Around 2003 through 2005, the "urban exploration trend" gained great momentum, fueled by online forums which allowed enthusiasts to meet on the internet, post photographs & share stories. The concept transformed from digital to material as explorers met in person & began to amass, creating "urban exploration groups". These groups adopted monikers such as "DegGi5", "Fallout UE", etc. Some explorers chose to remain autonymous while many others were inevitably drawn into the social web.
Insane asylums, prisons, & other such institutions were (&, in many cases, still are) places of unimaginable torment & melancholy. Fear, anxiety, hopelessness, & despair are too overwhelming for the inmate or patient to suppress, let alone conquer. Urban explorer groups are unanimously composed of socially privileged individuals who have never experienced incarceration & the infliction of grave suffering that comes with it. From a mix of innocence & ignorance came a severely irreverent attitude, promoted by several UE groups & advertized to a large, captivated audience. Thus, this attitude became the flavor of the day.
At least once a year, large groups of people convene at selected abandoned locations to mingle, make social connections, & trade information. Exploration groups coalesce at these soirees & reconvene with the purpose of infiltrating more locations. Exploration groups, ranging from 3 to 10 people on average (sometimes more) flood into locations without regard for secrecy, causing security to patrol more frequently, secure structures more tightly, & strip buildings of their contents to take away initiative. Certain self-centered explorers prefer this outcome, assuring that they are the only ones who possess photographs of certain rooms, objects, & locations.
A great deal of explorers verbally condemn vandalism & overt behavior, yet still consort with those who vandalize & provide location information to all the wrong people. Whether or not these individuals are directly responsible for vandalism or other indiscretions is of no value once the individual shows support for, or claims allegience to, a group that exercises these actions. Many who claim absolution from such activities turn a blind eye to the actions of disrespectful associates, choosing instead to be passive in the face of their supposed ethics.
The hunger for knowledge of the ommitted & forgotten annals of history have lost precidence to the hunger for attention & status in a superficial world that exists mostly on the internet. Education has taken a back seat to entertainment. Those who claim to have a conscience concerning past atrocities nullify their ideals by shamelessly promoting themselves as dark eccentrics. The drive to expose & confront atrocities of the past has become masturbatory, fraught with ulterior motives of recognition, popularity, & a superficial sense of comraderie. In the words of the infamous UE offender & scapegoat, Avatar X:
"The concept was simple. Create a messageboard and custom software package catered towards the needs of explorers. A place to put photos, stories, and other information. A place to discuss things globally. A place where regional discussions could occur. A place where exploration groups could have private discussions without being disconnected from the community at large. Furthermore, to help build the community, things like profiles and journals, which allow members to express themselves."
Unofficial UE celebrities have attempted to project a name, face, & general attitude upon the exploration of abandoned buildings & pose as "UE" poster children, forming elitist cliques through forum-based cyber-campaigns. Members of said cliques post voluminous amounts of photography under one's individual &/or UE group name on the internet & deluge online forums with threads & posts, dominating online search engines as a result.
It is time for those of an empathic nature, with honorable intentions, to stand alone & cease to encourage such childish behavior. It is time for individuals to pursue more meaningful channels as independent entities who operate outside of the meaningless, empty, juvenile construct of "UE". Leave the funhouse to the clowns & stand firm in the strength of independence.
