Skinheads
Ira, writing about early 1980's New York Punk Rock, recalls Ian Mackay, Minor Threat, and the kids then identified as "Skinheads".
Sunday March 10, 2002
Ira wrote,
The first time Minor Threat came to NY (81), they came with a bunch of their friends from DC. It came to our attention that they were what we were calling skinheads because they shaved their heads. They were also a lot younger than the rest of us so we didn't take them all too seriously. Word was that they were also straight edge. A no drugs, no drinking and no sex practice that we found to be quite outrageous. We were also finding out that they had no tolerance for gays and women with any sense of self worth ie:their belief seemed to be that men were better than women. Well this didn't go over too well with the women of our group.We were all in our mid 20's by then and the DC kids were mostly younger than 18. The kids we did see on the lower east side that were following the "skin thing" were weekenders, living with their parents and going to school and trying to play punk something when away from home. Show all of this to your basic low income working class adult committed to the lifestyle we chose and you get a lot of snickers for young wannabe's who were also very verbal about their beliefs for young kids not in their own town.
We steadily lost our patience but they were young so we just put up with them. They weren't allowed into most of our haunts anyway. The 1st Minor Threat show was at Irving Plaza and I was working for 1 of the bands and was expecting a woman friend to meet me later. There was an unwritten policy that there were certain people who just got door policy at clubs and when my friend showed up she ran into Ian who proceeded to get quite abusive with her and wouldn't let her in. She did explain who she was and who she was meeting but was told amongst other things as a "girl" she didn't have any place at a show. When I got wind of this I confronted Ian and tensions ran hot for the rest of the night. There were a few incidents but none as bad as a small fist fight in the bathroom I had with 1 of Ian's roadies which was broken up by a couple of my friends b4 I foolishly was about to follow through with a "sharp Italian" threat. The rest of the night was spent with both groups on different sides of the club and the rest of their stay in NY (Minor Threat) was tense but uneventful. I do not remember them coming back anytime soon.
E. 13th Street '82
E. 13th St.'81, neighbors
Ira on Flipper
Ira on Harley
Ira MDC
Ira Q&A
Ira on Skins
Ira
Punk Rock Stories | San Francisco | New York
