea discusses Bataille’s thoughts
on taboo and transgression, “…Bataille’s thought, however, demands that rules
and taboos can only be understood with their inverted form – transgression.
Rules depend on what they are designed to prevent…Without transgression rules
or taboos ceased to be, they become immutable facts or truths which exist
without recourse to the profane world” (O’Shea 935-936). The laws of
transgression imply that there must be limits for a transgression to occur. If
there are no limits then we are left with fact. When GG Allen states that he
holds mainstream America in contempt, he is allowing the very community which
vilifies him to inspect him as abject and therefore safely investigate their
own limits.
So, why would
anyone go to one of the shows in the first place, knowing full well of the
evident danger to one’s safety? From the movie, Hated - G.G. Allin & The Murder Junkies, we get an interview
with one of GG Allin’s devout fans, who refers to himself as “Unk”. Unk discusses
why he thinks people are fans of GG Allin. He states “…even if I never get it
out myself, he’s getting it out for me. I can do it vicariously through him.
And like with my band, I would never go on stage and take a dump and throw it
at people, but GG will… He’s doing something a lot of people wish they had the
fuckin balls to do” (Hated). Allin supplies his audience with a clear abject border
to inspect. Allin empowers his audience by allowing them to operate under the
same rules as he does at his performances.
Mary Douglas discusses
the dynamics of ritual in a work entitled Purity
and Danger: An analysis of the concepts of pollution and taboo. She states,
“During the marginal period which separates ritual dying and ritual rebirth,
the novices in initiation are temporarily outcast. …Then we find them behaving
like dangerous criminal characters. They are licensed to waylay, steal, rape.
This behavior is even enjoined on them. To behave anti-socially is the proper
expression of their marginal condition. To have been in the margins is to have
been in contact with danger, to have been at a source of power” (Douglas 2). This
is why people would go to a GG Allin show. Throughout the show, the audience
would experience a loss of convention through an establishment of the abject
followed by a cathartic rebirth which manifests itself in violence and debase
sexual activities. GG Allin fan, Unk, is asked why he goes to live
performances. He states, “Entertainment (laughs) even the fear of things. There
has been a couple of GG shows where I was afraid that my skull may be cracked
at any minute. It’s that whole thing, it’s kinda like going to see the most
bizarre freak show you ever seen in your life and why do people go to freak shows?”
(Hated). This statement emphasizes the audience’s role in the ritual of his
performances. Kristeva discusses “…laughing is a way of placing or displacing
abjection.” (Kristeva 8). We see this evident in Unk’s comment, “a lot of
people get scared, I was scared to go to one of GG’s shows…but I guess that’s
the reason why you’re there. To me it’s comedy as long as he’s not jumping on
my ass and beating up other people.” This is but one of many instances in which
I found his fans making light of normally disturbing and antisocial behavior.
After a visit from
GG Allen, Mass murderer John Wayne Gacy had this to say from death row, “GG
Allen is an entertainer with a message to a sick society. He makes us look at
it for what we really are. The human is just another animal who was able to
speak out freely, to express himself clearly. Make no mistake about it, behind
what he does is a brain (Hated).” This is a haunting commentary from arguably,
one of the most notorious men in history. O’Shea comments on Bataille’s theory
of transgression, stating that, “We do not transgress because we are human but
are human because of transgression”(O’Shea 936). I believe this refers to the
limits that mankind has placed upon himself and more importantly, man’s primal
desire of expression.
Throughout this
essay I have shown examples of the abject and why GG Allen’s audience subjected
themselves to it voluntarily. By expanding
the boundaries of the abject we allow ourselves to closely inspect our own
mortality. Through closer inspection of GG Allin’s live stage performances we
do not see a man out of control but an artist who has allowed himself to
transcend the normal social expectations. As for the audience, we find that
these spectators had a unique opportunity to explore beyond the normal
boundaries of traditional performances.
Works
Cited
Douglas,
Mary. Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo.
London: Routledge and Keegan Paul, 1966. Print.
Hated
- G.G. Allin & The Murder Junkies. Dir. Todd Phillips. Perf. G.G. Allin. Film
threat video, 1993. YouTube at: http://youtu.be/piEQGeyiE-k.
Web. 16 Oct. 2013.
Kristeva,
Julia. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. New York: Columbia University
Press, 1982. Print.
O'
Shea, Anthony. "Desiring Desire: How Desire Makes Us Human, All Too
Human." Sociology 36.4 (2002):
925-940. Business Source Complete. Web. 23 Oct. 2013.
The
Oxford English dictionary. Copyright © 2013Oxford University Press. http://www.oed.com.libproxy.cc.stonybrook.edu/.
Web. 16 Oct. 2013.
No comments
Post a Comment