Edge Day. Time to repost my now infamous “sad that this needs to be said” essay. I’ve edited it once again for clarity and a few additional thoughts.

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(author’s note: This is a slightly cleaned up and revised version of something I wrote in September 2011 that got several hundred

reblogs on here and gained me almost as many followers. The original message is still clear, I’ve just added a few details here

and there)



I all too often see things floating around all over tumblr,

and rather than reblogging one of the endless reblogs (since most of the

comments make my blood boil due to the serious idiocy contained therein)

I’m just going to post my own two cents, and the rest of you can reblog and

argue to your little heart’s content.



I am 38 years old. I am straight edge. I essentially have been, by definition, my entire life, minus the novelty of parents

giving a young child a small glass of champagne on New Years and little things like that.

I have been, by declaration, for over 25 years. Since I first got into

punk and hardcore and went to my first show (bad brains on the Quickness tour with Leeway at Revival, if you’re keeping score)

and found out what it was and that it spoke to my already consciously-made decision that I wanted no part in partaking in stuff that

I already knew was harmful, stupid, and destructive.

That said, I think I have some idea of what

straight edge means. Moreso than the teenagers and barely 20-somethings

pontificating over tumblr who don’t know shit about shit and should probably

shut the fuck up before they make themselves look dumber than they already

have. I have X’s tattooed on my hands. I got them when I was 24, and they still

mean every bit as much to me today as they did then. This is not me claiming superiority over younger people,

just some background to illustrate that I have been involved in this subculture for a very long time, long enough

to have seen and heard it all from every end of the spectrum, about every facet of straight edge.



If you are straight edge, and you choose not to have sex outside the confines

of committed relationships, good for you. Here’s your cookie. But make no

mistake, the two have nothing to do with each other. To me, that sounds a

little too much like some “no sex before marriage” restriction slapped on

you by some archaic, oppressive religion, and not something you adhere to

because of a lifestyle that is meant to better you as a person and enrich your life.

In fact, to me it would seem completely contradictory. Being straight edge is

not about restricting your life, it is about expanding the possibilities your life

can take by keeping your mind and body clear, clean, and sharp, by avoiding society’s greatest poisons. To call sex one of

society’s greatest poisons is not only moronic, but disgusting. Here we have

an act that can be an expression of love between two(or more) people.

It can be something used as a tool to create life itself. It can just be

something totally FUN. It can be an avatar of passion, of intensity. It is people

enjoying themselves and each other, getting in tune with their bodies. How is this poisonous?

CAN sex be a bad thing? Of course. Pretty much anything used improperly, or with

the wrong intentions, can be. But at it’s base, sex is not only not a poison, but

the complete opposite; it is one of the most amazing things we as humans can

experience.



The idea that sex, or sex outside of marriage/relationships/whatever is “bad” or

“wrong” is absurd. This concept is oppressive, counterproductive, and a tool

of the very society we as the straight edge should be striving to combat.

It is this same outlook that leads to the mindset that women who enjoy sex

or have a lot of sex or sexual partners are sluts, whores, etc (this usually also

coincides with men who are more than happy to have sex with these women, yet belittle them for this behavior; also, men are usually

championed for having sex with many women. Imagine that.)

This is the same mindset that chastises people(usually women) who might do things

like pose nude, or even do porn, things like that. (I can recall several messageboard

arguments over certain Suicide Girls being straight edge, as an example, as if

a woman’s choice to show off her body has any bearing on her character as a person, or her

choices to live drug-free for that matter) You have no say on who anyone can share their bodies with, be it visually

or literally. Nobody has ANY authority over anyone else’s body, it is the choice only of the person to whom it belongs

who gets to see it, who gets to touch it, who gets to experience it. Policing someone else’s body and telling them what they can

and cannot do with it is not only fascist, but sounds a few steps away from rape if you ask me. (that may sound drastic, but think

about it - forcing YOUR will upon someone else’s body which goes against what THEY wish to do with it, without their consent)



The “don’t fuck” line of Minor Threat’s “Out of Step” did not mean literally “don’t fuck.” It was

Ian MacKaye’s observation and disgust with the typical bro/bar culture (which is still prevalent today, sadly)

of people going out and getting wasted and going home with someone, having

meaningless, sometimes destructive, sometimes predatory, sometimes consent-less sex, and doing this sort of thing day/week in and out. Situations where people are actually harming themselves and others.

It wasn’t him saying “sex is bad, don’t do it.” He was equating people’s destructive habits

with those of drinking, smoking, and drugs.

Your “elder god” himself, Ian MacKaye(this is sarcasm, before some jagaloon quotes me and tries to call me out- I’m just pointing out that since a lot of you like to go back to his words as canon to try and prove your misguided points, perhaps you should take a look at what he has said beyond the lyrics of a song he wrote 30 years ago), has said this in relatively recent interviews(since straight edge

is basically all everyone ever wants to talk to him about). I recently saw someone use

the wrong example(edge kids “sleeping around”) in a tumblr comment to illustrate

that Ian “is ashamed of what straight edge has become.” No, if anything, it’s because

of the divisive idiocy that occurs over it in instances like this.

DIRECT QUOTE FROM IAN MACKAYE: “What I was clearly discussing was abusive quest oriented, manipulative sex. People who were not interested in other people’s feelings, but only in getting off.I saw as a teenager that peoples energies were so squarely caught up in getting laid that a lot of pain and and hurt came out of it. I knew women who were raped by people who did not care for anything other than getting off. And I just thought that this kind of obsession was not healthy….I thought I’d speak out against it, and I got a rise out of a lot of people. I am pro-sex, I certainly have no problem with sex between people who want to have sex. But I felt that so much energy in our scene was spent on selfish aims…” - Ian MacKaye on sex and straight edge from the book Sober Living For the Revoluton.



Sex should not be something that is frowned upon. It should not be something

reserved for people in relationships. And it should not be something that

your choice to live poison free should have any bearing on.



Bottom line is this: Have sex as much as you want, with whoever you want(well, as long as they consent of course, haha), and as many partners as you want.

As long as there is a mutual degree of respect and responsibility present, and

as long as nobody is being lied to, deceived, played, disrespected, or hurt

in any way, and as long as the intentions are clear to both(all) parties involved,

there shouldn’t be an issue. This has been the case with all of my past partners (many of whom I was not in a relationship with, OH NOES!) And this should be the case whether you are straight edge or not.





“sex is natural, sex is good, not everybody does it, but everybody should” - George Michael (yeah,

leave it to me end an essay about straight edge by quoting the guy who sang for Wham!)

Addendums: in perusing all the idiocy on tumblr, I noticed an anon accuse someone of “not knowing what the third X means.” Let me clear that up for you, junior. For all your basing your incorrect arguments on Minor Threat lyrics, you sure don’t pay much attention to the other happenings of that scene from that era. The “three X’s” do not stand for “smoking, drinking, and fucking.” Here’s some history about straight edge, and about hardcore, something you young kids really don’t pay enough attention to. Know your roots, blah blah, etc. Anyway. XXX, right? The straight edge scene started in DC. Take a look at the flag of Washington DC.

Notice the three stars. OK, back in the day Dischord Records (DC punk label that released all the old Minor Threat records, among others) put out a very influential comp called Flex Your Head. Here is the cover.

Do we get it yet? DC kids start DC label that puts out only DC bands, use DC flag as logo of their comp, replacing the stars with Xs, because most of them were involved in the straight edge scene at the time. Follow? That is the only reason there are three Xs. The iconography has stuck around throughout the years, but make no mistake, each of them does not stand for ANYTHING, and had the flag of Washington DC featured 7 stars, you jagaloons would be trying to convince everyone that they weren’t straight edge because they don’t follow some imaginary “7th X.”



In closing, know what you’re talking about before you open your mouth. Let the edge folk fuck who they want, and you go fuck yourself!

XXX



PS - since I have your attention and we’re talking about sex…who wants to fuck?

(Source: chris-is-hardcore-fest)