I saw it because some of the others in the photo, still friends, began reminiscing fondly about this band and our performances. I had a different reaction.
I am proud of some things I did as a teen. I am proud of protesting the Viet Nam War. I am proud of organizing some of those protests. I am proud of having run for the Board of Education in the town where I lived and went to school. I am proud of helping organize an unauthorized student meeting in our high school which led to a walkout. I am proud of participating in that walkout. I am proud that a member of the school administration told me that the other participants would be suspended, but that I would be expelled. I am proud of working to convince the 800 or so suspended students to simply ignore the suspension and return to school.
I am proud of working on a lawsuit against our school superintendent to defend students' rights to print and distribute independent, non-school-sponsored publications. I am proud to have written first drafts of briefs for our attorney. I am proud of printing and distributing an independent, non-school-sponsored publication. I am proud that we won that suit.
I am proud of leading people in public song during rallies. I am proud of leading people in public song during synagogue worship. Singing together is breathing together is bringing people together. This band was often the opposite.
Our most important performance, the one that sticks in the memory of everybody commenting on Facebook, was at a Battle of the Bands at our high school. Battles of the Bands privileged volume, shredding guitar solos, driving beats, and -- generally speaking -- hard rock. We came out with washboard, washtub bass and acoustic instruments. We had a crowd of ethereal dancers. We had grossly-offensive original songs which finally drove a large part of the audience, particularly the young women, to simply leave the auditorium. The most important part of that performance was our desire to outrage convention. I am not proud of that.
I would love to excuse myself by saying that I was young. But so were the people who walked out on us. I have spent a lifetime raising teens to be adults, as a high school teacher and principal. Would I have been proud of my students for publicly performing original material that was designed primarily to disgust their classmates (and that was, in fact, disgusting)? Or would I have been proud of them for publicly signaling their disapproval?
I look at that photo and I see a group of highly-privileged young people. I know that all of us were more than one thing, more than just people who took that privilege for granted, more than just people who engaged in outrage for the sake of outrage. But my memories of that photo conjure more shame than pride. I have taught hundreds of teens. I am proud of so many of them, for so many things. I would not be proud for any of them to see video of that performance at the Battle of the Bands.
