Why Going To Live Shows Is An Act of Resistance

NYLON: Our safe spaces are under attack. The places we turn to for escape and entertainment have become targets for violence, intimidation, and terror. The bombing outside Ariana Grande’s Manchester concert that killed 22 people and injured 119 is the latest in a steady stream of terror attacks. Last year, Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, became the scene of the deadliest mass shooting in American history with 49 mostly LGBTQIA-identified people’s lives taken. In November 2015, a terror attack in Paris killed 139 people, 89 of whom were inside the Bataclan, a concert venue in the city’s 11th arrondissement. The spaces we’ve come to believe are safe, are not so—no matter how beefed-up security may be. But in spite of all that, there is safety to be found in the crowds of revelers, concert-goers, and clubbers. There is resilience to be found in the resistance of fear.