In today's fragmented social environment, however, there also are certain problems with
this view of various subcultures underneath one central and dominant culture. Gary Clarke
criticises "a level of abstraction which fails to consider subcultural flux and the dynamic
nature of styles; second, and as a result, the theory rests upon the consideration of the rest
of society as being straight, incorporated in a consensus, and willing to scream undividedly
loud in any moral panic" (84). However, as the mainstream gradually vanishes "the absolute
distinction between subcultures and 'straights' is increasingly difficult to maintain: the
current diversity of styles makes a mockery of subcultural analysis as it stands" (G. Clarke
93). Theories of the relation between subcultures and the 'parent' culture may therefore
need adjustment; those on the internal makeup of subcultures still remain valid, though.
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