My daughter just reminded me that Rage Against The Machine’s debut album was released 22 years ago today.
Though it would take me a few years for me to decide whether Zack and the boys’ social and political commentary were a mere pose or should be taken seriously (I ultimately decided YES, very), I was immediately sold on the music and rage. It inspired a third wave renewal of my interest and passion for the then-current music scene which I was quickly losing (as the promise of West Coast alternative-independent punk-inflected metal of the early Sub Pop label in Seattle and Triple X Records in L.A. was becoming inexorably co-opted, tamed for commerce, and market-packaged as major label “grunge” for Stone Temple Pilots fans who preferred to have their “alternative” music served predictable).
The first time I heard it, “Killing in the Name” gobsmacked a huge grin on my face and immediately reignited my interest in what the young folks were listening to these days (I was a very jaded 35 at the time).
You have to admit, as a yawp of identity and resistance, RATM’s “fuck you I won’t do what you tell me” is way more significant (and fun) than my generation’s Network inspired “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore”?
Though Paddy Chayefsky’s movie is satire, more than a few people thought Howard Beale’s “mad as hell” speech spoke to an important unexpressed rage in the American public. Indeed, as recently as a month ago, Republic Broadcasting Network’s Dave Hodges, host of “The Common Sense Show” (audience size ~43–maybe), said of the “mad as hell” quote: “Look in the mirror, America, you are Howard Beale and it is time to get as mad as hell…”
Please.
The “mad as hell” oath (taken seriously, as Hodges would have it) is the miserable whine of a privileged middle class that wants all the issues, critiques, and taxes made to disappear so they can get back to the comforts of mindless, guilt-free uberconsumption.
“Fuck you I won’t do what you tell me” is a truth-to-power declaration of independence. A battle cry against injustice. White teabaggers toting open-carry permitted pistols and long guns from their fully loaded Ram pickups to the local DQ talk shit about being mad as hell. (About what, asshole?)
Every constituency of the progressive cause can authentically identify with Rage’s rage—women burdened with workplace discrimination and the reproductive surveillance state, workers whose collective bargaining rights and day-to-day dignity have been nullified by the corporate fascist state, LGBT people who must beg pardon for the sake of love and sex, all who are marginalized and oppressed by dint of caste, class, color, or transgression against the capricious tides of privileged norms and tastes can authentically (and joyfully) rage at full scream along with Zack: FUCK YOU I WON’T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME!
Others must modify the sentiment as per the graphic above.
Back to the Root 