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Something Important I've Never Talked About

2020-10-06 · letter vlog · Hank · 3:59 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Pop culture · mode: Personal essay · tags: calendar ritual

Revealing that he loved mosh pits, Hank argues they are not lawless: their rules (pick up anyone who falls, no punching or kicking) were set by lead singers and bands like 7 Seconds and Operation Ivy, his first models of intentionally leading a community, and lifting someone up feels even better than being helped.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Hank's never-told love of mosh pits; misconceptions that pits are anarchic and violent

  • ★★ Hank says he likes, or maybe used to like, mosh pits, which he thinks he has never said online; he may have had his last one. (hedged) — 00:00:00
  • ★★ Though a huge dork, Hank calls flinging himself into turbulent physicality with strangers one of the top ten sensations of his life. — 00:00:00
  • ★★ Hank says it is a misconception that mosh pits are purely anarchistic and violent: you can get hurt and there are violent people, but there are also rules. — 00:00:00

00:00:41 — Pit rules and who makes them: lead singers, 7 Seconds, Operation Ivy; leading a community; lifting people up

  • ★ Hank says the rules differ from scene to scene: a death metal pit is very different from a ska punk pit. — 00:00:41
  • ★★★ In Hank's pits the first rule was that if somebody goes down you get them back up, since that is the dangerous moment; you don't punch or kick, and shoving differs from that. — 00:00:41
  • ★★ From roughly age 15 to 25, Hank was fascinated by who makes these rules. (hedged) — 00:00:41
  • ★★★ Hank says pit rules are a microcosm of how culture works: at small shows the lead singer is in charge, and whether to stop violence in the pit is their responsibility as a leader. — 00:01:10
  • ★★ Hank says the norms the leader sets spread through the crowd, so a questionable activity becomes something you obviously shouldn't do, enforced by the crowd. — 00:01:10
  • ★★ On 7 Seconds' live album Scream Real Loud, Kevin Seconds can be heard several times telling people to get a guy out or calm down. — 00:01:39
  • ★ Hank calls 7 Seconds the most wholesome hardcore band ever. (playful) — 00:01:39
  • ★★ Bands of that era also wrote songs about the rules: 7 Seconds' Not Just Boys Fun is about making the hardcore scene more inclusive to all genders. — 00:01:39
  • ★★ Hank calls Operation Ivy hugely influential, overlooked and ahead of its time: about half the songs on Energy are about being a good person or a good member of the Gilman Street punk scene. — 00:02:09

  • ★★ Hank quotes Operation Ivy's The Crowd: if we're scared of one another we must be scared of ourselves; we need a gathering, not just another crowd. — 00:02:09

    “if we're scared of one another, must be scared of ourselves”

  • ★★★ Hank says these bands were his first exposure to intentionally leading a community: they established norms and said which behaviors were and weren't acceptable. — 00:02:36

  • ★ Hank adds that their parents were also good at leading, but a hardcore band and your mom differ in how cool they are. (playful) — 00:02:36
  • ★★★ Hank says the world looks like chaos yet usually we stay on our feet, and at best when we don't, somebody picks us up, because bad things happen when people are on the ground. — 00:02:36
  • ★★★ Hank says you lift someone up not just because of the rules but because it feels good: being helped when you need it is nice, helping someone else is even better. — 00:03:06

00:03:56 — Sign-off after the Pizzamas music ending

In the description and comments

  • ★★ In a channel comment Hank concedes he used 'anarchistic' wrongly, but holds that musicians set much of a scene's norms, as Energy shows Operation Ivy's singers doing. — creator comment

Threads in this video

Mentioned

Central: moshing

Also: People: Kevin Seconds

Projects: Pizzamas

Works: Energy · Not Just Boys Fun · Scream Real Loud · The Crowd

Groups: 7 Seconds · Operation Ivy

Concepts: punk subculture · social norm

Places: 924 Gilman Street

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