As I'm often quite interested in other cultures, I was wondering, are there any other subsim members that are or have been part of a distinct subculture?
If so, please define that culture. I don't really mean the clothing and looks and such, but more the underlying thoughts, behavourial rules, values etc. of that culture. In other words, the things you can't really see at first glance. The little facts that might surprise an outsider. The things that are likely the reason why you are a member of this culture.
I'll start of as a member of the local metal community:
Name of subculture: Metalhead
Music: metal. Almost all metalheads also listen to other kinds of rock though, ranging from hardcore punk to 60's psychedelic rock to the beatles. Extensive knowledge of the history of rock and metal is held in high regard.
Metal lyrics are often sad and highly romantic, or instead very heroic. They often show a deep interest in our ancestors' cultures and history, most clearly seen in Folk and Viking Metal.
Looks (males): Black bandshirt, black or blue jeans. Often wearing leather jackets, also common are zipped black hoodies with a band logo (though barely worn with the hood on). Sometimes wearing leather bracebands, occasionally with studs or spikes.
We often wear our hair long. Beards are very common.
Pictures of metalheads wearing face paint ("corpsepaint") are well known, though in fact corpsepaint is barely used, and almost exclusively by members of the Black Metal subculture.
Looks (females): Dressing rules for female metalheads are much less strict. Clothing can range from the stereotypical (male) metalhead clothing to dresses bordering on the goth culture, to flowery colourful shirts to a plain shirt with a zipped hoodie. Hair is once again worn long.
For some reason I can usually easily recognise female metalheads, even though they lack a common easily recognisable factor. I suspect it has something to do with both their clothing and behaviour lacking the whorish, overly sexified looks of mainstream girls (or occasionally being extremely sexy, but in a totally different way).
Behaviour: To the outside we try to look tough and masculine, much like the bikers of whom we inherited some of our culture.
To the inside, we're in some ways still much like the hippies we and our music descend from. We drink loads of beer and usually smoke drugs like weed or hash. Under our shield to the outside world, we're all kind and unagressive people. If another (befriended) metalhead gets into any kind of trouble, we see it as almost an obligation to help him out. I guess that's one of the advantages of belonging to a more or less secluded society, there's lots of comradeship.
Other subcultures are often frowned upon. Some, like goths or punks, are accepted, while others like hiphop are blatantly despised.
There's still some masculinity and looking-tough within our culture, and funnily enough the women have copied some of that (I guess they more or less have to in a male-dominated culture). For example, 3 female metalhead friends of mine are extensive gamers. And 4 out of the 7 women in the first 3 years of my study, one of the studies with the lowest male-female ratio, listen to metal.
Composition: Mostly caucasian males ages 16-30. I guesstimate the male-female ratio about 4 males to 1 female. Non-caucasian metalheads are not completely nonexistent although extremely rare.
