....A guide to straight edge
presented by That Kid
So yesterday, naturally, I’m at the bar.
Hammered drunk at noon, stealing green beer from girls’ pitchers, telling them how interesting it is that they are taking a fine arts class (yawn). Sometimes cheap beer just can’t do it for me so it’s time to head back in and order myself a man drink. Through the crowd of brosers ordering there festive bud lights in the green bottles, I make my way to the front and get the bartenders attention. Obviously I have complete reign over the bar at this point, and when the bartender acknowledges my Sox hat in a sea of Yankees tools, I jump to the front of the line. “A shot of Jameson with a Guinness back barkeep, and keep the change”, I say as I pay the man his money, when a little way down the bar I hear an order probably only spoken once in a blue moon on St. Patrick’s Day:
“Can I get a coke and a water please?”
The order hits me so hard I basically stumble back, for sure this young man meant to put some Jack in that coke, but as I make my way over to him I see the reasoning behind this most vile of vile bar orders, three large, bold, white letter X’s on a black shirt.
For those of you not familiar with this symbol, this is the self-appointed international symbol for the Straight Edge community. From what I’ve heard some people have different definitions of what Straight Edge means, but basically the three X’s are meant to stand for, No Drinking, No Drugs, and No Promiscuous Sex (Although I heard some don’t follow this one, but how much more fun is promiscuous sex when you can drink).
Now I know you must be saying to yourself, “That Kid, you must be joking, surely there must be a reason, no college student in his right mind would choose not to drink, do drugs, or slam bits voluntarily?”
Unfortunately comrades, I jest not. The story goes that the hardcore punk band Minor Threat coined the term straight edge in their song of the same name in the 1980’s. If you’ve ever seen kids with X’s on their hands, this also is a sign of the straight edge lifestyle, first used when underage kids would go to see shows and the X’s bouncers would draw on their hands was used to signify that the patron was underage and couldn’t drink, which was later adopted by anyone following the lifestyle. Many hardcore bands today still promote the straight edge lifestyle, usually expressed through their lyrics and during shows and such.
So let’s go over this again, anyone going by these rules doesn’t drink, doesn’t do drugs (some even retain from advil…what), and doesn’t have promiscuous sex. In recent years too, the movement for veganism/vegetarianism has been pushed to be included. So basically, they are the complete opposite of the archetypal bro, bro’s love to drink, love to do whatever the fuck they want, promiscuous sex is the only kind of sex, and grillin’ anything as long as it was once a living breathing animal.
If you see one at a bar, they will generally stay out of your way, but if they ever feel the need to dismiss your particularly awesome activities, there’s only one phrase I have for them:
Sorry for Partying.
http://www.dobi.nu/yourscenesucks/
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