Thirty years of teenage angst. Thirty years of rage. Thirty years of commercial manipulation.

It’s been thirty years since the Sex Pistols desecrated “God Save the Queen” - for the good of music and to add to the arsenal of expression available to citizens overlooked or oppressed by their government.

It’s a pity that a large part of the punk rock identity has been appropriated. Not just by large corporations peddling Never Mind The Bollocks tshirts or using London Calling in mobile phone ads, but by snot-nosed suburban kids with no real idea of the severe social, political and economic dislocation that prodded punk rock into existence.

Now, I don’t mean that punk rock MUST be reserved for the dis-associated sallow-skinned British youth. Punk has a mutli-cultural (and multi-generational) appeal and a highly personal relevance.

Instead, I am obsessed with the appropriation of punk imagery by the customers of mainstream marketers. My kids like a Canadian retail chain called West 49. There, they can find studded belts, skate decks, DC shoes, plaid pants, and $100 Billabong hoodies. And all these things sell very well.

But that sort of behaviour has to be expected. These retailers are serving the market.

But what is wrong with the GD kids? Why are $80 ballet flat Vans with death’s head appliques selling so well? Why does the young woman boarding that suburban bus have a “punk rock” tote bag? Why can kids pick up temporary hair colour in purple, yellow, green and orange?

DIY punk seems to be dead, at least in middle-class Ottawa. Is this the result of increased brand awareness among children?

Do kids now look for “punk” brand attributes? Are they looking for their rebellion, their outrage and a radicalisation of their family, neighbourhood, city or society in a well-designed box?

As we keep pushing youth and children to identify with brands, with products or with sentiments, are we undermining their ability to express themselves?

Are our marketing dollars making brand attributes so prevalent and so culturally predominant that it takes a truly dissociative individual to build a truly independent identity as a punk?

Is it even possible to buy white Chuck Taylors to colour and “bedazzle” with spikes and pins?

To quote Hot Topic Is Not Punk Rock by MC Lars:

“…Hot Topic uses contrived identification with youth sub-cultures to manufacture an antiauthoritarian identity and make millions.

That $8 you paid for the Mudvayne poster would be better spent used for seeing your brother’s friend’s band.

DIY ethics are punk rock! Starting your own label is punk rock! GG Allin was punk rock!

But when a crass corporate vulture feeds on mass consumer culture, then spending Mommy’s money is not punk rock!

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