Unofficial Burning Man revellers set effigy ablaze in SF

The gathering, which was listed on a Facebook event page as “Burning a Man in SF,” took place Saturday night at San Francisco’s Ocean Beach. At its peak, more than a hundred revelers formed a loose ring around one of the beach’s concrete fire pits, watching as the flames swallowed a wooden effigy (aka The Man), inch by inch. From a dark corner, a speaker pumped out house music. Some stepped into the circle and twirled light-up batons. Others stood back and drank beers. One especially resourceful group set up a grill and cooked steaks.

“Burn firewood only,” the side of the firepit read.

Many attendees were Burners or former Burners, who for one reason or another decided to stay in the Bay this year. Some brought their children, who put on glowstick necklaces and chased each other around. 

The Facebook event page was posted by a 49-year-old Berkeley meditation teacher and leadership educator who goes by the “stage name” Mae Cee, who also built the Man. (Cee was granted anonymity according to SFGATE’s ethics policy.)  

Cee told me that they believe that people go to Burning Man because they experience “something transformative” — the same thing that “deep meditators” and “people on mushrooms” experience. They call it “pure consciousness experience.” 

“You can have that anywhere,” they told me. People think they have to purchase a $700 ticket and travel hundreds of miles, they said, “but that’s an illusion.” 

People come to Ocean Beach every year to Burn, Cee said, although most of the informal Burns are small and go unnoticed. The most famous of these occurred in 2020, when more than a thousand gathered to celebrate the 34th anniversary of the event. The celebration, which occurred at the pandemic’s early stages, drew criticism from Mayor London Breed, who called the event “reckless and selfish.” She shut down nearby parking lots for the remainder of the weekend to prevent further gatherings.

When I arrived at the beach, I had trouble spotting “Burning a Man.” At 6 p.m., this stretch of Ocean Beach was dotted with tents, picnic blankets, and volleyball games.  I saw furry jackets and fingerless gloves here and there, but it was hard to figure out where the Playa began and the default world ended. 

The crowd began circling the firepit as the sun set, as a group of volunteers planted the man into the firepit and stuffed its recesses with kindling.

At 7:46 p.m., Cee stepped into the circle and held up a blowtorch, to cheers from the crowd. They set the man ablaze, starting at its base. Some children chanted, “Fire! Fire! Fire!”

As the Man burned, a woman stepped into the circle and planted a sign on a wooden stake into the sand. “Now,” it read. A father and his child, both wearing leather jackets and motorcycle pants, danced around the fire with maracas.

At 8:01, the Man toppled, sending a spray of embers into the air. 

It’s hard not to wonder if “Burning a Man,” in its DIY, trademark-dodging glory, channels the original spirit of Burning Man. The event started out as a beach gathering in the 1980s — only a few miles away from the site of “Burning a Man,” at Baker Beach. Like the original Burns, “Burning a Man” is unofficial, unauthorized, and unregulated. 

In the future, “these regional burns will take over,” said Marshall Smith, 77, a retired city employee living in Russian Hill. “I think the whole thing in Nevada’s getting unsustainable, so you’ll see more of this going on all over the place.”

He and Priscilla Weiler, 76, went to their first Burns in 2001 and returned for many years after. Before that, they went to some of the early Burns at Baker Beach and were acquaintances of Larry Harvey, co-founder of the event, “a little bit.”

I asked them how the event stacked up to the early Burns at Baker Beach. It’s much the same, they both said.

The pair opted not to go to Black Rock City this year for several reasons.

“I’ve done it 15 or 18 times, I’m done with it,” Smith explained. “After it got totally commodified, and you know…” 

“We’re aged out — I’m aged out,” Weiler added. “I’ve been 16 times and I had a wonderful time.”

After the Man had burned away, the children rushed in with sticks and marshmallows.

“This is the Burn,” Cee told me. “It may not be trademark Burning Man, but we are that experience.”