With their whiter-than-white skin and black eyeliner, these teenagers can intimidate onlookers. Nadine O'Regan mingles with goths to discover what's behind the stereotype

The city of Dublin is awash with colour. Girls walk arm-in-arm, flags draped around their waists, tiny green shamrocks painted onto their cheeks. Toddlers bash each other happily with giant plastic mallets. The St Patrick's Day parade snakes through the streets - and the punters roar their approval.

Then you reach Temple Bar and you wonder if you need to readjust your camera lens. All before you is a sea of swarming black. Scores of ghost-skinned, black eyeliner-wearing teenagers congregate outside the Temple Bar Music Centre. Clearly, as far as they're concerned, St Patrick can rot in his grave.

Every weekend, more and more of them gather here. Now you can hardly walk down Curved Street without tripping over a goth or a metaller. Shoppers are avoiding them. Gardaí are watching them. Even the Coronation Street screenwriters have taken notice of their ilk, turning one of their characters into a crucifix-wearing lover of Cradle of Filth. And, um, the decidedly un-goth band Keane.

The perception of half the city is that these teen and 20-something characters are thugs, out to drink, take drugs, slit their wrists and worship Satan. The other half are just as convinced that they're middle-class youngsters who travel home in their parents' BMWs once they're done hanging out with their friends for the day.

The confusion surrounding the goth movement has been ever thus. Goth culture has its origins in 1970s and 1980s Western Europe and North America. The movement, according to most observers, sprung from a hatred of middle-class materialism, a love of art, literature and music, and a desire to investigate the dark side. These were the characteristics most goths saw in themselves. But they weren't the ones noticed by others. Then, as now, different - and sometimes very negative - theories abounded.

Do they contain any truth? Today, at least, this is the reality. It's 2pm. Lee Byrne, a rangy, bandana-wearing 21-year-old, is arguing with Orla Lavelle (23) over who is the hottest female in the world.

He says Amy Lee, the lead singer of Evanescence. Orla says Dita Von Teese, the fetish performance artist and fiancée of Marilyn Manson. Their gestures as they speak are exaggerated, almost clownish, all finger-jabbing and faux threatening movements.

They look like they're having fun. While they talk, Stephen Roche, aka Rochie (18), all streaming black hair and clothing, lifts up the sleeve of his coat to show me his gauntlet gloves - long leather ones with terrifying-looking buckles and studs.

"The Rochie protection system!" Lee yells. Orla smiles. She has been hanging around by the Central Bank since 1996. She knows everyone and everyone knows her.

Orla's hands are a work of art. Her nails are painted in alternate shades of red and black. The rings she wears on almost every finger are each more striking than the next.

Music has helped Orla through hard times. When she talks about her favourite bands, she lights up.

"Music is my therapy," she says. "If I was depressed I would rather listen to music than have to pump myself full of Prozac."

We're standing by a wall talking when a young girl approaches. She has a ponytail and looks like she just got out of primary school. She wants to know if Orla could buy her some alcohol. "Sorry, sweetie," Orla says, in a regretful tone.

The girl keeps going. She'll find someone soon enough. And soon enough someone will find us.

The scene: another afternoon by the Central Bank. This time, it's cold and windy. Yvette Reid (17), from Cabinteely, is talking about why she doesn't drink alcohol. She'd rather spend her money on other things. And she doesn't want to look stupid. Right now, we're having the kind of conversation any parent would approve of.

Then a guy wearing a faded beige jacket pops up beside us. "Do you want to buy some spliff?" Yvette shoots him a withering look. He scuttles away.

"See?" she says. "Because of the way we look, they think we want to buy it. I can barely walk down the street without having something said, especially where I live. I was called a nigger because I was wearing all-black. You get the usual, 'Hey Avril'. Avril Lavigne. I'm like, 'I don't look anything like her.'" And Yvette most definitely isn't into Lavigne's lightweight music.

Back at the Temple Bar Music Centre, Rochie is attempting to pinpoint the varied musical tastes of the people who hang out by the Central Bank.

"You have your new metallers, metallers, death metallers, black metallers.I'm a black metaller. I'm into everything from classical to the really heavy shit, you know?" I'm guessing classical in this instance doesn't refer to Beethoven? "Classical heavy metal," Rochie grins.

The talk turns to religion. Rochie is a nihilist. Lee announces he's a Wiccan.

"Are you serious?" exclaims Alexia Tolmacheva, a pretty 15-year-old, originally from Russia, who has floated over to join our group. She gives Lee a hug. "I want to be one."

So what does being a Wiccan entail?

Lee, under pressure, looks a little blank.

"You don't believe in one God," supplies Alexia. "You believe in nature."

"It's pretty much about nature," Lee agrees. "Everybody thinks there's a higher power, like God or Satan. I don't believe in that. I just believe there's life in everything." Wiccan is hot, Catholicism not.

Sarah (16), part of another Temple Bar group, shows me the pentangle she wears around her neck. She's interested in the Wiccan religion, but not committed to it. Her group are, on average, younger than Orla's and seem much more naive.

They come from Terenure, Rathfarnham and Ballyroan. Some of them have been drinking naggins of vodka earlier. They are spending their afternoon chatting to friends and drifting in and out of the Blast all-ages gig happening at the Temple Bar Music Centre and featuring alternative acts such as Acidtone, Mute and Aggressive Broccoli.

At the first Blast gig five years ago, there were just 50 teenagers present. Today, around 650 teenagers have streamed through the Temple Bar Music Centre doorway, according to Mark Keegan, a director of the not-for-profit organisation, Blast Youth Trust for Education through Entertainment Ltd, which organises such events in cities outside Dublin too (see panel).

Inside, the music centre looks like a picturesque version of the bowels of hell. Red walls and dead-eyed teens dominate. The bands, meanwhile, rip off the chords of their betters, and howl about the Antichrist. Some of Sarah's group like the Blast gigs because they meet their friends there. Others go for the music. There are also those such as 15-year-old Bob, who, clad in a neat jumper and jeans, doesn't look one bit like a goth or a metaller.

"I don't come for the music," he grins. "I come to meet girls."

"What newspaper is this for?" Sarah asks.

"The Irish Times," I say.

"My parents read that," she laughs. Then a look of alarm crosses her face.

She and her group decide that they don't want their real names used.

What do her parents think of the scene? "They hate it," says Sarah. "They say I'm a disappointment to them."

The middle-class issue is one that keeps cropping up with regard to the Temple Bar scene. The majority of teenagers interviewed go to good schools, have career plans and ambitions. The thinking, therefore, is that they lack authenticity as goths/metallers.

It's an age-old argument and one that is not likely to be resolved any time soon. All the Temple Bar crowd can say is that middle-class or no, this is who they are and where they want to be.

While the notion that they're fakers is bad enough, what they hate even more is the popular conception that they are all suffering from depression.

"It's not a support group for people that are suicidal," Tom, a 15-year-old fan of the Norwegian group Emperor, observes dryly. Rochie wishes someone would explain how they really are to the Coronation Street crew. "They portray goths as people who are always down," he complains. "Some people are depressed, fair enough, but not everyone. Far from it." Speaking of portrayals, they are all a bit worried about whether this article will be negative, and whether there will be implications for them. They love their scene. More than anything, they want to remain part of it.

One 15-year-old girl, who has asked to remain anonymous, explains her feelings towards the Temple Bar milieu this way. "You don't feel like you're out of place," she says simply. "But you don't feel like you're the same as everyone else either." Well, it ain't the Chalet School girls. But it sounds like a recipe for happiness just the same.