Damon Root: When the punk rock thought police ruled the scene

Damon Root writes:

The freakout over Agnostic Front’s politically incorrect punk came to a head when Miret, Stigma, and bassist Rob Kabula agreed to be interviewed for Maximum Rocknroll’s January 1985 issue by punker Dave Scott.

Scott sent his questions by mail and the band sent back their answers. But Yohannan thought the interview was too friendly, so he mailed a batch of his own questions, focusing on the “disturbing aspects to these nice guys’ philosophies” and “their admittedly nationalistic outlook.” Miret, Stigma, and Kabula replied again.

Yohannan then edited the whole correspondence together, littering the Q&A with a final round of his own commentary. He literally gave himself the last word on his most contentious exchanges with the band.

It was an ugly and heavy-handed piece of work. Yohannan had revealed his own intellectual insecurities by doing everything in his power to stack the deck in his favor. He clearly did not trust his subscribers to read the original interviews and then make up their own minds. Even left-wing punks were embarrassed by the performance.