Like I said, there are no generations. But there are memetic tribes, some of whom do battle. So it occurred to me, as many things often do, that the entire problem between guys like me and guys like SJWs is not generational so much as it is experiential. And of course I'm smarter and wiser, but let's not belabor that point. Let me put the blunt point on it. The problem with today's cutups and rebels are that they are not Punks.
You see I can recall very well what was fascinating about the 1980s. In addition to the fact that we lost our fascination with Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder and Dianna Ross we were beginning to be fascinated by their opposites. This is as any antithesis should be. The result musically was the eventual synthesis as discovered by ATCQ and Soul II Soul, some of the greatest spanning of the period of the 90s to come. But what was the antithesis of the Motown R&B thesis? It was Sid & Nancy. It was Malcolm McLaren. It was Joey Ramone and Billy Idol. It was The Clash. It had something to do with abandoning romance. It had something to do with accepting exile. It had something to do with having absolutely no expectations of society and instead reveling in the satisfaction of the entire punk aesthetic. It was liberation from all convention. It was bad. Not bad meaning good, but bad meaning bad. Punk didn't care about the planet. Hell, punk didn't care about City Hall or even the college Administration Building. And there you have the difference between Punk rebellion and the cringe inducing politically correct temper tantrums we are experiencing today.
Some contingent out there wants Uncle Bernie and Cousin Yang to give us something that assures us that the world is going to be a better place. They are willing to do damage for the domination of their own neo-puritanical worldview. Banish coal. Banish meat. Banish hate speech. Banish patriarchy. Banish. Banish. Bash. It's all BS. They are the new Hollow Men, who accept their prefab imagination as the perfection of innocence in a world far too cruel. And yet what can they create that would stand the test of time like Punk? How can they even stand on their own two feet without arm-twisting some socialistic backsheesh from the polis? They are ready to sacrifice all mankind on a Malthusian alter to Gaia. All they need is their Leviathan. They clearly won't simply accept the Administration Building or City Hall. They want the totality. They want the tide to lift all the lightweight and anchorless above the height of all human skyscrapers. They seem completely incapable of self-improvement.
That kind of attitude of self-denigration might be OK if they were Punks. Punks accepted the dark side of humanity. They lived below it and they were self-contained in their rage. They took their social isolation as a badge of honor and were ready to fight. Not for a cause, but for themselves. There was no ideal. Punks didn't even need to agree with each other. They were individuals to the extreme, even though within their aesthetic you could pick out a Punk from a mile away. They weren't trying to bring about the Apocalypse. They weren't trying to change your mind. They simply dared you to discover and explore the Punk in you. That was something I could respect. In fact, that was something I could mosh to.
It would be a nicer world if today's contingent of unfunky ubervictims could make peace with their inner demons. But I respect enough of the true spirit of the Punk not to expect too much of the world. I just flip them off and go my own way. Speaking of which, would you agree that we have a Punk for President?
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