We Didn’t Grow Up on Punk Rock to Bow to Fascists
We Didn’t Grow Up on Punk Rock to Bow to Fascists
Gen X, it’s our time to rise. We’ve been training for this our whole damn lives.
I didn’t grow up listening to punk rock to capitulate and lick some fascist wannabe dictator’s boots.
None of us did.
We were the generation of eye-rolls and resistance, born into Reaganomics and raised on skepticism. We learned early that authority isn’t always right, and more often than not, it’s corrupt.
Our soundtrack wasn’t about submission; it was about survival.
Punk Rock Taught Us to Resist
We were taught to Rise Above — thank you, Black Flag.
We knew that taking a Holiday in Cambodia wasn’t about fun in the sun; it was a brutal satire about ignorance and privilege — the Dead Kennedys were our prophets.
Punk wasn’t just a genre. It was an education in dissent.
It told us that we didn’t have to accept what we were handed.
That we could fight back: loudly, creatively, unapologetically.
So when I see people from my own generation bending the knee to fascism, cheering for censorship, cruelty, and control, I have to ask: what happened to you?
Punk Rock Has Always Been — and Will Always Be — Anti-Fascist
Let’s make it plain: Punk rock is ANTIFA.
Not the caricature Faux News sells, but the real meaning — anti-fascist.
That’s literally what it stands for.
From The Clash to Bad Religion, from Bikini Kill to The Interrupters, punk has always punched up. Always sided with the oppressed. Always screamed truth to power.
Even today, the anthems ring just as loud:
🎶 Take Back The Power — The Interrupters.
🎶 Welcome to the Black Parade — My Chemical Romance.
These songs aren’t nostalgia. They’re battle cries.
We Don’t Have to Sit Idly By
We’re watching the same old forces of greed and hate trying to rebrand themselves with new slogans and red hats.
They did away with DEI — diversity, equity, inclusion — only to replace it with DUI hires like “Kegsbreath” Hegseth and RFK Jr.’s brain worm.
You can’t make this stuff up.
And through it all, they’re trying to convince us that they’re the rebels, that authoritarianism is “freedom.”
Sorry, but trading your spine for a slogan isn’t rebellion. It’s regression.
Gen X: This Is Our Moment
We were the latch-key kids, the last analog generation, the first to grow up online.
We learned to fix things with duct tape and attitude.
We made mixtapes instead of playlists.
We survived parents who weren’t home, recessions that hit hard, and politicians who didn’t care.
We’ve seen this story before, and we know how it ends if no one fights back.
Even if you got duped once, even if you fell for the orange con man’s snake-oil pitch, there’s room for you in this fight for freedom.
Owning up and showing up are the most punk rock things you can do right now.
FAFO Generation, Reporting for Duty
We are the FAFO generation — Fuck Around and Find Out.
We’ve been training for this moment our entire lives.
The next verse of resistance is already being written; not in arenas or boardrooms, but in living rooms, city councils, school boards, and voter-registration drives.
If punk rock taught us anything, it’s this:
You don’t wait for permission.
You don’t ask for validation.
You rise above.