Walking on the Edge

Reflections on the Straight Edge music subculture circa 2005, community-building, third- spaces, protest, tangible media, and human belonging

Photo by Evgeniy Smersh on Unsplash

Destroy the machines that kill the forests, that disfigure the earth.
Ecotage when efforts to reason fail and no longer have worth.
Direct action is the only choice when wild lands are faced with destruction. Now is the time for counter-aggression. With every day that passes the assault
on nature accelerates. For the industrial nations' excessive ways this world they devastate. - Earth Crisis (1996)

I have found myself in a moment of time that feels like we are on the edge of a significant change. My current world is a space where everything feels inauthentic. Everyone is racing to get the news first and it feels repetitive; disinformation spreads like wildfire, and the world seems out of control. This is a moment that comes after the 2024 election and after the fires in LA (close enough to me to know people affected), and it is the community and the real people who have come together to be a force for good post-fire. This is authenticity, and this is real power.

It feels like the media ecosystem is writing about and rehashing the same ideas online over and over, so I want to explore something new, fresh, and different.

I read through my Master’s thesis on the Straight Edge Subculture from 2005, and it got me thinking about some things. I also feel like more people deserve to read this.

Part One - Introduction

It was a chilly night outside in Corona, California, in 2005, but inside the small concert venue, it was as hot and muggy as a sauna. The room heated up as the crowd started moshing to the loud, metallic music blared by the bands. The small nightclub for all ages was called the Showcase Theatre.

It had just gotten dark outside, and several Straight Edge bands were playing at the club that night. Cars pulled up by the dozens, and a large line formed outside the tiny brick building. Most of the young people arriving were dressed in black T-shirts and jeans.

The concertgoers had black fingernails painted and large Xs written in black permanent markers across the tops of their hands. Their T-shirts were tight-fitting and a little ragged, with band logos screen-printed across the front. There was a buzz of excitement outside as the band noise rattled out the front door during sound check. The doors opened, and the Straight Edgers shuffled inside, anxiously awaiting the show's start. Five bands played that night.

Straight Edge bands played at the Showcase Theatre almost every weekend. These bands traveled across the country on tours and stopped in small all-ages night clubs, like this one, to play for their underground fans. It seems that almost everyone knew each other here. The scene was very close-knit, and many of the same kids came out night after night to see the same bands.

The majority of the T-shirts worn in the crowd were of Straight Edge band favorites like Bleeding Through, Eighteen Visions, and Atreyu. New Straight Edge bands cropped up daily in garages across Southern California, hoping to open and play on one of the bills with their favorite bands.

Hundreds of people were gathered inside the club in front of the tiny stage. Although the stage was small, it was full of musical equipment. There were several disheveled-looking amps, microphones, and a drum kit on the stage. People gathered around and anxiously awaited the impending performance. The majority of these individuals did not stand out in any offensive way. However, both men and women sported the same short hairstyle with long bangs and black eyeliner.

When the music began, a powerful sense of congruence erupted throughout the room, creating a sense of chaos. The music was loud, hard, and fast. It was not anything you would ever hear on the radio. People slammed into each other on the dance floor to form a “mosh pit.” They forcibly pushed and shoved each other in and out of the circle while intentionally ramming into each other while singing along with the band.

Those in the front row climbed onto the stage and jumped back into the crowd. The audience ebbed, swelled, and caught the stage divers as they “floated” back and forth across the top of the crowd. Also, arms were waving in the front row, and the crowd chanted the lyrics along with the band, echoing each word with violent emphasis and fists pumping.

(*In 2005, there were no phones in sight recording anything. Everyone is watching the show LIVE and PRESENT.)

The History of Punk Rock

It is impossible to explain the phenomenon of the Straight Edge movement without first addressing where it came from. Straight Edge is a subculture of teenagers, most of who claim to abstain from alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, and promiscuous sexual activity. According to Wood (2001), many contemporary Straight Edgers also incorporated animal rights issues such as veganism and vegetarianism into their philosophy and lifestyle. Straight Edge began as an offshoot or sub-creation of punk rock.

In the beginning, the primary goal of the punk rock movement was to express rage against the establishment harshly and originally. According to O’Hara (1999), many punk bands built their platforms or messages around the advocacy and admittance of non-conformity. Punks question conformity by looking and sounding different and questioning the prevailing modes of thought. Punks also have a blatant distaste for corporate culture and for “mainstream” thought.

I will use several terms and take the opportunity to explain them right now. A “show” is what Punks and Straight-Edgers call a concert. It differs from the average music concert because the boundaries between the audience and the performer are not as distinct as within a concert. This new term helps distinguish between the two events. The word “scene” describes the Punk or Straight-Edge community. There are local, national, and worldwide scenes.

To understand the Straight Edge movement, one must understand that its roots are planted in Punk Rock. Punk Rock began in Britain as a group of underprivileged working-class white youths. Many deeply felt their social situation and used Punk Rock as a medium to express dissatisfaction (O’Hara, 1995). The original Punks began to express their rage and frustration harshly and unusually through loud and rebellious music. The most hated thing in the world to a Punk is a conformist. These Punks questioned conformity by looking and sounding different and questioning prevailing modes of thought (O’Hara, 1995).

Punks do not respect authority of any kind and, in general, view it as an evil-causing agent. Rebellion is an undeniable characteristic of Punk and is implicit in its music and lyrics. Punks believe in rebellion and change and are formidable voices of opposition.

The History of Straight-Edge Culture

The Straight Edge movement appeared on the East Coast of the United States in the early 1980s (Wood, 2001). It was born out of punk rock, where it had become cool to be drunk and rowdy. Punk rock in the 1970s and early 1980s had grown violent and was scarred by a proliferation of drugs and alcohol.

O’Hara explains the Straight Edge movement was a new intensity and conviction of this music (which) began to bring back to life a dying Punk scene that had begun to stagnate with political sloganeering and ‘party time’ attitudes.

Ian MacKay, originally a punk rocker from Washington, DC, formed a band called Minor Threat. This band first coined the phrase Straight Edge (Wood, 2001). In 1981, he wrote several songs as statements of his discontent with the proliferation of drinking, drug use, and promiscuous sexual activity among his punk rock peers. The songs were “Straight Edge” and “Out of Step.” His ideals serve as the fundamental inspiration and the genesis of the Straightedge subculture, which existed some 20 years after MacKay coined the concept. MacKay kept all his punk rock philosophies but was the first to complain about their lifestyles (Wood, 2001).

MacKay explains his Punk rock roots,

When I was 17 and in high school, at this point I was the only straight edge kid and had a reputation for being pretty outspoken about it. They used to call me the “group conscience.” I was pretty much constantly being ribbed about being straight (edge), but I had a kind of an attitude about it because my feeling was that I didn’t understand why I was getting so much shit for being straight (edge). Now you have to keep in mind that this was in the context of the late 70’s when virtually every teenager was smoking pot. Everyone I knew drank or smoked pot and people who were straight (edge) were really considered the goofiest, nerdish motherfuckers, and I was just not interested in getting high. I just was not into it, and I did not appreciate the fact that I was made to feel like a fool, so I responded by being over aggressively straight. I was like, ‘Yah, I’m fucking straight (edge), do you got a problem with that?”

The larger of the second wave of Straight Edge bands was New York’s Youth of Today. Their singer, Ray Capo, embraced the Hare Krishna religion and began to influence the Straight Edge principles of no sex, no drugs, and no alcohol. He even went further than Minor Threat or Ian’s other band, Fugazi, did in the beginnings of Straight Edge and began to stress the vegetarian and vegan lifestyle. He explains his beginning as a punk rocker,

I had the Mohawk and some engineer boots in junior high. I was ridiculed in my anal retentive Connecticut high school where it was unheard of for a 15-year old male to ride a skateboard around in the halls. At the same time some punk ethics did not impress me. I was athletic. That wasn’t punk. I always despised lethargy, violence and intoxication. I was vexed and confused about how these things were such a dominating force in my alternative scene. That shit was happening in the regular scenes of the suburbs, and I wanted an alternative (Lahickey, xi).

He goes on to explain the genesis of Straight Edge and its rise to popularity,

I wasn’t alone. When Straight Edge hit big in 1987, it was unbelievable how it took over the club scene, record sales, fanzines, and punk culture. Moving to downtown Manhattan in 1988, and touring across the nation for the next few years, I watched it blossom first hand with its stronghold in NYC, Connecticut, New Jersey, LA and Florida. This incarnation of Straight Edge was different than Minor Threat who had broken up in ’83 and had officially coined the term ‘Straight Edge’ on their monumental CD…But there wasn’t much of a scene to support the philosophy in Minor Threat days, so this newer generation took the ball and ran with it, and since then it has existed, leaving the Minor Threat singles as the straight edge version of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Lahickey, xi).

He then goes on to explain how he sees the scene and what it means to him as an individual,

Now as I type this nearly 10 years later, I was unaware of the whirlpool I was caught up in – a whirlpool that still has an effect on the music scene internationally. But I feel those days were foundation building, especially within my own life. The Straight Edge scene gave me a society of like-minded individuals (not a Contradiction of terms) who appreciated punk energy, but did not want to end up in the gutter. And most didn’t. I still see people from back in the day. Some aren’t Straight Edge and some are. Some are really still into music and some are not. Some have changed costumes, politics and principles. With all of these differences, whenever one of them makes eye contact with me, I always have flashbacks to what we were and what we did, and I smile inwardly or publicly. It definitely was a time we will remember (Lahickey, xii).

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Reflection

I am sharing this now (because it’s an incredible history that I witnessed and recorded) and because I think understanding this movement is essential. The club was a vibrant third space and an outlet for a like-minded community to grow and be a force for change and good in the world.

The band Earth Crisis was way ahead of its time, fighting climate change. The lyrics at the top of this post are relevant today after the destruction of the LA wildfires last week. The music and the energy brought these young people together in tangible ways, and many described their bonds as being like family. In the digital world we live in now, this seems to be a problem—there is a lot of inauthenticity and, thus, a lack of belonging and real community.

The subculture was tangible and real, empowering and unifying for these kids. Since this is the first part of a series, I wrote about how this culture helped them make sense of their reality in my thesis. It will be interesting to view it from a more digital standpoint now when this community spirit and energy seem lacking.

(People still go to concerts now but watch a large part of them while holding up their phones and then posting to social media)

I hope you will join me on this journey as I re-explore subcultures, media, digitization, loss of third spaces, and tangible media and the connection to us as human beings.

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This was excerpted from my Master’s Thesis - Walking on the Edge: A Phenomenology of the Straight-Edge Subculture (2005)

Sources:

Lahickey, B. (1997). All ages: Reflections on Straight Edge. Huntington Beach, CA: Revelation Books.

O’Hara (1999). The Philosophy of Punk. AK Press. New York, NY.

Wood, R.T. (2001). Identity, Meaning, and Value Contradiction Among Straightedge Youth: Implications for a Chaos Interpretation of Subculture. Unpublished.

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See also my post on Zine culture which was directly tied to this movement in this same time period.

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