sXe Factor
Straight Edge movement followers abstain from drugs, alcohol and promiscuity in a punk lifestyle
Photo:Jessica Crossfield
Tony Depaolo’s long, brown pony tail falls over his shoulders as he bends down and lifts his jean pant leg to reveal a column of three, large black X’s covered by patches of dark curly hair. The six-year-old reminder, bought as a 20th birthday present from his mother, permanently stains his calf and takes him back to his days of living Straight Edge (sXe), a lifestyle in which he refrained from alcohol, smoking and promiscuous sex.
“I broke it over a Budweiser beer,” Depaolo says, laughing.
Now at 26, his tattoo’s latest edition, which he got when he was 24, reads “Time’s Up” above the top X and “No Regrets” inked below the bottom X.
“Once a person breaks his edge, there’s no going back,” he says.
“It was a hot summer day and I was running late for band practice, so I didn’t bring water like I normally would. All my friends brought cases of beer,” he says. “I thought who cares, I’m a big boy now, and if I want to have a beer with some friends, it’s OK. I just cracked it open and drank. Everyone freaked out and hugged me.”
Depaolo, a Naples native, wears a dark bushy beard and goatee. Silver hoop gages hang from his ears. After proudly showing off his black electric guitar at his place of work in Sim’s Music & Sound in Gainesville, Depaolo talks about the punk and hardcore music scene that became his pathway into the sXe world.
Bands like Minor Threat, Earth Crisis, Gorilla Biscuits and the Youth of Today, to name a few, play an essential role in the sXe movement.
Throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s, Washington, D.C.’s hardcore punk band Minor Threat founded by lead singer Ian MacKaye and drummer Jeff Nelson, grew in popularity as one of the first bands to preach the “stay punk, stay clean” ethos. According to Fortune City’s Straight Edge for Life Web site, the Straight Edge ideal was created by Nelson, who was drawing a poster for a show featuring a wood ruler. He told his bandmates that the ruler’s straight edge was a metaphor for their lifestyle.
The sXe movement’s poster song “Straight Edge” written by MacKaye in 1981, is said to be an obituary to his friend who died of a heroin overdose, according to the Manchester Newspaper. In his song, MacKaye expresses his pain, anger and his determination to live a clean and pure lifestyle. He sings, “Always gonna keep in touch, never want to use a crutch, I’ve got the straight edge,” but says that the movement does not reflect his opinions.
“I have never thought of straight edge as an organized movement,” he explains. “I was never kidding about the lyrics and the decisions about my own lifestyle. I just wasn’t interested in engineering a code to be enforced on others.”
Whether he intended or not, “Straight Edge” inspired other bands and youths like Depaolo, to follow Minor Threat’s lead. X’s which were originally used by club owners and bartenders to prohibit underage drinking were now voluntarily drawn onto sXe hands with black permanent marker. After Nelson replaced the D.C. jurisdictional flag’s three stars with three Xs for band artwork, the triple—X became the symbol used on clothing, accessories and tattoos. X’s also became popular besides the spelling of names, as a mark of identity. Depaolo says that he liked putting X’s on his hand when he’d go out to concerts and would wear sXe shirts with band lyrics on them in school.
“People would ask me what the lyrics on my shirt meant,” Depaolo says. After he’d explain that he didn’t drink, smoke, or have casual sex, he said that people would inquire what he did. “I have fun.” He would reply. As if that wasn’t a good enough answer, he says that people would then question, “Well what do you do for fun, if you don’t do those things?” Depaolo rolls his eyes as he shakes his head.
“I was completely taken aback; I don’t know how to answer that. Is that how pathetic and shallow everything has gotten?” he asks.
Though Depaolo is no longer sXe, he says that he is still reminiscent of his old sobriety. Sometimes sXe can mean so much that it becomes dangerous, says Rob Barnes, 31, who is a friend of Depaolo’s. Barnes smiles and says that he and Depaolo look like twins, minus Depaolo’s ponytail and the sleeve of tattoos covering Barnes’ right arm.
Barnes says that after 11 years, he still considers himself sXe, but chooses not to associate with it as a movement because he’s afraid of being characterized as the militant sXe extremists known to support the “hard- line” movement. They were known as the “Chaos Crew” in parts of South Florida.
In a back room at Body Tech, a tattoo and piercing parlor in Gainesville, Barnes, a tattoo artist, is crouched before a black stool on wheels. As he diligently presses his tattoo gun to tattoo a tyrannosaurus rex holding firework shells onto his client Rex’s forearm, he explains how the sXe “hard-line” movement “has gotten out of hand.” The hard-lines, who have deep-rooted ecological beliefs in veganism, animal rights and adhere to strict rules against caffeine, became “worse than the problem was,” he says. Barnes describes the hard-line mentality by using a novelty voice to sing the Earth Crisis song, “Fire Storm.” He sings,…“Block by block taking it all back. The youth immersed in poison - turn the tide, counterattack. Violence against violence let the roundups begin. A firestorm to purify the bane that society drowns in. No mercy, no exceptions, a declaration of total war…” Barnes, surprised that he remembered the lyrics, smiles and says that people would rally behind this song.
When he started to hear stories of vegan extremists bombing McDonald’s and various other hard-liners breaking beer bottles over the heads of people drinking or smoking, Barnes decided to sever some of his sXe ties.
Unlike the hard-liners, he says that he has never pushed his beliefs on others, for the same reason he wouldn’t want others to push their beliefs on him. He adds that most of his friends drink, and that a few of his family members have had some drug history.
“I just knew that I was never going to be that guy,” he says.
After experiencing the deaths of his aunt, Gail, who was killed by a drunk driver, and his uncle, Mike, who killed someone while driving drunk and later shot himself, Barnes says that he knew he was making the right choice in life.
“I’m not trying to change the world, just myself,” he says.
After finishing Rex’s tattoo, he lifts his black shirt to show off his 11-year-old “Straight Edge” tattoo spread across his shoulder blades in black Old English letters.
Barnes, who is from Palm Beach, says he’s only tattooed about 100 X’ s and sXe tattoos during the past five years that he has been working at Body Tech. The low numbers of sXe tattoos in town are due to lack of followers, especially in a college town, where the breaking rates are much higher, he says.
Other than members from the Florida bands Battle!, underOATH and Culture and two of his Body Tech co-workers, who call themselves sober instead of sXe, there’s not much sXe motivation in the state; however, Barnes says that abstinence is just like breathing to him.
“My friends can get plastered and know that they’ll always have a ride home,” he says. “I’ll be sober.”
Like Barnes, who confirmed his sXe tendencies from his uncle and aunt’s negative encounters with alcohol, 19-year-old Kyle Albert’s sXe inspiration comes from his dad’s DUI.
Albert, a UF elementary education major, says that he is proud of his dad, who hasn’t touched a drop of alcohol since the incident, two years ago.
“I’m not doing this alone,” he says.
Albert sits on a bench while holding his knees to his chest. He is wearing a backwards black baseball cap and black Converse All Star sneakers. Black rubber bands cover the braces on his teeth. He says that despite his age, he plans on “putting on the X” even after he turns 21.
“It’s a part of me, who I am and what I do,” he says.
Albert is a devout Catholic, who says that he doesn’t believe in sex before marriage. His ideal mate would be sXe, he says, though it’s hard to find other like-minded sXe individuals.
“I basically think the culture has pushed people not to be sXe, through advertisements for alcohol, tobacco products and advertisements suggesting sexual activity,” he says, while still holding his knees.
It is this negative exposure, that makes him want to be a positive role model for his future elementary students, Albert says.
“I’m not going to push my views on my students, but it would be good if they can pick it up.”