That stark number set off a chain reaction among local government and law enforcement officials. The Bureau of Land Management doubled the number of rangers sent to police the following year's event. Although, according to the BLM, there had been four arrests in 1999 for felonies involving drug trafficking, the agency has no record of any citations for minor drug-related offenses. The following year, however, there were more than 50 drug-related citations. K-9 units were brought in, and law enforcement ATVs trolled Black Rock City's streets in strings. The event's atmosphere became oppressive.
"Was it a result of that article? I'm sure of it," says County Commissioner Bond. "We don't want it to be a drug event, and it was an attempt to send a message."
Burning Man founder Larry Harvey.
Burning Man founder Larry Harvey.
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As it turns out (to the Burning Man organization's frustration and chagrin), the article at the heart of the backlash was erroneous. McHardy says he got the "80 to 90" number from the Regional Emergency Medical Services Authority, a Reno-based group hired by Burning Man to provide medical services at the event. But REMSA says that was a misunderstanding.
"That [80 to 90] was the total number of people we see in a day," says Alan Dobrowolski, the group's clinical director. Dobrowolski worked the event in 1999, and says that the majority of medical cases involved dehydration, cuts, and scrapes; few were in any way drug-related.
It is exactly the kind of public misperception created by an inaccurate and simplistic wire report that Burning Man's organizers seek to avoid via hard-edged media relations tactics -- and simple repetition. "Burning Man is a celebration of self-expression," says Goodell. "It's not a giant party."
This assertion is, of course, classic spin control in action; anybody who's listened to Kool & the Gang knows that a celebration and a party are basically the same thing. But failing to at least attempt to control the spin on an event as large and unorthodox as Burning Man could be downright self-destructive.
At first glance, Burning Man's media policies may seem draconian. In the abstract, it is easy to hold that Burning Man intrudes too far on journalists' right to report the news, and on documentary-makers' ability to express themselves through their art. But when you remove Burning Man from the world of abstraction, and look at it in the context of the real world and real-world media practices, you can see that the event's press-relations strategy is necessary for survival. Without spin control, Burning Man could spin right out of the organizers' hands into an environment controlled by people who fear, suspect, or simply dislike the event's essential messiness, and its aims.
Former Nightline correspondent Tom Foreman says he thinks the event really is a target for some people. "What's that old saying?" jokes Foreman. "'It's hard not to be paranoid when everyone's out to get you?"'
