As every year, the Balance Festival counters the unsavory nonsense of “Männertag” (Men’s day) with a discourse programme to argue for the abolition of this celebration of patriarchy. 

Club culture, like any other form of society, is only ever a reflection of the society in which it exists and can never be a complete alternative: every rave is capitalistic, every cultural production can become a commodity and every output economically exploitable.  In moments of crisis, it becomes clearer than ever how much capitalist logics determine our society — and how important solidarity care practices, tender squads and radical alliances are. And yet it is precisely in this moment that we need escapism, collectivity and utopia for testing, learning and strengthening ideals of a better society. So how can club culture be revolutionary? How can we address the tension between radical imaginations of subculture and the economic dependency on institutional frameworks? And how do we manage to be there for each other, with each other and together, even in times of crisis? During our theme day “RAVE CAPITALISM” we we want to explore these questions and explore different forms and scales of lived alliances: ranging from the personal associations addressed in the podcast/workshop with the Feminist Health Research Group on the topic “Being in Crisis Together” to the institutional conditions elaborated on by the text of Kordula Kunert “Not my institution? Potentials and problems of institutional alliances in club culture” and, of course, the artistic and musical contributions.