Hot take: When the party becomes a product, the crowd changes

Hard techno doesn’t have a sound problem. It has a problem with crowds, DJs and promoters.

This morning, we came across testimonies shared on TikTok following the Teletech event on January 10th in Lyon.

@fitbysosoo Disgusted #techno #rave #teletech #technogirl #hardtechno ♬ original sound – Darkground Records

 Unapologetic pushing, phones raised like weapons, intrusive stares, wandering hands, random insults, theft, latent aggression, total indifference toward people in distress, sometimes even a form of assumed brutality. These are no longer isolated anecdotes or “bad nights.” This is a structural trend, experienced by many people, and especially by those who are already the most exposed in nightlife spaces.And no, this is not just about drugs. It’s not simply a trend either. What’s happening here is deeper, more political, and far more preventable than many are willing to admit.Hard techno has experienced explosive growth. Algorithms, TikTok, viral reels, short sets, an aesthetic of transgression emptied of its context, accelerated DJ starification, and the constant glorification of excess as a value in itself. In just a few years, the scene has expanded so rapidly that its codes, practices and values have had neither the time nor the space to be passed on. Entire crowds are now arriving without shared history, without collective memory, without understanding what a techno party represents beyond sound and image.A music scene is never neutral. It relies on implicit rules, on attention to others, on an invisible social contract. When these rules are neither explained, embodied nor defended, they disappear. And this void is never neutral. It is always filled by dominant external norms: individualism, virilism, performance culture, contempt for care, and an implicit right to take everything without ever looking around.Talking about “bad crowds” is too easy and often lazy. No one is born knowing how to behave on a dancefloor. The real issue is that we collectively stopped transmitting values while simultaneously opening the floodgates to ever larger, more profitable and more visible events, where any form of education becomes impossible. When an event gathers tens of thousands of people, is marketed as a product, and promoted by influencers with discount codes, the message is clear: you are here to consume, not to participate.In this context, the responsibility of promoters and DJs is immense and too often avoided. DJs are not neutral. They choose where they play, for whom, and under what conditions. Promoters are not mere service providers. They shape the crowds they attract. And when part of the techno scene consistently refuses to take a stance against the rise of the far right, under the guise of “neutrality,” “kindness” or “everyone is welcome,” it sends an extremely clear signal.This refusal to name things attracts crowds unfamiliar with PLUR, or who consciously reject it. It normalises the presence of people whose ideologies, behaviours and symbols drive minorities away. It creates spaces where queer, racialised, trans or simply perceived-as-vulnerable people no longer feel safe. This is not abstract. It is lived, body after body, night after night.Saying that “music should remain apolitical” in this context is ignoring the fact that the absence of a stance is already a stance. And it always benefits the same people. A scene that refuses to draw clear lines becomes fertile ground for those who have no respect for others but know exactly how to exploit ambiguity.If we truly want to reduce these drifts, we must also stop pretending that XXL events are compatible with values of care, respect and solidarity. This is not about nostalgia or elitism. It is a structural issue. The bigger an event is, the more individual responsibility dissolves. The more it is promoted as a mass product, the more it attracts people who come for the image, not the culture.Today, when an event is pushed by content creators whose main role is to generate traffic rather than transmit history or values, it is almost always a warning sign. Not because these people are inherently bad, but because flow has never been a tool for transmission. Flow flattens, homogenises, and leaves behind dancefloors where no one looks at each other anymore.Repeating that “it’s not like it used to be” is no longer enough. What is missing is not the past. What is missing is a conscious effort to transmit. Transmission through human-scale collectives, through clearly stated and enforced rules, through trained and visible teams, through DJs who remind us that a dancefloor is not a release valve, but a shared space. Transmission also through the crowd, by making coherent choices, sometimes renouncing big machines, omnipresent headliners, and events that promise everything without ever guaranteeing the minimum.Techno was never “everything for everyone.” It has always been a space with codes, not to exclude, but to protect. Refusing to defend them today means accepting that other logics will take over. Logics of force, domination and pure consumption.Violence on dancefloors is not inevitable. It is the result of very concrete decisions. And those are precisely the decisions the scene must finally be willing to confront.