Is anyone familiar with the so-called "straight-edge" lifestyle?

I have heard that Henry Rollins is a practitioner of this. My understanding is that these are punk-rock types who advocate "clean" living: no drugs, no alcohol, no tobacco, and eating as healthy as possible. Am I off base with this characterization?

used to go to Straight-edge hardcore shows in the late 80's...I hate to step on toes, but you also forgot being as irritatingly self-righteous as possible(Youth of Today is a perfect example). :evilgrin:

I'd heard about some of these people beating up on stoners and others whom they look down upon, simply because they don't "live clean."

As self-righteousness goes, Fugazi were WAY worse. And this is coming from someone who was an enormous fan of that band all throughout the late '80s and early '90s.

(Then again, I never actually saw YOT live. Maybe they WERE that self-righteous live?)

And it's nice to meet a fellow aging punk fan, especially one who also remembers Youth of Today!

:toast:

Both in their music and their dogma. The only thing I liked by them was fittingly enough their final single (Disengage).

I never thought Fugazi was dogmatic. I just thought they attracted a lot of people who tried really hard to piss them off, and then got mad at them when they took the bait.

I remember Ray Cappo was voted Asshole of the Year in Flipside back in '89, narrowly edging out G.G. Allin! Damn I feel old!

Suicidal Tendencies was voted best and worst band of the year in Flipside.

Haha...just kidding. I just always feel very old, especially since I still keep up with and pay attention to this stuff somewhat. Which at age 34 is fairly sad.

You either loved them or hated them.

BTW: Didn't Robert Trujillo, Metallica's current bassist, come from this group?

Early on in the 80's they were more of a hardcore punk act. Then they got caught up in the metal crossover thing, which is the era that Trujillo is from. I think he was always more of a hired gun both for them and for Ozzy, who he also played with.

In 2004 we will find NO shortage of candidates, of course -- and not just musically, either. :)

that's basically it. Plus they put little 'X's' on their hands to let everyone know they're straight-edge cool!

with O's written on our hands, got them a bit pissed off!

that's awesome!

:D

I had a student who'd written about her brother's being involved with the straight-edges.

... but I never heard him give it a name.

Minor Threat was a hardcore punk band in the early 80's who had a song called straight edge, about escewing the drugs, alcohol, and sex fueled lifestyle of rock in favor of thinking straight and making a change.

Various other groups adopted this lifestyle but in the late 80's it hit a peak with bands like Youth of Today and Gorilla biscuits, etc. who took it to a militant level.

It also eventually expanded out to included ideas like vegetarianism, etc. It became really self righteous and almost militaristic in it's belief and dogma, much removed from it's original intent.

Henry was never really part of the straight edge scene, but he was always clean living and sympathetic towards the ideals.

but he does live a very disciplined lifestyle. I think he did dabble in some drugs back in his Black Flag days, but he despised the fact that Greg Ginn was a big-time pothead.

ancient history.

claim some specialness because they do as well? Give me a break.

The cats are adorable -- and a RIOT! Peace.

:hi:

:hi:

On the "Women" page -- the red shirt & leather hat -- that's me, Bertha. Mrs. V. is on DU, too; she's "kpharmer."

:bounce:

n/t

Then again, I'm surprised that TRUE hardcore punk is still around at all. I thought it was all replaced by that god-awful cheezeball SoCal skatepunk crap that Bad Religion wreaked on us and which was popularized by NOFX in the early '90s, consisting of schlocky sub-Bon-Jovi pop metal tunes over tedious, by-the-numbers thrash.

(The Offspring also came from that scene, but the particular songs that made them popular among the public -- "Come Out And Play" for example -- were more straight rock and not as much in that cheeseball pop-thrash vein.)

boooooooor - ing!

Skin heads showed up in the punk scene and all they wanted to do was fight. Any excuse. Thus the first wave of skinheads were racist homophobic thugs. The next wave were the antiracists. They would stomp all over the racist skinheads. The cycle continued until you got Henry Rollis variety that mandated that everyone must live clean or get thumped.

Good God!!! I agree that clean living is probably good for you, but these kids all wore the same outfit, and were more self righteous than I could stand...and the music sucked!!! (Other than Minor Threat...the Revelation label stuff was the pits...sorry!!!)

I was NOT straight edge myself during this time, and got so tired of the little robots coming in buying their new Revelation single that I would purposely throw on the heaviest psychedelic stuff I could find while they were in the store (i.e. Spacemen 3 "Suicide", Throbbing Gristle, and other stuff just to drive them nuts).

Tough movement for me personally :)

BTW: the store was called "Vinyl Ink" in Silver Spring, MD, and was the coolest record store EVER!!! (George, the owner, passed away two years ago, and I still miss him terribly).

With derision.

Was it because they considered their lifestyle THE CHOICE OF A NEW GENERATION?

There was a bunch of Pepsi Commercials in the late 70s that basically went:

"Join the Pepsi People, Feelin' Free, Feelin' Free" La La La

You may look like a Punk and act like a Punk, but straight edgers weren't Punks

"All across the na-tion/it's the Pep-si Gene-ration/here to-day/here to-day...." Something like that.:)

Dabbled with that - but he found them too dogmatic. Told me about the beating up of stoners etc.
He subscribes to their belief. He's a musician and writer and he figures it's much more an achievement to create without the use of any alcohol/drugs.
He points to Joyce, Hemmingway, Mailer, Steinbeck and so on.
Says they 'cheated' :) Ulysses is alcoholic ravings according to him.

PS I'm an alcoholic - maybe that had something to do with it. ;)

It sounds as though something positive turned sour because these folks could just accept this lifestyle for themselves, and maybe promote it in a non-violent and positive way.

Too bad really. You'd think "clean living" wouldn't need defending, but when people get extreme about things, bad things always happen.

You will find that a lot of the post skinhead punks were in it to justify their anger at something in the world. Like early neocons they were angry at a society that did not condone their acting on anger. So they rebelled. At first the skinheads would target anything that got a rise. But then new skinheads showed up that targetted racist skinheads. The focus was on being angry at someone.

The straightedges were simply pissed at those that they thought couldn't deal with reality. Stoners and others. So they went to the opposite extreme and used that to justify their anger towards them.

That seems to be the operative word, the driving force. I am not an expert/scholar on punk and its off-shoots, but from what little I know about the culture, it seems to me that this is what fuels the music, the look, the lifestyle, the scene. I wonder, though, how much of that anger is real -- and there was and is A LOT to be pissed off about -- and how much of it is all an act.

Please understand that I am not knocking or damning anyone here, because I am aware that quite a few of punk's best have emerged as articulate and effective spokespersons and activists for various causes over the years.

When I found myself drawn into the punk scene it was in part about anger. A sort of reaction to the oppression of society. The sameness mandated on everyone. But in the punk scene we found an outlet for that stress. The music gave voice to our rejection of society. And for most creating our own society was enough.

But for some it wasn't. The societies comformity had to edges to it. The early punks were angry at the loss of identity but embraced the inclusiveness. There were those that rejected not only the sameness of society but also the idea of tolerance. They were angry that their intolerance was not acceptable. And they saw the punks as a model to base themself on. At least in giving voice to anger.

of what happened with the group Green Day when it was starting to move from the underground to the mainstream. (I was never a fan, though.) Green Day was practically driven from their local punk scene because the scene's so-called "gate-keepers" thought their music was not "punk" enough. (Billy Joe Armstrong's response, in so many words: "So what? We do what we want to do.")

So much for tolerance when it comes to artistic difference/freedom. Punks champion resistance to conformity -- that which is imposed on people by mainstream society. Yet once their ideal community is in place, they heap scorn upon those who do not conform to its mores and expectations (e.g.: Green Day.). You become what you most despise in trying to maintain a sense of order, control, and stability. And that goes for ANY group, mainstream or outlaw.

violent flaming asshole!

They're just conformos of a different feather, who exalt whichever lifestyle choices/fundamental belief systems they adhere to in order to convince themselves that they're better than others to assuage their underlying insecurities and fears. Its a seemingly intrinsic human characteristic that makes us distrust our neighbors and fight amongst ourselves instead of uniting to confront the real evil of people like George Bush and his legion of corporate jackals.