Politics & Power Quote by Greg Ginn

Punk’s most effective politics often didn’t show up as a slogan in the chorus; it showed up as a logistics problem for the state. Greg Ginn’s line is a neat demolition of the lazy assumption that “political music” is just lyrical content. Black Flag could write about boredom, paranoia, and personal collapse and still read as dangerous, because the threat wasn’t a manifesto. It was a scene.

The intent here is partly defensive and partly clarifying: Ginn is refusing the tidy box of protest singer while insisting the band carried politics in a different register. “Overtly” matters. It nods to how authorities and gatekeepers prefer dissent in legible, containable forms: a song you can debate, ban, or parody. What’s harder to manage is a group whose actions - DIY touring networks, anti-commercial independence, confrontational shows, a refusal to play nice with venues, cops, or labels - model an alternative way to live. That’s politics as infrastructure.

The subtext is also a subtle flex: we didn’t need to preach to unsettle you. The band’s “philosophies apart from the music” suggests a split between art and life that’s actually a fusion; the lyrics might not name institutions, but the community built around them pressures institutions anyway. In late-70s/early-80s America, with punk clubs policed, shows raided, and “youth trouble” framed as a public-order issue, authorities weren’t listening for policy positions. They were reacting to autonomy, mobility, and a loud refusal of respectability. That’s why Black Flag could be “non-political” on paper and still feel like an insurgency in practice.