Meta-punk. Manifesto of lost protest.
Our Story
Johnny Rotten and Glen Matlock created punk rock. Maybe they were fed up with the progressive wailing of ten-minute solos at Woodstock, or maybe the hypocrisy of millionaire “nonconformists” on rock festival stages had started to look ridiculous — but the fact remains: the world discovered Sex Pistols.
Those guys didn’t care at all about traditions, values, decency, laws, or social norms. They were against absolutely everything. They laughed at everyone. Their ideology was the absence of ideology. They mocked the right, the left, the rich, and the poor alike. The climax of this chaos was Sid Vicious, the short-lived bassist of the band — he hated everyone, including himself. He had no stereotypes, no hatred toward anyone in particular — he hated everyone equally. The guy would walk through the Jewish quarter of Paris wearing a swastika T-shirt, not because he hated Jews or supported Hitler (he probably barely knew who that was), but because he simply wanted to tell everyone to go to hell all at once. And that won many people over. There was absolute honesty in it. That was the original punk rock.
I loved all of this so much that I started playing this music myself. But the deeper I immersed myself in modern punk, the more doubts began to appear in my head. Reality was very different from what I thought punk rock was.
Today the situation is this: punk rock is represented by anyone but true rebels. Sure, punks today can and must rebel — but only within a specific and clearly defined (though no one knows by whom) set of rules. Punks today are all “Vote Blue” — they’ve become instruments of propaganda for certain values. Now every punk must take a position (but only the “correct” one). You cannot remain outside of it — or worse, be on the other side. You must pull in the same harness with them, otherwise you’re not even a punk anymore.
An ideology that does not tolerate criticism resembles a totalitarian cult — regardless of whether it is “good” or “bad.” Totalitarian cults are not defined by their values, but by the way those values are imposed. Modern punk rock speaks to you with a phrase that emerged in Russia during the October Revolution: “If you’re not with us, you’re against us.” It’s deeply ironic that today’s “rebels” use rhetoric that later gave birth to one of the most totalitarian and anti-human regimes in human history.
If you’re not with us, you’re against us?
You know what… I’m not with you. I don’t want to stand in your line. Your values disgust me just as much as the values of those you claim to fight against. The left, the right, the top, the bottom — I hate you all. That’s my ideology. To hell with all of you.
That’s how I describe my punk — meta-punk. I’m returning to the roots of this music, to the ideas that started the entire movement. My meta-punk steps outside the movement. We remain outside the subculture, outside the culture, outside all ideas and values. Punks say, “We’re against the system.” I say, “You are the system.” I am outside the system.
The core tools of meta-punk will be irony, self-irony, and deconstruction. We laugh at everyone around us — including ourselves — because we have no restrictions. The rules modern punks voluntarily accept do not apply to us. We don’t follow rules because we don’t believe in them. Don’t try to explain to us why it’s okay to laugh at phenomenon A but not at phenomenon B — it’s pointless. It’s just as pointless as explaining the color red to someone born blind: they won’t understand.
Deconstruction in our philosophy means doubting everything. Absolutely everything. There are no objective truths for us — and we don’t need them, because they impose limits, and we refuse to have any boundaries. Don’t expect us to show up at your rainbow celebration and not ask questions. Don’t expect your political statements “for everything good and against everything bad” to go unquestioned. We are here to ask questions — of everyone. And we have many. If someone shouts “for,” we ask: “Why?” But if someone shouts “against,” we ask: “Why?” as well.
Absolute nihilism matters here as a tool for understanding the world. I ask questions not only to show you that your ideology is a colossus with feet of clay, but because I am constantly searching for truth — leaving you the opportunity to convince me that what you believe in so deeply is true, precise, and right. I explore the world, myself, the people around me. Try to convince me (you won’t succeed). What matters is that my nihilism comes from absolute and all-consuming freedom — my freedom. But my freedom extends to you as well. That’s why I’m ready to listen. I’m ready to argue. As Voltaire once wrote: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Because freedom is an absolute value to me — not just freedom, but infinite freedom. You are free to say whatever you think is necessary. And I am free to disagree with everything you say.
This is my protest. This is my path. This is my struggle. We return to the roots of punk. We protest against everything. We question everyone. We are not with you. We are not against you. We are outside. We are meta-punk.