Skinhead

Of Mods in Skinheads

Skinheads result from vagueness modernist : after 1967 much of Mods transfer towards the flower power and the Psychédélisme. Some preserve the original style and radicalize their look: they are the hardware mods , or heavy mods . They carry the curved costume and the hat pork-magpie to dance, but of the sport clothing or work to trail in the street (sports shirt Fred Perry, shoes Doc. Martens black and waxed well with white laces…). They take the opposite course to the connected mode of the time (the such psychedelic wave or the movement Hippie), reject the Conformisme and post their working origins proudly ( working class ). These hardware mods is contracted on the identity modernist of the period 1962 - 1966: American negro music (drunk person), Italian luxury (Dolce vita), urban and modern style, scooters Vespa or Lambretta…

As they live in same the suburbs and working districts, the hardware mods attend the Rude servant boys , or rudies , young immigrants West-Indian, especially jamaïcains, to which the look is close and with which they share the taste for the American negro music (Soul, rythm' blues) and jamaïcaine (Ska and Rocksteady). Towards 1968 the hardware mods and the rudies merge to become the skinheads . Some claim that they mowed the hair to be distinguished from the hippies. Or because number of them worked in factory, to carry the short hair raised of a standard to avoid the incidents in contact with the machines. More probably, it is about a means to escape the police force assembled at the time of the riots. The look skinhead is standardized quickly: short hair (mowed or crossed short, but seldom shaven with white at that time), favorites, sports shirt style Fred Perry, shirt style Ben Sherman, straps, jeans style short Levis 501 crossed or pants adjusted standard Sta Close (rejection of the legs of elephant), shoes Doc. Martens, rangers or tennis shoes, wind-breaker style Bombers jacket, harrington or donkey jacket (coat of docker), scarf of its preferred football club… Let us note that the wind-breaker harrington, carried by the mods, then the skinheads and finally the punks, is not a mark but a type of light jacket in plain fabric of cotton doubled of fabrics with squares Scot (tartan). The name comes from the hero of the American televised series " Peyton Places " , very popular at the beginning of the Years 1960, Mr. Harrington, who wore this clothing. The look skinhead is thus a mixture of sportswear, working clotheses and surpluses military. But the adjusted costume, heritage modernist, are still carried to dance or brag in evening. These teenagers and these young adults adapt themselves, like those of today, certain marks becoming emblematic: Fred Perry, Lonsdale, Ben Sherman, Everlast, or Adidas…

1969, Skinheads popularize the reggae

In 1969, a true tidal wave skinhead invades the United Kingdom. This counter-culture becomes suddenly very with the mode and links the young people of the working districts, as well white as black. The skinheads listen of the drunk person, the rythm' blues (of the labels Stax, Motown or Chess records), of the mod' S happy (British drunk person-rock'n'roll of the Who and other Kinks or Small Faces), but especially of the Ska, the rocksteady and the reggae with black artists come from the the Caribbean such Simaryp, Laurel Aitken, Desmond Dekker and even the Skatalites, the Upsetters, Jimmy Cliff or Bob Marley, Wailers… The reggae and the rocksteady, much more than the ska almost passed of mode in 1969, seem the sound skinhead par excellence. For the purists, one speaks then about skinhead reggae , reggae one drop or of early reggae . In the tradition modernist, the skinheads like to dance. They compete of steps of dance complicated to brag at the time of the discoes , the equivalent of the booms Frenchwomen. The songs speak about their daily life: riots, difficulties of the working condition, problems of the every day, social dispute, but also sex, dance and football. The principal recording companies editors of ska and skinhead reggae in the United Kingdom are Trojan Records and Pama Records. The logo Trojan (a helmet of Trojan warrior) was taken again thereafter to indicate the original skinheads ( spirit off 69 ). The girls are called skinhead girls rather than birds or birdies (term pejorative are equivalent of French " pouffiasse").

These gangs of young people have sometimes a behavior violate and the Hooligan S quickly adopt the vestimentary style of the skinheads. Some advance that the skinheads result from hooliganism. They is at the same time true and false: the young British of the middle-classes and popular often behave in hooligans in the football stadiums, but hooliganism is older than the style skinhead (it dates from the beginning of the 20th century) and the vestimentary codes of the hooligans vary much with the modes (the majority of the current hooligans do not have absolutely the look skinhead). The abuse alcohol and various Drogue S (especially the Amphetamine S to be able to dance all during the night, LSD being rather a fashion of Hippie S) does not arrange anything with the image skinheads. The press tabloïd can consequently stigmatize the skinheads, as it had done before for the mods or the rockers . It is the new threat.

The frequent use of the national colors (Union Jack for the whole of the British or Holy Georges Cross-country race for the English) by the skinheads of this time is wrongly interpreted as a slip towards nationalism. In fact the young British often show a patriotism jingoist such as one can meet it in the platforms of the football stadiums. It is not generally founded on any nationalism in a strict sense. The mods before raised the national colors and the punks thereafter will make in the same way. Also let us note that the British pavoisent much more frequently than the French. This pride to belong to the British nation is even a unifying element for the young white British and the black West-Indians come from Jamaica or St Lucia (states of the Commonwealth, whose inhabitants are compared to the British since subjects of the same queen).

But it is true that the skinheads of this time are proof of mistrust in the opposition, not of the Blacks, but of the young Indians and Pakistani, whose vestimentary style and the musical tastes bring them closer to the hippies. Some organize true Ratonnade S in their opposition: the paki bashing . Those react and found gangs of skinhead scalpers . This opposition between skinheads black and white on the one hand and young people indo-Pakistani of the other was however never a general information at the time of the first skinhead wave. It is rather a circumscribed reality with certain districts of London and especially with certain gangs. Besides the files of time show many skinheads with the Asian type.

This first skinhead wave thus before a a whole mode, a musical and vestimentary style is largely ignored out of the United Kingdom. There is practically no skinheads at that time in continental Europe or North America. At most the vestimentary fashion skinhead it had some echoes in May 68. In an amusing way, in the film " Everyone it is beautiful, everyone it is gentil" (1970), the actor Jean Yanne carries during some sequences a behavior inspired by the skinhead fashion: tightened Jean with reverse, fitted wind-breaker of the same fabric, rangers, hair plated and favorite. For the majority of the British journalists the skinheads are only one new kind of unverifiable hooligans (at the time France has its black wind-breakers). The movement or is not politicized little.

About 1971 the skinhead wave is blown. Novel modes appear: the style Glam rock'n'roll for the young white and the Movement rastafari for the blacks. The authentic skinheads, which reject racism and free violence, adopt the style suedehead (velvet cranium): the look becomes more required, with the manner of the mods, the hair push back.

1979, Skinheads reappear then are politicized

After 1971 the skinhead spirit does not disappear therefore and survives through the suedeheads then the smoothies (these-last carry the rather long hair). Both adopt the style bootboy when they go down in the street: rolled up jeans, rising Doc. Marten' S, straps… It is the vestimentary style raised in film of Stanley Kubrick " Clockwork orange ". Work is violent but the message is more subtle than it does not appear to with it: a criticism of the behaviorist theories and a caricature of the most ridiculous aspects of the modern societies. After this film a source of inspiration for many skinheads groups will constitute, contributing to forge the image of the young violent, unverifiable but cynically lucid rebel.

The mods them also are Has-been but remain numerous, in particular in the north of England where they are at the origin of a particular musical style, influenced by the American negro music of the years 1960, the northern drunk .

The musical codes change and at the bootboys the reggae, the rocksteady and the ska are quickly supplanted by the glam rock'n'roll (cf David Bowie or The New York Dolls), the pub rock'n'roll (cf Dr. Feelgood and Elvis Costello) then the punk-rock'n'roll (musical genre invented in the United States by the Stooges, the New York Dolls, still them, and the Ramones, born in 1974 and famous since 1976). Number of the British first Punk S (end 1976-beginning 1977) have the style bootboy , to start with the Clash (in addition fans of reggae and pub rock'n'roll).

Benefitting from the media explosion punk in 1977, the skinheads and even the mods reappears and mixes with the punks . They very few, are then drowned in the punk mass. The film Quadrophenia (1979) and groups it The Jam take part in the revival of the current modernist . The hybridization of the mods and the punks bears the name of hardware-mods (begun again of a term already used at the end of the years 1960). After 1979 however, the punk-rock'n'roll does not have any more the favor of the media of mass and the look punk is radicalized: the punks become not dead (of the expression “punk' S not dead”). It is the time when hobnailed wind-breakers and coloured peaks appear. However much of punks of the first wave adopt the style of the skinheads, which passes at the same time like a return to the sources and a toughening. The movement skinhead knows a new hour of mediatization.

These new skinheads listens to or plays of the street punk and the oi!, i.e. violent and radical forms of punk-rock'n'roll. Oi! , in slang cockney, is the contraction of the apostrophe: Hey you! . One hears Oi! for the first time on a piece of the Clash in 1977 ( Career opportunities ). The precursory groups are Menace, Angelic Upstarts or Sham 69, then come Cockney Rejects, Business, Cocksparrers, The 4 Skins, Last Resort, The Oppressed, Blitz…

Sham 69, group emblematic of the skinheads (and always on the road) never adopted a radical look skinhead (the singer carries the semi-long hair). The videos of end of the year 1970 show rather the very frequent look bootboy at that time. The members of Blitz or Oppressed post as for them an appearance skinhead more standardized much (mowed hair, ankle boots, straps…). Exploited reveal the street-punk look, basically different from that of the skinheads but with similarities: cuts iroquoises (peaks), hobnailed leather jackets, grinding cartridge pouches and pants deviate from the look skinhead. One notes here (except for the hair) an osmosis with the style heavy very extravagant metal of the time. But the punks not dead carry also turned up straps, jeans and ankle boots like the skinheads. The punks seem to prefer the rangers and the skinheads coquées Docs Martens or the paraboots (generic term to indicate the boots of jump, the most known mark being Getta Grip). The intermediate looks between the punk one and the skinhead are indicated under the terms bootboys , skunks or herberts . These nuances appear futile to the neophyte. But it should be understood that at the punks like the skinheads vestimentary appearance, the haircut and the pace in general have a considerable importance. The majority are teenagers or young adults who seek with émanciper and are thus very attentive with the vestimentary codes.

This time knows also a revival rocksteady, ska and skinhead reggae which contributes to popularize the style skinhead with groups like Madness, The Specials, Bad Manners or The Selecter at Two-Ton Records. These musicians adopt a vestimentary style rather modernist or hardware mods , but the public is largely skinhead. Many artists jamaïcains fallen into the lapse of memory remake surface (for example the singer Laurel Aitken, godfather off ska music , or the trombonist Rico Rodriguez). The ska, energized by the punk-rock'n'roll influences, gains the favors of the public skinhead of the time.

But in 1979, contrary to 1969, the very great majority of the skinheads are white. It is as of this time as date the practice to shave the hair and the Oi music! from this time is often described as closed shave (shaven of near). The slogan ACAB ( all the cops are bastards , " all the cops are bâtards") fact its appearance. Since 1979 the skinhead fashion exceeds the United Kingdom and touches North America and Western Europe (in France the first skin-punk compilation Chaos leaves in 1982). It is a particularly long-lived counter-culture in the years 1980, even if it does not attract the majority of the young people. In France, thepunk one of the Camera silens or the Mouse Déglinguée attracts a public skinhead. The same applies to Skarface, legend alive of the ska to France. In New York the inventors of the punk-hardcore music are generally skinheads (Agnostic Front, Madball, MOD,…), and assert still today their membership of the movement. These skinheads evolves/moves in a broader mobility: punk-rock'n'roll, the hardcore or alternative rock'n'roll.

This second time skinhead is also marked by the political recovery of the movement. At the end of the years 1970 the Extrême British right wing (National British Party and National Face) is established among the white young people punks and skinheads resulting generally from the most disadvantaged social classes and in situation from marginalisation. The provocations of some punks, as Sid Vicious which often raised a tee-shirt to swastika, made think of some that rebellious truths were the Nazis. Ian Stuart, singer of the punk group Skrewdriver, is a typical example of this drift. Skrewdriver was a street group punk perfectly apolitical (like the vast majority of the punks groups at that time), but particularly provocative, born in 1977. After Split of short duration Ian Stuart reconstitutes the group in 1979, but in a openly politicized form néonazie, then it creates Blood and Honor with the beginning of the year 1980. It is a nationalist movement, racist and in particular anti-semite. Ian Stuart does not hide its fascination for Hitler and is not long in giving directly its support for associations néonazies, as well in the United Kingdom as to Germany. It is followed by part of the skinheads which adopt an increasingly violent behavior and rock towards the extreme line. Much is hooligans fascinated by violence in all its forms. They howl Sieg Heil! or Heil Hitler in the concerts and starts frequent brawls with the others skinheads or the punks, without speaking about the aggressions towards the blacks or the immigrants. The paki bashing begins again.

Some skinheads could approach the extreme-right-hand side to take the opposite course to the punks to the period 1979-1982: rejection of dirtiness, the look " destroy" badly shaved, of reducing to beggary, anarchism bawler, the hard drugs… respect of the family values, work, the fatherland, healthy and clean pace physical and vestimentary… I.e. the rejection of the marginalisation and attachment with at the same time popular and preserving values. Ideologically these nationalist first skinheads rake very broad: survivors of the British Nazism of the Thirties which serve mentors, anti-semites of any hair, xenophobes scalded by immigration, anticommunists who denounce the Soviet states, hooligans violentissimes, punks and skinheads deprived of ideological reference marks which like to cause while raising badges Nazis (whereas their parents often fought the Nazis in 1939-45)…

Nauseated by this recovery of their counter-culture and faithful to their mongrel roots, the skinheads antiracists gather as from 1979-80 in Skinheads Against the Nazis (S.A.N., impelled and controlled by Socialist Worker' S Party, trotskist), then within SHARP ( SkinHeads Against Racial Damage , movement founded in New York about 1987 starting from the experiment since 1985 of a group of skinheads and boot-servant boys of Cincinnati called Baldies Against Racism). The emblematic figure of movement SHARP is Roddy Moreno, leader of the Welsh group The Oppressed and importer in 1989 of the SHARP in the United Kingdom. The Oppressed sing Work together (wink Marxist with the " Proletarians of all the countries, you link! "). But before " avoid-feux" do not start to function, the image skinheads and even certain groups emblematic of the scene had to suffer from the drift towards the neonazism of a part of them. Thus the Sham 69, desperate that many skinheads of extrème-right-hand side attends their concerts (the " SHAM Army" , troop of fans of the group, being even gangrénée by those). Its mythical singer Jimmy Pursey then decides to give the pendulums per hour while making play the group in festivals RAR (Rock'n'roll Against Racism). The Sham 69 adapt the Chilean revolutionary song El pueblo unido jamas will be vencido (the plain people will never be overcome) in If the kids are united they will never Be defeated (If the kids are linked, they will never be beaten). These groups reaffirm their pride to belong to the working class and to share its values: fraternity, solidarity, social struggles… At the same time the Dead Kennedys (Punk group Californian) denounce the drift of the punks and skinheads Nazis in the piece Nazi punks. Fuck off! . Some skinheads antiracists are engaged within Socialist Workers Party, Marxist organization revolutionary which organizes great strikes as from 1980 in reaction to the liberal policy of the Thatcher government (called into question of social skills, doulouleuses reorganizations in industry and the mines…). They are called reds (red) by the nationalists who show them to want to make rock the Occident in the Soviet sphere (makes the majority of the skinheads antiracists of it are close to British socialism or the trade unionism reformist, more rarely of Communism). Besides true the redskins , close to the revolutionary left, constitutes in the beginning (around the group of drunk person-rock'n'roll The Redskins animated by the permanent ones of the SWP) a movement distinct from the skinheads. The skinheads antiracists consider the nationalists and the néonazis like forgery skinheads and call literally them Bonehead S (" craniums of os" , makes the English equivalent of " of it; crétin"). These two terms, pejorative in the spirit of those which use them, always have course today.

Skinheads today

Today the mobility of the skinheads is deeply divided and heteroclite. The neophyte will have great difficulty to decide between them, more especially as the vestimentary codes are similar in spite of very different political tendencies. The culture skinhead is founded on a musical support. The reading of the songs, the imagery of the small pockets of disc, the labels of distribution, production, the posted logos or slogans often make it possible to locate the artists politically.

The skinheads are in fact with the image of the company: their political sensibility goes from the Extrême right-hand side to the Extreme left while passing by the left and the right traditional. Some are democratic, whereas others are attracted by radical speeches which preach the Dictatorship of the proletariat of the Marxist-Leninist type, or contrary a dictatorship of the National-Socialist type. Some are radically racist, whereas others reject in very standard block of racism. Some are atheistic or agnostic, whereas others are believers (Christian, pagan, Buddhist)…

In spite of this diversity, there are common points which gather them (almost) all: they result generally from the modest or average social classes, and are proud their social origins. They scorn with vitality the police force, the middle-class men and the hippies (still that the contempt of the hippies resembles more one play than with a real hatred in certain bands). They generally support the football team of their city and optionnellement their national team. Their taste for the provocation and the brawl gathers them too. In the same way, they adore déhancher on the tracks of dance at the time of evenings 60 ' S with the sound of the musics mods, drunk person or jamaïcaines - except the skinheads néonazis -, go pogoter at the time of concerts streetpunk, oi! (or RAC for the néonazis). Lastly, the skinheads are also very active in the drafting and the diffusion of fanzines dedicated to the music, football and other cultures (like tattooing or the scooter for example).

Skinheads non-aligned known as apolitical

The question of the apolitical skinheads feeds the hot throats. Historically it is undeniable that the first skinhead wave, between 1968 and 1971, was stripped of any political fastener, therefore apolitical by definition.

The mention of apolitical attitude appeared as such, and asserted by many skinheads, when the extreme line recovered part of the movement as from 1978. This mention of apolitical attitude then meant the rejection of the extreme-right-hand side and its values. It is besides there the later origin (1985 - 1987) of movement SHARP: SkinHeads Against Racial Damage (Skinheads against the racial prejudices). Cf the first part of the article.

However the concept evolved/moved while spreading with all the attempts at infiltration, of right-hand side like left. One can define the apolitical skinhead as that which savagely refuses to post as a skinhead any affiliation with a party or a trade union and refuses to mix the skinhead fashion that it raises to the political commitment, of right-hand side like left, extremist or moderate. This does not mean however that it does not have any idea, nor no engagement. But it openly does not post it as a skinhead and shown a relative reserve.

Beyond this simple refusal of the mixture of the kinds, much of skinheads apolitical are disgusted by recoveries of their movement, as well by the extreme-right-hand side as by the extreme-left. They consider that political recovery (almost always extremist when they are the skinheads) " salit" , all corrupts, and especially that a truth skinhead cannot be posted as a militant, and not to be extremist. Between the higher bids of the skinheads néonazis on the one hand and Communists or anarchists of the other, some skinheads return them back to back. In a paradoxical way, they come from there to militate for the apolitical attitude (cf the texts of French groups: Eye for Eye " To drink! " , Iron " Cranium; Apopulaires" , Trap " Apolitique" or Catalan: Lastly Assalto " Apoliticos"). One can see with the reverse of the small pockets of the disc of the evocative logos like a barred swastika associated with an also barred sickle and a hammer. The French group Kohorte IDF is made represent on its small pockets by a semi-skinhead character, semi-mercenary of the 15th century, which relates to its ecu " neither red, nor bone (for bonehead), just skin". It is a clear rejection of the extremism of the two edges.

In the beginning the apolitical skinheads were those which refused the enrollment by the extreme-right-hand side with the beginning of the year 1980 in the United Kingdom and the United States. Original movement SHARP can then be regarded as apolitical. Today however the SHARP appears rather on the left committed and the apolitical attitude is asserted in two manners by some of the skinheads (but also a number not négigeable of punks): the first is the refusal to openly mingle its fashion with any trade-union political commitment or (moderate or extremist), the second a refusal of any political commitment or trade-union, especially extremist. The limit between these two forms of apolitical attitude is often fuzzy and fluctuating but it appears sometimes in a clear way: thus, for example, in May 2002 much of skinheads apolitical ravelled in the street to mark their opposition to the candidate of Le Pen extreme-right-hand side. They thus clearly posted their membership of a camp

The far left indicated the apolitical ones as of rough a long time for which counted only the " 3B" (beer, kisses, baston), even like crypto-fascists or specialists in the reversal of jacket. It is true that certain French skinheads years 1980 started by being apolitical before becoming néonazis. There be also courses opposite. Especially the apolitical skinheads seem today scalded by the extremists of all edges. But the majority are also posted like antiracists and not-Nazis, which is already a standpoint by the negative one.

The SHARP, evoked previously in the article, is at the border of the apolitical attitude and ideological engagement, this is why will treat we later. In a way there still very paradoxical one could define the skinheads Sharp like " apolitical of gauche" (the expression is of a Québécois journalist).

At the apolitical skinheads one meets in particular the traditional Trojan skinheads or skinheads: perpétuateurs of the spirit of 1969, fans of reggae, drunk person, rocksteady and Ska, they often circulate in the scooter like the mods , they hardly mix music and policy. They post a sincere antiracism however and assert their membership of the working class . They are, with the historical direction, the faithful continuators of the first skinhead wave.

Among the apolitical groups of music skinhead, one can quote The Last Resort , 4-Skins , Cock Sparrer , Warzone or The Business .

Skinheads engaged, said politicized

The politicized skinheads are sympathizers or militant political, trade-union and/or associative who share either an ideology of extreme left or an ideology of extreme-right-hand side. Their will is to make pass a radical political message through their concerts or their different fanzines and actions.

The expression even of skinheads politicized should not induce in error: the extreme-right-hand side and the extreme-left (or far left) are not to in no case plain and their differences carry it of much on their common points. The committed term of skinhead or militant is preferable (let us notice that it exite also militant plumbers or engaged rappeurs, therefore it is not a characteristic skinhead…).

Skinheads of extreme right-hand side

Nationalists

The latter are close to the traditional parties of extreme right-hand side, like the Front National or the National republican movement (MNR) in France. These skinheads is not Nazis. They are identity (defense of the national identity, the culture gréco-Roman (even celto-Germanic) and of the Christian of Europe, and anti-gauchistes heritage. Their sometimes exacerbated nationalism can bring them closer to time to other of the movement White Power (racist and Nazi); some are particularly opposite with the Islam and to the immigrants of Maghrebian origin (in France), Pakistani (the United Kingdom) or Turkish (Germany). The nationalist skinheads, often attached to the preserving values, can also scorn the homosexual ones. The Groupe union defense (GUD, studied movement of extreme right-hand side in France) has a time recruited among the young people around federator topics like the defense of the French identity, the refusal of immigration or the corruption of the politicians. According to Fiammetta Venner, many Beurs or individuals of immigrant origin composes the movement skinhead and their engagement makes think of the symptom of an identity crisis, as if the fact of being among most racist made forget their origins and was the ultimate form of integration .

Also let us note that the French extreme-right-hand side is divided and that the skinheads which are close the same. Many challenges the skinhead term to prefer that of " to him; young person nationaliste". The frequentation of the sites and forums Internet of this mobility learns to us thus that some are deeply anti-semites, they condemn the existence even of Israel and take make and cause for the Arabs and even the islamist ones. Contrary to others see Israel like the avant-garde of the Occident vis-a-vis the danger arabo-Moslem and support the radical Zionism then. This example shows us from the quite different points of view.

The White Power white , néonazis and supremacists

Openly Nazis, therefore racist. One also speaks about Boneheads, pejorative term used by their opponents (all others skinheads), or of naziskins . They very active (and were rather widespread in France during the time 1985-95, where they represented the majority of the skinheads then) and are gathered in various organizations such Blood and Honor, Hammerskins or Combat 18, a terrorist group organized starting from the fascistic kop of Chelsea Headhunters. The naziskinheads are very visible in Scandinavia, East Germany (ex-GDR), in certain areas of the United States (where they are organized in network with other organizations of extreme right-hand side like the Ku Klux Klan), as in Eastern Europe, in particular in Poland, Serbia or especially Russia, country which counts the greatest number of skinheads néonazis (where they often défraient the chronicle by their many aggressions against immigrants or Russians Eastern, usually going until the murder). The look is distinguished a little from the original look skinhead: it is frankly paramilitary, the hair are generally shaven with white. The badges are the swastika, the escutcheons of the LVF or of division Das Reich , the Celtic cross, the gallons of the Wehrmacht or the S… the Germanic symbolic system, Viking or Celt are often used by the skinheads néonazis which mark thus their rejection of the values Judeo-Christians and preach a return to Indo-European paganism. The use of the Celtic or Germanic imagery is a recovery. All the movements which claim paganism, celtism etc are not néonazis, nor even nationalists. The boneheads Nazis are recognized thanks to the initials NS (national-Socialist, i.e. Nazi), generally coupled with number 88 (for HH, eighth letter of the alphabet and initial of " Heil Hitler" ). The Lonsdale mark was a long time preferred néonazis because by partially opening the wind-breaker on the tee-shirt one can read NSDA, that is to say the beginning of NSDAP (German initials of the Nazi party). However the owners of the mark communicated much on the fact that the champion of Lonsdale boxing, at the origin of the mark, created in London the first room of drive open to the blacks. The skinheads néonazis have their emblematic own brands and initials today. The boneheads Nazis claim also working class. In years 1980 much of between-them regarded themselves as spiritual sons of SA (Sections of attack, brigades of militants Nazis of the years 1930 in Germany). These SA held at the same time nationalist, racist but such a social speech and resulted from the working world and the lower middle class. They claimed advanced social measures and the constitution of a popular army. Their chiefs were carried out and their organizations absorptive by the S with the orders of Hitler at the time of the " Harms of long the couteaux" in 1934.

The music of the boneheads is the RAC: Rock'n'roll Against Communism . The majority of the rac groups are diffused in a discrete way, by the mail-order selling, where at the time of the concerts. In France a misadventure of the rac was RIF: French Identity rock'n'roll. Among the musical groups of skinheads néonazis, one can quote: The Germans Landser, the French Legion 88, Bunker 84, Buckshot, Skinhead Division, Australian the Fortress, the Poles Konkwista 88, the Americans Bound For Glory or the Swedes Pluto Svea. The group of reference remains the English of Skrewdriver (cf the first part of the article). The majority of these groups incorporate metal influences in their music which remains nevertheless containing Oi!. There has existed, for a few years, a bringing together between the skinheads white power and the mediums Black pagan metal, which claim sometimes them also national-socialisme, creating a hybrid style which starts to become certain extensive, in particular in Eastern Europe and USA. If one notes also an adhesion with the ideas of extreme-right-hand side in a minority part of the scenes industrial and Dark folk, the Gothic mobility is far from adhering massively to the extreme-right-hand side. There is still a partial recovery. Only the RAC can be considered, by the ideas that it conveys, like authentically extrème-right-hand side. However nationalist and néonazis attends also other musical universes which are not reserved to them (it would be absurd and anachronistic of décrêter that Beethoven and Wagner are Nazis under pretext that Hitler used their music for his propaganda).

to also see National socialist black metal

Skinheads of extreme left

The Skinheads Against Racial Damage

The history of movement SHARP (Skinheads Against Racial Damage) was evoked in the first part of the article. It is a form of apolitical attitude of left, as paradoxical as can appear the term. Generally the majority of the skinheads sharp share the idea according to which political recovery gangrené the movement skinhead, the extremism of right-hand side as of left condemns but posts proudly their antiracism, them antifascime and of the working values (solidarity, social struggles, direction of the festival, friendship…). Current movement SHARP is rather a mobility because it is structured little. They are associations type law of 1901, nonfederate between them, which adopt the same logo and of the similar statutes. There is no militant in a strict sense. In France the SHARP wants to be " antiracist, antifascist and populaire" and " free of any political affiliation or syndicale". The skinheads French sharp attend however much the skinheads of extrème-left and defect and poured. In years 1990 of the skinheads French sharp were close to the movement Ras the Face, opposed to the Front National of Jean-Marie Le Pen. However Close-cropped the Face was controlled by intellectuals close to PCF and militants of the LCR…

In the United States, skinheads sharp ravelled in the street as well against racism or the homophobie… as in favor of the first war of the Gulf (1991)! Of left, but as patriotic… the skinheads sharp of on the other side of the Atlantic are certainly less close to the radical left as their French counterparts!

The SHARP also seems for certain a form of apolitical attitude accompanied by an engagement with minima to dissociate skinheads of extreme right-hand side. The logos sharp often include/understand the helmet of the Greek hoplite Trojan label, crossed axes, bay-trees (references to the logo Fred Perry) or a boot which crush a swastika.

In the majority of the countries, the SHARP is close to other mobilities skinheads more engaged much and generally to extrème-left. But there exists in France and especially in Paris region a higher bid between skineads sharp on the one hand and some redskins of the other. The sharps show the redskins to be " staliniens". The redskins show the sharps not to be radical and sincere antifascists. Nevertheless, these sometimes violent oppositions remain especially characteristic of the Parisian scene, since, in province, the skinheads affiliated with the SHARP are generally interdependent of the skinheads more politicized with the extreme-left.

Some groups close to Sharp: the Oppressed, Sham 69, Blaggers (RU), Comrade (Belgium), Impact (Canada), Los Fastidios (Italy)…

The Redskin S

In the beginning, they are not skinheads strictly speaking, but fans of the British group of drunk person-rock'n'roll The Redskins (at the end of 70 ' s/première half 80 ' S), whose several members belonged to Socialist Workers Party and were the permanent ones. The group, which holds a revolutionary speech on bottom of crossbred music drunk of punk-rock'n'roll, organizer of Red Wedge (the " corner rouge") with other groups and artists (Style Council, Billy Bragg, Happy Bronski/The Communards…) to support the fights of resistance against the social and political damage of the liberalism of Thatcher, then makes followers who gather and more or less start to organize themselves to take again the street with the fascists or to defend the concerts. They meet authentic skinheads " then; rouges" , gathered in Red Action Skinhead (skinhead fraction of Red Action, a political small group trotskist resulting from a scission of the SWP on the question of anti-Fascism in the street) or resulting from bands with special character, like that of the skinheads of Coventry, close relations since their origin of tiny British Communist Party.

In France, carried by the emergence of the scene known as of the " rock'n'roll alternatif" (Black Bérurier, Nuclear Device, Ludwig Von 88, Babylon Fighters, LKDS, Ugly Thénardier…) and popularized by the fights coeds of winter 86 and their combat in the street against the skinheads of extrème-right-hand side, the first redskins posted a look borrowing as much from the skinheads that with the tribes " rock" in general (punks, mods, psychobillys…). With the backward flow of the vague alternative, as from 1989, some then approached the original style skinhead by sometimes preserving some particularisms inherited this first redskin wave: to bend turned over side orange lining, laces red, distinguished and patches communist various… But all the redskins are not regarded by for as much as skinheads. If the major part of today can be attached to the skinheads (musics, vestimentary style or of life…), there remains a current which remains about it only with the margin or, even, moves away from there sometimes at the cultural level (invested in the rap…) and often cultivating with the others redskins only one social link and policy.

The Red And Anarchist Skinhead S

Founded in New York at the all-beginning of the Nineties, the RASH (Red and Anarchist Skinheads), especially European and, for a few years, Latin-American, have gathered old redskins first wave and new skinheads engaged with the extreme left, sometimes resulting from mobility SHARP. Its members regard their membership of the movement skinhead as a complement of their militant engagement, the skinhead becoming a form of ideal ouvrierist, but the reverse is sometimes true: some skinheads " sentimentalement" or culturally of left, but without engagement, become militant by the frequentations, the formation or experimental acquisition within bands and groups where militants are present.

The majority of skinheads RASH revolve around: anarchistic Union, the Anarchistic Federation, the Anarchist Black Cross-country race, the Libertarian Communist Organization, the National confederation of Work (anarchist-trade unionist), the Communist revolutionary league and various bunches trotskists or guevarists, even, marginally, post-Maoists… This movement asserts a visceral antiracism and a radical antifascism and often plays the higher bid with respect to the SHARP, sometimes considered an ally, sometimes as a competitor (but not like an enemy). The topics of the internationalism or revolutionary urgency, class struggle are recurring. A slogan of the skinheads Rash is: " No the war enters the races, not of peace between the classes".

Among the scene skinhead of extreme left, one can quote Italian of Banda Bassotti, Erode, Los Fastidios or Nabat, German of Stage Bottles, the Catalan independence groups marxisants Opcio K-95 and Pilseners, the inhabitants of Madrid of Kaos Urbano, Guerilla Oi! or Not Servium, Basque of Suburban Rebels or Mossin Nagant, or libertarian groups Parisian Brigada Flora Magon and Ya Basta! or Marxist groups of Bordeaux Los Foiros and REDWEILER

It should be noted that some skinheads Sharp, Rash and of many redskins are also posted like freedom fighters, even nationalist. There exist two nationalisms: one of extreme-right-hand side (primacy of the nation, value structural), to which skinheads nationalist and néonazis are attached, another of left (freedom for the nation, spaces historical and dialectical of a community of destiny), to which some are attached skinheads committed on the left, in particular within minorities which fight for their recognition, even their independence: Breton, Basques, Catalans, Occitans… In this last case it is about a very minority mobility and which raises the slogan " Occitània Antifascista". There is thus no ambiguity.

Other identities skinheads

In a more anecdotic way, there exist other identities skinheads.

Skinheads Christians

For some, their positioning is openly antiracist and anti-nazi. Very present in North America (Canada and the USA) where the scene punk-rock'n'roll Christian woman is gigantic, Christian skinheads make more and more speak about them in Europe. The latter are much more present in the hardcore medium and straight edge (neither alcohol, neither cigarette, nor drug) that in the medium Oi! or Punk Street . Among the Christian skins groups, one can quote the American group of ska/rocksteady The Israelites , the group of punk hardcore American The Deal , the group of Oi! German Jesus Skins (who carried out a " split" commun run with the group of skins Jewish Californian " Jewdriver ") or the American streetpunk group with Scottish sonorities Flatfoot 56 .

The Gayskins

" Skinheads" homosexual. The skinhead fashion is openly raised by certain homosexual, called gayskins with some amusing imaginations: pink sports shirt grinding latex fluo or pants… In the male homosexual pornography, the skinhead is a misadventure of the working class servant boy (young workman). The skinheads of extrème-right-hand side, generally homophobes, challenge this mobility. The others hardly take them with serious because the references skinheads of the gayskins are more vestimentary musical. It should be noted that there exists nevertheless, in or close to Rash (notemment in Germany), of true skins gay affirmed and asserted like such. There exists also a gay bunch néonazi founded by a roadie of the fascistic group Skrewdriver: the Gay Aryan Skinheads, which refers to SA and manners " Greek antiques" these-last. But these " skinheads" homosexual Nazis practice much less the art of the second degree that the others gayskins and try especially, through their contradictions, to realize a marginal identity in oneself as much as in their own space socio-policy.

Gabbers

The Gabber medium, founded in Holland, owes its name with the word Yiddish which signie " frère". Gabbers are " teufeurs" with the look skinhead. To the Netherlands and in Belgium especially, more rarely in the north of France, certain music lovers techno and of turnip left raise almost the look skinhead. Indicated under the name of Gabbers, they prefer the techno known as " hardcore" or " makina". A priori this mobility neither is organized, nor politicized although one finds there of all… and especially not politicized people. However, some - especially in Belgium - are politicized with the extreme-right-hand side and bend explicit escutcheons and patches on their wind-breakers. Some can thus be comparable with skinheads, but are not it to in no case, even with boneheads. Gabbers, or Gabberines with female, can be recognized, like the skinheads, with the marks which they carry (Lonsdale, Fred Perry, Everlast…) and other wind-breakers (bomber' S or Harrington) and shoes (Doc. Marteen' S, Adidas).

Conclusion

It should be retained that the first skinheads appeared at the end of the years 1960 and that they were not to in no case racist or fascistic, nor Communists, therefore not politicized besides. Their common point was their modest social origin, their love of the negro music and their taste for the brawl. It is with the appearance of the Punk-rock'n'roll in 1977 and the unemployment which strikes full whip Europe at the end of the Années 1970, that the movement skinhead politicizes mainly. It is the beginning of the great opposition between the scenes skinheads of extreme-right-hand side and extreme-left, the first being in particular allured by the texts néonazis of the second formation of the British group Skrewdriver, and the seconds by groups like The Clash or The Oppressed.

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