BNS 2: Running Amok
- Sister Sanguinista
- May 30, 2019
- 7 min read
Updated: Jun 2, 2019
A ball is only what you make it.
Why do people go to a B&S?
Running amok
What people don’t go for?
Ball future = B&S goers behaviour + B&S liability insurance
Country BNS vs City bogan
Why do people go to B&S’s?
A ball is only what you make it. A few people go in the hope of finding love, heaps go in search of a root, but many just go to hang out with mates, and some just to get drunk. But all go to have fun. Some revellers go to connect with mates they made through other balls. While others are regular ball goers who have been to every ball in the state and over the border too, and are part of a B&S community. People also go to compare rigs—vehicles and bodies alike—and use their rigs to show off and play up. But more on that later.
People go to compare rigs—vehicles and bodies alike
Running Amok
Probably one of the biggest draw cards, is running amok—but in a country larakin way, not a fight-picking, city-bogan, hurtful way. People go to relax society’s expectations of adult behaviour and enjoy being loud, talking shit, swearing, playing around and not having to be completely dressed. Although most sheilas don’t want to give it away for free, so they leave it up to the blokes to be the naked ones or wear the mankinis in the carpark. If the blokes tried it in the ball they’d be kicked out.
What people don’t go for?
People don’t go to pick fights, brawls, be sexually harassed or assaulted or commit those acts. People go to run amok as country larakins, not to take it as a free for all and excuse to act like an obnoxious dickhead by finding excuses to insult people, pick fights, cause brawls, or assault people by groping them or being a rapist.
Ball future = B&S goers behaviour + B&S liability insurance
Half the fun of the B&S is the freedom to choose your own campsite, save space for mates, get loud, swear, and run amok with new friends at an adult event. But gone are the days of the wild BnS’s of circlework and burnouts, most of it has been stamped out by hoon laws. For every twenty people who could do a hoop, or burnout, there was one who hurt someone and fucked up it for everyone else—so no more hoops.
And unfortunately, more often than not, it only takes one dickhead to fuck it up for everyone else, so the point is: go have fun, run amok, but don’t hurt anyone or do anything that will stop the ball from getting public liability insurance or council approval, because they can’t run without it. And every shitty incident tightens up the rules more and more, making it less fun and free.
One example is how for every one who used to bring an old couch to sit on, some lazy arse set theirs on fire, because they were too lazy to take it home again, which created a tradition for dickheads who were too lazy to take their couches home. It actual just dumps extra work on the volunteers who have to clean it up—volunteers who have spent months organising the ball and then running it, and still have to clean up after it. So on that note, use the bloody garbage bags they give you on entry, you muppets. Or whatever bags or slab boxes you brought yourself. You will cut the volunteers work down, because then all they have to do is drop the bags in the bins instead of picking up every individual bottle and can that you and other muppets chucked around.
The result of leaving burnt couches is that it adds to the tip fees, cutting into the ball profits that would have gone back into the community. One couch may seem like nothing, but if other people are doing it, or dumping other shit, it all adds up.
It also provokes some balls to ban them. So if you are taking a couch to a ball that allows it, make sure you take your couch home again. If you really don't want it, you can always stick it on your nature strip for someone to rehome, or just take it to the tip yourself—don't be a lazy tight arse.
Worse than burning couches, is bringing cars to smash up and even set on fire, and dump for the volunteers to get rid of. It's pretty rare, but I know of two incidents in which it has occurred, and really it just a cunt act.
As well as cutting into community fund raising profits by upping the tip fees, you are adding to the tow truck fees. And you've made a hell of lot more more mess for the volunteers. Maybe they'll get sick of it and stop volunteering, maybe without the volunteer numbers the ball will get axed? But hopefully it will just be the careener getting a visit from the coppers because they tracked them with the vin number.
The balls are held on showgrounds, farmers paddocks and footy ovals, where people walk, play sport, hold pony clubs and animals eat etc. So no one will thank you for the smashed glass. So pull your head in. Again, the more shit like this happens the harder it is to get liability insurance. So don't be a muppet.
Sometimes restrictions occur from unrelated events. One ball now keeps the vehicles and campsites separated by dirt mounds and wooden poles. Nothing happened in that ball, but an incident occurred in an unrelated private event in the same shire, where a drunk ran over a person in their tent and killed them. The ball I am talking about still lets people pick their own car parks and campsites, but the freedom of being able to camp between vehicles and hang tarps off them for shade etc is gone. That ball is still a pretty relaxed and fun ball however.
Country BNS vs City Bogan
The further a ball is from the city the freer they tend to be. It takes longer to get to, so it is mainly the locals, and those dedicated enough to put the miles in to get there. Creating a mostly practical country crowd, rather than a more uptight crowd of the more guarded city brethren who live in a constant rat race, social competition. So things are pretty relaxed. There is also a little more chance to get away with some of the stuff of the old wilder balls, despite the rules of no circlework etc.
So if you do go to one of those balls and decide to do some hoops, just make sure you don't hurt anyone, because if you do, you will fuck it for everyone else, as you will be forcing the committees to crack down on the rules. Also, you will lose your car and licence under the hoon laws. And good luck getting home, if you were one of the dedicated ball goers who travelled miles to get there.
In contrast, the balls that are closer to the city tends to be stricter and more uptight. City security are used to city crowds whose sense of accountability is diluted by the anonymity of being in a large population. There are more of the type of people who think they can get away with shitty behaviour because nobody knows them, whereas if if you lived in Dingy, and Old Mavis saw you playing up, she'd go and tell your parents. Also the city population is used to being in a concentrated social rat-race competition and have far more interactions with strangers, so they tend to be more defensive, need sharper social wits, and do not have the same trust or sense of community as that of country people. The city security firms are also more likely to come in contact with violent hoodlums as well, so they aren't about to trust a crowd to get loud and play around and not break out into fights.
The other issue with a ball close to the city, is going to a BNS suddenly gets put in the head of city bogans, who think a BNS is a free for all to pick fights, behave like arseholes and find easy roots from dumb hicks. Now I'm not talking about the city people who go to the balls knowing the difference between running amok as a country larakin and just being an obnoxious twat. I'm talking about city bogans who are just looking for trouble. They bring their sense of superiority and prejudices of country people being unsophisticated rednecks. They don't understand (or don't care) that when a country bloke yells out some lewd come-on to a passing sheila at a BNS it's in fun and not a blatant show of disrespect or misogyny. And that the sheila will either ignore it, laugh it off or go have a chat, knowing that the bloke was doing a half-arsed attempt to break the ice, make people laugh or lay some ground work to possibly hook-up later. Hell, the sheilas also do the yells outs as well.
The city bogans aren't necessarily used to the blunt forthright nature of country people and will take the bloke/sheila's come-on as offensive and a reason to pick a fight, or if they try it, they will take a rejection as a challenge to their weak sense of masculinity and get nasty. Another example is that rather than just being two blokes being shoved into each other on a crowded dance floor, which could be diffused with a few words before moving on, the city bogans will take it as an excuse to pick a fight. Most balls don't have that many fights for the amount of alcohol and number of people around, but the closer the ball is to the city the more fights and even brawls seem to happen. And feel a little more hostile in their atmosphere.
So if you are a city bogan you should know a few things:
The ball goers won't necessarily be in awe that you are from the city.
Even if the sheilas are looking for a root, it doesn't mean they have to root you. They are people, not sperm receptacles.
If you can't go there without picking fights, you don't get it, probably have major insecurity issues and should stay at home and save your money for therapy.
Next: BNS 3: History
Back to BNS 1:What is it or BNS index
Comments