Punk Conservatism

The American Spectator ^ | 9/28/2004 | Andrew Cline

[GoldwaterAvenger]

THOSE WITH THEIR EARS to the ground have not been surprised that punk has resonated with conservatives. Rolling Stone magazine rock critic Anthony DeCurtis told the BBC this year, "In a lot of ways in the United States, the Republicans have gotten much more punk than the Democrats."

The ingredients of punk rebellion -- introversion, angst, and teenage alienation -- belong to no ideology. To the extent that conformity is encouraged or discouraged by particular political movements, the right is now more "punk" than the left.

The left espouses group identity; the right promotes individualism. The left says we all must hold hands and sing campfire songs together; the right says, "Screw you, hippie, I'm doing my own thing."

[GoldwaterAvenger]

The pressures to conform to form that magic 51% are often greater than standing for what one believes is truly right, on either side of the fence. This may be the most accurate and accessible definition of politics I have seen. Personally, I believe that the objectivist belief system which has been bastardized by the libertarian party, will eventually become the republican platform. The right wing will decline by a process of natural attrition and more evolved political elements will succeed. Wishful thinking? The dem Party on the other hand, cannot be reformed and is a hopeless trainwreck. The only social utopians left are busy getting rich by screening Che Guevara tshirts for apathetic and clueless Gen Yers.

[RightWingAtheist]

You really ought to be selected for a Dewar's Profile. :-)

[RightWingAtheist]

Ping!

[Tribune7]

A punk is waiting for a bus. He has green and pink spiked hair and rings through just about every part of his face. He sees an old man looking at him.

"What do you want," the punk sneers.

The old man continues to stare. "What do you want, geezer," the punk says.

The old man thinks for a moment, then quitely but with sober force says "Many, many years ago I had intercourse with a parrot. I was just wondering if you were my son."

[Physicist]

Are Punks still Gen-X???

The original punks and others of our generation fell into a narrow demographic wedge between the Boomers and the Gen-X'ers. Cartoonist Tom Tomorrow (I know, I know) has dubbed us the "Wedgies".

[Physicist]

You really ought to be selected for a Dewar's Profile. :-)

When I was at Stony Brook, we made sure that all the liquid nitrogen dewars had white labels.

[qam1]

The original punks and others of our generation fell into a narrow demographic wedge between the Boomers and the Gen-X'ers. Cartoonist Tom Tomorrow (I know, I know) has dubbed us the "Wedgies".

Looking at your homepage you have that you are 37 years old which means you were born in 1966 or 1967 so you are an Xer which is 1965-1981.

The Wedgies (or Generation Jones) are from 1957-1964

[Physicist]

I haven't touched that page in a long time. I was born in 1965. That used to be in Gen-X, but Gen-X drifted over time to cover a later range. It's been a while since I've seen anyone start Gen-X as early as '65.

Some contend that the Boomers go right up to 1964. I kid Mrs. P. about being a boomer, as she was born at the end of '64, a mere two months or so before I was.

[namvetcav]

I don't understand your problem and why you want to even communicate with me. Your #25 isn't a refutation. It's an embarrassing oversight which you acknowledge on #26 because it makes no sense in that we were largely in agreement, I think, and not buying into the freeeee non-pragmatic approach to electoral politics. Neither you nor freeeee have refuted anything I've written.

However, at this point I do regret the apparently abstruse Roseannadanna aside. Not just because it started something but because, as tiggs pointed out, the Radner character was Emily Litella. In any case, your btw "insight" into the hundreds of hours of SNL broadcating does not effectively proscribe SNL as a cultural resource. And by the way, however you wish your cultural quarantine to go, your "Hollywood elites" of SNL should probably be called "New York elites", unless you want to look as out-of-it as the Church Lady.

Obviously there's lots of misunderstanding here. You're clearly wrong to say otherwise. But even more than that, you have the effrontery to call me an average myopic rightist stooge - an unsupportable personal insult that goes over any line of civil discourse. I don't know what would prompt such an obtuse insult on this forum, unless it was whiskey. What important clue suggests I'm shortsighted and pedestrian, and am a stooge for rightist dogma? We were both pragmatists if your #25 reflects anything at all beyond your pathetic misunderstanding that I wasn't posting any objection to anything you'd written.

If you'd like to go a few rounds over who's the knucklehead here, you don't worry me. I'm no Bush sycophant and I don't know any. Because of jerks like Kerry, people I went to highschool with actually took the trouble to call me a babykiller on more than one occasion. There's lots of good reasons to get 51%. I can't think of anything more myopic, stooge-like, and dogmatic than defeating George W in the name of individual freedom.

[GoldwaterAvenger]

This thread has just about outlived its usefulness, it appears. I must digress on your invitation to "Go a few rounds" and put an end to this pissing contest. Your last post was rather gratuitous in that I could really care less.

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

Gabba Gabba, Hey!

[namvetcav]

Were you to "digress", if would be evidenced by going on a tangential track or wandering from the subject, not by "declining", which is what you are attempting to do. By the time you graduate from highschool, I'm sure you'll understand the distinction.

The first line of my "gratuitous" #48 clearly indicates I don't want to go any rounds with you. The only issue is your shallow, rude, unsupported personal insult of me. There is no mystery here why baloney would reject the grinder. Your escape is not a digression. It is exactly consistant with your display of intellectual acumen in this thread.

[GoldwaterAvenger]

You are going to impugn anyone's intellectual acumen with that load of verbose crap? hahaha--get a life soldier--woohoo

[namvetcav]

Wake up. You got on to Free Republic on Sept. 21st and you've called a real conservative with a graduate degree an average myopic stooge to rightist dogma - quite a personal insult even on DU.

I've got a life, Mr. Woohoo. I doubt that you have much of a future as a freeper.

[GoldwaterAvenger]

Hey man...seriously, I was just being a little punkrock with you. My bad on the disrespect. My pops is a vietnam vet as well and I have nothing but respect for you guys--except Kerry, Cleland and Clarke. They are VINOS(vets in name only)

Let's both save the vitriol for the leftist pricks who so richly deserve it, shall we?

[qam1]

thought it would be of interest! :D

Oh no, I am terribly sorry if I sounded rude, I don't know if Punks are still Gen-x or not either. And there is a Punk (RightGoths?) ping list and a Rock & Roll ping list so I didn't want to intrude on their "turf" if Punks aren't Gen-X anymore (Though since neither ping list keeper has shown up yet I guess I could have). Plus I did already do 3 pings that day and didn't want to go too crazy.

But Yes, Thank you for the Ping, If you find an article please don't hesitate to PING me again