A
PUNK MANIFESTO
by Greg Graffin
I have never owned a record label, nor directed
a successful merchandise company, so I don't pretend to be an expert on
marketing. I have evolved through my craft as a songwriter, but others have
labeled it and marketed it and made it neat for consumption.
Although I have made money from Punk, it is a
modest amount when one considers the bounty that has been bestowed on the
companies that promote Punk as some sort of a product to be ingested. It has
always been my way to de-value the fashionable, light-hearted, impulsive traits
that people associate with Punk, because Punk is more than that, so much more
that those elements become trivial in the light of human experience that all
punkers share.
Since it has been a part of me for over half of
my life, I think the time has come to attempt a definition, and in the process
defend, this persistent social phenomenon known as Punk. It is astounding that
something with so much emotional and trans- cultural depth has gone without
definition for so long, for the roots of Punk run deeper, and go back in
history farther than imagined.
Even in the last two decades, it is difficult
to find any analysis of the influential effect that Punk Rock had on Pop Music
and youth culture. And rarer still are essays detailing the emotional and
intellectual undercurrents that drive the more overt fashion statements that
most people attribute to Punk.
These are some of the wants that compelled me
to write this. If my attempt offends the purists, collapses the secrecy of a
closed society, promotes confidence in skeptical inquiry, provokes deeper
thought, and decodes irony, then I have done my job and those who feel slighted
might recognize the triviality of their position. For I have nothing to promote
but my observations on a sub-culture that has grown to global proportions, and
through visiting much of it, I have found threads of common thought everywhere.
Common thought processes are what determine the
ideology that binds people together into a community. There is desire among
Punks to be a community, but there needs to be some shape imparted on the
foundations of the punk ideology, and where it comes from. The current Punk
stereotype is scarred by mass-marketing and an unfortunate emphasis on style
over substance.
But these ills don't destroy the Punk
sentiment, they merely confound the education of the new generations of people
who know they are punk, but don't know what it means. It is a long road to
understand what it means. This essay is part of the process.
PUNKS
ARE NOT BEASTS
Punk is a reflection of what it means to be
human. What separates us from other animals? Our ability to recognize ourselves
and express our own genetic uniqueness. Ironically, the commonly held view,
among the marketeers and publicity engines, stresses the
"animalistic", "primitive" nature of punks and their music.
They assume that violence is a key ingredient
in punk music, and this assumption is easily perpetuated because it is easy to
market violence and news items about violence always get column space. This
focus on violence misses a key element of what Punk is all about:
PUNK IS: the personal expression of uniqueness that
comes from the experiences of growing up in touch with our human ability to
reason and ask questions.
Violence is neither common in, nor unique to
punk. When it does manifest itself it is due to things unrelated to the punk
ideal. Consider for example the common story of a fight at a high school
between a punk and a jock football player. The football player and his cohort
do not accept or value the punk as a real person. Rather, they use him as a
vitriol receptacle, daily taunting, provoking, and embarrassing him, which of
course is no more than a reflection of their own insecurities.
One day, the punk has had enough and he
clobbers the football captain in the hallway. The teachers of course expell the
punk and cite his poor hairstyle and shabby clothing as evidence that he is a
violent, uncontrollable no-good. The community newspaper reads "Hallway
Beating Re-affirms that Violence is a Way of Life Among Punk Rockers".
Spontaneous anger at not being accepted as a
real person is not unique to punkers. This reaction is due to being human, and
anybody would react in anger regardless of their sub- cultural, or social
affiliation if they felt de- valued and useless. Sadly, there are plenty of
examples of violence among punks. There are glaring examples of misguided
people who call themselves punks too. But anger and violence are not punk
traits, in fact, they have no place in the punk ideal. Anger and violence are
not the glue that holds the punk community together.
IN
UNIQUENESS IS THE PRESERVATION OF MANKIND
Nature bestowed on us the genetic backbone of
what punk is all about. There are roughly 80,000 genes in the human genome, and
there are roughly 6 billion people carrying that genetic compliment. The
chances of two people carrying the same genome are so small as to be almost
beyond comprehension (the odds are essentially ½ 80,000 times the number of
possible people you can meet and mate with in a lifetime! A practical
impossibility)
The genes we carry play a major role in
determining our behavior and outlook on life. That is why we have the gift of
uniqueness, because no one else has the same set of genes controlling their
view of the world. Of course cultural factors play the other major role, and
these can have a more homogenizing effect on behavior and world-view.
For example, an entire working-class town might
have 15,000 residents who are raised with the same ideals, work at the same
factories, go to the same schools, shop at the same stores, and like the same
sports teams. As their children develop, there is a constant interaction of
opposite forces between the social imprinting their culture imparts and the
genetic expression of uniqueness.
Those who lose touch with their nature become
society's robots, whereas those who denounce their social development become
vagrant animals. Punk stands for a desire to walk the line in between these two
extremes with masterful precision. Punks want to express their own unique
nature, while at the same time want to embrace the communal aspects of their
cookie-cutter upbringing.
The social connection they have is based on a
desire to understand each other's unique view of the world. Punk
"scenes" are social places where those views are accepted, sometimes
adopted, sometimes discarded, but always tolerated and respected.
PUNK IS: a movement that serves to refute social
attitudes that have been perpetuated through willful ignorance of human nature.
Because it depends on tolerance and shuns
denial, Punk is open to all humans. There is an elegant parallel between Punk's
dependence on unique views and behaviors and our own natural genetic
predisposition toward uniqueness.
THE
BATTLE OF FEAR AND RATIONALITY
The compulsion to conform is a powerful
side-effect of civilized life. We are all taught to respect the views of our
elders, and later when we realize that they are just dogmatic opinions, we are
taught not to make a commotion by asking difficult questions. Many just go
along with the prevailing notions and never express their own views, which is
analogous to a premature death of the individual.
Our species is unique in the ability to
recognize and express the self, and not exercising this biological function
goes against the natural selection gradient that created it in the first place.
This complacency combats a fear of failure.
It is easy to assume that if everyone else is
doing something, then there is no way to fail if you just go along with it.
Cattle and flocks of geese can probably recognize this advantage. But the
entire human race could fail because of this mentality.
Thinking and acting in a direction against the
current of popular opinion is critical to human advancement, and a potent
manifestation of Punk. If an issue or phenomenon is found to be true only
because other people say it is so, then it is a Punk's job to look for a better
solution, or at least find an independent variable that confirms the held view
(sometimes the popular view is just a reflection of human nature, Punks don't
live in denial of this).
This ability to go against the grain was a
major part of the greatest advances in human thinking throughout history. The
entire Enlightenment period was characterized by ideas that shunned the dogma
of the time, only to reveal truths in nature and human existence that all
people can observe, and that are still with us today.
Galileo fought the church, the church won the
battle, by putting him in jail for life, but ultimately lost the war; few
people today believe that the sun orbits around the earth, and thus God didn't
create the earth as the center of the universe. Francis Bacon insisted that
human destiny is equal to understanding. If we deny this fundamental principle
of what it means to be human, he reasoned, then we descend into the depths of
mere barbarism.
Charles Darwin, wrote after the heyday of the
Enlightenment, he nonetheless was directly influenced by its tradition, was
trained as a theologian and yet still was driven to understand the underlying
order that connected biological species he observed in his travels. His views
threw into question many of the Bible's tenets, yet his reasoning was sound,
and through a process of self-improvement (the struggle in his own mind to
understand) he improved mankind by establishing a new benchmark of human
knowledge.
The dogma of the church was further
marginalized. The fear of repercussion from the church was overshadowed by the
wave of understanding that his views created in people, and by the truth to his
observations.
The modern-day Punk thought process, driven by
this desire to understand, is a carbon-copy of the Enlightenment tradition. The
fact that so many historical examples exist that reveal a will to destroy dogma
leads to a powerful tenet: It is a natural trait of civilized humans to be
original. The fact that uniqueness is so rare reveals that our nature is
stifled by an equally potent opposing force: fear.
PUNK IS: a process of questioning and commitment to
understanding that results in self-progress, and by extrapolation, could lead
to social progress.
If enough people feel free, and are encouraged
to use their skills of observation and reason, grand truths will emerge. These
truths are acknowledged and accepted not because they were force-fed by some
totalitarian entity, but because everyone has a similar experience when
observing them.
The fact that Punks can relate to one another
on issues of prejudice comes from a shared experience of being treated poorly
by people who don't want them around. Each has his/her own experience of being
shunned, and each can relate to another's story of alienation without some kind
of adherence to a code of behavior.
The truth of prejudice is derived from the
experience they all share, not from a written formula or constitution they have
to abide by. Punks learn from this experience that prejudice is wrong, it is a
principle they live by; they didn't learn it from a textbook. Without striving
to understand, and provoking the held beliefs, the truth remains shrouded
behind custom, inactivity, and prescriptive ideology.
WHAT
IS TRUTH?
Philosophers distinguish between capital
"T" truth and truth with a small "t". Punks deny the
former.
Truth with a capital "T" assumes that
there is an order prescribed by some transcendental being. That is to say that
truth comes ultimately from God, who had a plan for everything when he created
the universe.
Little "t" truth is that which we
figure out for ourselves, and which we all can agree upon due to similar
experience and observations of the world. It is also known as objective truth,
from within ourselves, revealed here on this earth; as opposed to big T truth,
which comes from outside and is projected down to us, specifically for us to
follow.
Morality need not be thought of as a product
only of big "T" truth. Objective truth lends itself just as readily
to a moralistic, spiritual culture.
PUNK IS: a belief that this world is what we make of
it, truth comes from our understanding of the way things are, not from the
blind adherence to prescriptions about the way things should be.
Punk's dependence on objective truth comes from
the shared experience of going against the grain. Anyone who has stood out in a
crowd feels the truth of the experience. No one had to write a doctrine in
order for the outcast to understand what it meant to be different. The truth
was plain enough, and that truth could be understood and agreed upon by all
those who shared a common experience.
WHAT
IS FEAR?
The fears that drive people to conform have
caused dismal periods in human history. The so-called Dark Ages, were tranquil
and without upheaval, but also dismally quiet and pestilent, nary a contrasting
view to be found. The pseudo-comfort and tranquility that the people of the
Dark Ages experienced, by conforming to a rigidly enforced bureaucracy enforced
by the king and church, was masked entirely by the misery they had to endure in
their day to day life.
Life is easy as a peasant, no direction, no
purpose, just produce more goods and offspring for the benefit of the king. But
using fear to control peasants (or modern-day blue-collar workers for that
matter) is just a short-term foul exercise, because peasants have the same
mental equipment as the royalty.
The deeply ingrained biological traits of
self-recognition and the desire to express the self cannot be quashed for long.
Eventually peasants realize that life without the practice of reason is as good
as being a farm animal. Being controlled by fear is the same as being
biologically inert, unable to take part in the human drama, merely wasting
away.
The fear that controls human behavior is
learned. It is different from the immediate, reflexive, run-away-from-the-
nasty-stimulus response that other creatures employ to stay alive. We have
motor reflexes like these as well, but fear of failure, and fear of speaking
out come from the limbic system.
The limbic system is a network of neurons in
our brain that control our most deep-seated emotions. It connects two parts of
the brain together: the midbrain, where sensory information is sent (i.e. sight
and hearing stimuli) and the forebrain, where that information is processed.
Although the forebrain has been around for at least 480 million years (it was
present in the earliest vertebrates), it evolved special functions with the
advent of humankind.
A specialized portion of the forebrain, called
the cerebral cortex, is highly developed in humans. 95% of our cerebral cortex
is responsible for associative mental activities like contemplation and
planning. The other 5% is responsible for processing motor and sensory
information.
By comparison, a mouse (also considered a
higher vertebrate), has a cerebral cortex with only 5% of its neurons devoted
to associative functions, while 95% are devoted to motor and sensory fuctions.
The highly developed limbic system is at the
core of what it means to be human. We differ from other animals in the amount
of time we spend planning, contemplating, and expressing ourselves. Our limbic
system is very powerful. It can over-ride primitive emotions, and suppress deep
desires.
Anyone who has ever seen a sad movie with
friends, and willfully held back tears because they didn't want their friends
to see them crying, employed the power of their limbic system. They
contemplated the repercussions of their friends reaction to crying, and shut
off the emotional cascade that would have brought the tears.
In the same way that rationality is the product
of the limbic system, fear is also centered in the same neurons of the limbic
system. Fear is usually rational behavior, based on irrational thoughts, and it
can freeze the processing power of the cerebral cortex. Denial and fear go hand
in hand, and both are examples of how our limbic system can suppress obvious
stimuli and promote behavior that is safe and conforming.
The limbic system is like any other organ in
the sense that it can operate unchecked to produce detrimental results. Being
in touch with our bodies leads to overall general health, and the limbic system
needs constant attention in order to master it. To overcome fear, one needs to
be in touch with their limbic system, and recognize when it is suppressing the
obvious.
Etiquette and "being nice" are forms
of limbic-system repression, necessary at times, but ultimately demeaning of
human originality. Lying is the ultimate form of limbic-system repression. It
is a denial of the obvious. Truth-tellers, those who are authentic and
trustworthy, have learned to master their limbic system. They recognize the
desire to lie, but rationalize the futility of advocating something that is not
true.
Liars, on the other hand, are slaves to their
limbic system, out of touch with their most basic mental capacities. Their
behavior is guarded and shifty because they let their flawed reasoning, to
cover up the obvious, control their entire makeup. They eventually have to give
in to the truth and concede defeat, but only after every possible avenue of
deception and twisted logic has been advocated in the interest of hiding their
fear.
Politicians, Clergymen, Business leaders, and
Judges are masters of twisted logic and promotion of fear. They make good
intellectual targets for Punkers because they don't respect people who have
learned to master their limbic systems. And Punkers are not afraid to point out
that which is obvious, even if it means their social status might be
jeopardized.
PUNK IS: the constant struggle against fear of social
repercussions.
THE
PUNK MOVEMENT
I have tried to enumerate some of the factors
that make Punk a movement, in the cultural sense. The typical stereotype of a
feeble-minded ruffian vandalizing, destroying, stealing, fighting, or arguing
in the name of some empty, short-lived cause is no more punk than the
pretty-face-empty-head image of today's pop stars.
Because it is so easy for record companies to
sell images of violence, sex, and self-importance, many bands have taken the
bait and portrayed themselves as Punks, without realizing that they were
actually perpetuating a stereotype of conformity that is wholly un-punk.
The "come join us" attitude that
seeks to attract followers, usually results in a rabble of weak people who
think that their power lies in the large numbers of like-minded clones they
have compiled. There is no strength in numbers however, if the people are glued
together by a short-sighted, self-serving, fear-induced mantra that promotes
factions and exclusionary principles.
Strong ideologies don't require a mob, they
persist through time, and never go away, because they are intimately connected
to our biology. They are part of what it means to exist as Homo sapiens. Punk
typifies that tradition.
It is a movement of epic proportions, that
transcends the immediacy of the here-and- now, because it is, was, and always
will be there-and-forever, as long as humans walk the earth.
As we enter a new era in the voracious march of
culture, Punks will have their day. The internet has allowed people to
communicate directly once again. On the web, human behavior is interactive,
like it was before the advent of mass-media.
People now focus on ideological discussions and
lifestyle issues, as opposed to the classic 20th century behavior of closing
oneself off from cohorts, and adhering to a network's, or commercial's
prescriptive code of acceptable behavior. The lies, and mysteries of elitism
will erode quickly as the global conversation that transpires daily on the web
invades more people's lives.
The world population will be more receptive to
alternative ideologies because they will be creating them. People will be less
receptive to ideologies of out- dated institutions because the holes and flaws
in their logic will be ever more amplified when they are broadcast instantly
around the world as they become revealed.
The "Strength-In-Understanding", and
"Knowledge-Is-Power" ethics that Punks maintain will become the norm.
The rigidity, brutishness, and futility of secret agendas will be made obvious,
paving the way to an appreciation of human uniqueness, and a new era of
originality.
WHO
IS PUNK?
Everyone has the potential to be punk. It is
much harder for someone who comes from a placid, un-challenging, ignorant
upbringing, because they don't see the value in questioning or provoking the
institutions that gave them such tranquility. But such examples of carefree
existence are rare in today's shrinking world.
Eternal questions still burn in the minds of
most people. What it means to be human is becoming more clear every decade.
Sometimes, people are trained to follow the safe path to an early grave by
consuming and repeating the dogma of a fearful aristocracy.
On the other hand, the human spirit is hard to
kill. Punk is a microcosm of the human spirit. Punks succeed with their minds,
not their brute force. They advance society by their diversity, not their
conformity. They motivate others by inclusion, not domination.
They are at the front lines of self-betterment
and by extrapolation can improve the complexion of the human race. They adhere
to unwritten universal principles of human emotion, obvious to anyone, and shun
elitist codes of behavior, or secret agendas. They embody the hope of the
future, and reveal the flaws of the past. Don't tell them what to do, they are
already leading you.
PUNK IS: the personal expression of uniqueness that
comes from the experiences of growing up in touch with our human ability to
reason and ask questions.
PUNK IS: a movement that serves to refute social
attitudes that have been perpetuated through willful ignorance of human nature.
PUNK IS: a process of questioning and commitment to
understanding that results in self-progress, and through repetition, flowers
into social evolution.
PUNK IS: a belief that this world is what we make of
it, truth comes from our understanding of the way things are, not from the
blind adherence to prescriptions about the way things should be.
PUNK IS: the constant struggle against fear of social
repercussions.