Class of Nuke 'Em High: Punks in Movies from the '80s
After punk showed up, freaked everyone out and found itself mutated in the public eye until it was New Wave, there was still a need for ‘the cultural other’ in movies. At such a late date, it had become culturally insensitive to pawn it off on black folks and homosexuals weren’t as completely vilified as they’d become until after everyone was aware of AIDS. So punks were the left overs capacious of terrifying straight audiences, looking weird and appearing to be wasted, even if they weren’t.
