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I don’t want to hear it about trust-fund hippie kids. Yeah, it is infuriating that they can use the safety of their middle class lives to tell themselves they are adventuresome. If they’re sanctimonious on top of that, that’s really frustrating. BUT. Think of it this way. This is what people do when they know they are safe. These kids have felt safe their entire lives and trust the world, and what do they do with that? They choose a lifestyle of openness and gentleness, of connectivity and consciousness. When you know your whole life that you can have what you want, what they want is to be in a tribe and care about nature and spirituality. (Maybe they care about nature and spirituality in an easily accessible way, but as far as cheap philosophies go, it is a kind one.) This is also what impresses me about Burning Man. When privileged people have everything they want, the next thing they want to do is build amazing things for other people (and celebrate and be nude and beautiful). People who have never been scared don’t want dominion. They want expressiveness and connection.