The Day We All Went Punk

[slunken]

Pretty decent After School Special dug out of the archives



article - http://dangerousminds.net/comments/p...school_special

http://images.dangerousminds.net/upl...unko057532.jpg

http://images.dangerousminds.net/upl...punktghth1.jpg

just finished watching it. 4.5 stars. half star deducted for lack of perceived punk activity. he's actually a really good kid.

What the program was trying to do, I think, is reduce the decision to be punk to the relatively manageable issue (in 45 minutes) of taking on an “unacceptable” personal style. But the problem is, bringing the subject down to that plane renders everything everybody does unintelligible, nothing fits together. In the end, the show makes it clear that Terry kind of does have to make a choice between the pink mohawk and his desire to continue with the orchestra—but why would he want that??? Punk has no context here. In a way, the intolerant old-timers in the show are right: deciding to be punk does mean crossing a line over which there may well be no easy return, you can’t just wander back and forth as you wish, unless you’re supremely charming or talented or both—and even then, that ability may come only after years of societal rejection.

Amiable as Terry is, you can’t be a punk unless you’re a punk on the inside—and we never see any evidence of that in this friendly young fellow.