“putting out a fire with gasoline”

The expression “putting out a fire with gasoline” is the book’s closing image for the danger of reacting to a movement without first understanding it. In a conclusion originally published in Morgenbladet in 1995, the writer argues that society will need a long time to form a clear view of the movement; an action taken too lightly, rather than containing the danger, may intensify it. The metaphor makes the response itself part of the risk: haste can feed what it is meant to extinguish.

The Image and Its Warning

The phrase compresses the conclusion’s concern into a familiar reversal. Putting out a fire ordinarily means reducing a threat, but gasoline is fuel: the proposed remedy can enlarge the very danger it addresses. The surrounding passage describes a society that has not yet grasped the movement it faces, and cautions against acting as though that understanding already exists. The image is therefore a warning about consequence and judgment, not a claim that every response will necessarily make matters worse.

The book’s wording also gives the warning an unsettled timescale. The movement, the conclusion says, will take a long time to understand clearly; meanwhile, a “lightly considered” action could have an effect opposite to its intended one. The metaphor turns that gap between incomplete understanding and consequential action into a concrete danger: fuel is added before the fire has been properly assessed.

The Scene Around the Metaphor

The earlier account shows a scene taking shape around Øystein Aarseth’s practical efforts as well as its music. After Dead’s departure from Mayhem, Aarseth continued trying to consolidate the extreme underground in Norway. He re-established Deathlike Silence Productions, released an LP by Merciless, hoped to reissue Deathcrush, and recognized that less uncompromising releases might be needed to finance those projects. His stated hostility to trend-followers sat beside the commercial calculation that their money could help sustain the label and scene.

Aarseth then rented a space in Oslo for Helvete record shop. Though it had to sell less extreme music to meet its expenses, its orientation was Black Metal. The shop became a focal point for people around the emerging scene, even though it did not make much money. The account describes its atmosphere as demanding: visitors sought acceptance, trust mattered, and people were deferential toward Aarseth and the older figures around him. Ihsahn recalled a powerful environment in which some visitors wore corpse paint during the daytime, even while going shopping.

By mid-1991, Darkthrone, Burzum, Immortal, Thorns, Enslaved, Arcturus, and later Emperor were in contact with Aarseth, who planned to release many of them through Deathlike Silence Productions. Aarseth later used the name Norwegian Black Circle when speaking to the press about the church burnings. Yet the account also stresses that this was not a formally constituted organization: the name referred to people who spent time around the shop, with no membership cards, official meetings, or defined membership. People knew whom they could approach for particular abilities and might ask them to get involved.

Attention, Action, and Changing Associations

The evidence presents attention as one pressure within the scene, without reducing its participants’ motivations to a single cause. Bård Eithun recalled that many welcomed the attention and that some, after receiving it, wanted to go further and do more. He also described people drawn by the music and by Black Metal’s opposition to Christianity and organized religion, convictions they took seriously. The combination of a focal meeting place, personal trust, shared beliefs, and heightened attention helps explain how activity could gather around a scene without the formal structure implied by the name Norwegian Black Circle.

The book later marks a change in how the relationship between Black Metal figures and extremist politics appeared. Up until 1997, it says, the connection between figures such as Varg Vikernes and extremist political movements seemed to consist mainly of shared slogans and symbols. By 1997, the author judged that this had changed: Vikernes was described not only as a driving inspiration behind the rise of church burning, but also as a source of motivation for members of the revolutionary right. This later assessment gives the 1995 warning added resonance, while remaining distinct from it: the conclusion’s metaphor cautions against careless action, whereas the later passage describes a perceived development in the movement’s political associations.

The Expression’s Place in the Book

The phrase does not name a specific incident or prescribe a particular intervention. It closes an argument about the difficulty of recognizing a movement clearly and the danger of responding prematurely. Set beside the earlier account of Helvete’s informal influence and the later account of changing political connections, the image holds two ideas together: a scene may be difficult to define even as its effects become consequential, and a response shaped by incomplete understanding may compound the problem. Its force lies in that caution, not in treating the metaphor as proof of a single inevitable outcome.