Skinhead Culture

In Britain in the late 1960s there existed a youth sub-culture known as Mods. A lot of the tough Mods began to cut their hair close to the scalp, both as a fashion statement and due to the fact that it kept their hair out of their faces and made it impossible to grab during a fight. The fights often take place in the streets and would involve chains, boots, fists, and anything else they could get their hands on. This was the beginning on skinheads.

It is a stereotype that all skinheads were racist but this is not true. Towards the beginning of the 70’s when skinhead culture was prominent teenagers were becoming skinheads for two vital reasons, the fighting and style. It was very popular to be a skinhead during the 70’s because they had a reputation and if you were a skinhead it automatically meant that people were scared of you. In the mid 70’s the National Front and Britain's National Socialist Party began to infiltrate the skinhead movement. They did this by recruiting the skins from within and having their other foot soldiers dress in the skinhead style. In this way they were able to capitalise on the reputation of the skinheads, mostly in terms of fighting and intimidation. This is when the fascist movement began within the skinheads.

Music was very important to skinheads as the Jamaican music known as ska was very influential in the beginning of the establishment of Skinheads. This was due to the influx of Jamaican immigrants in the UK. In the mid 70’s skinheads began to listen to punk rock, a new wave of music in which they could call their own. These changes in music led to even more diversification among the skinhead groups. Every band seemed to have their own political agenda. Those with political leanings to the right were associated with the racists and fascists, whereas those to the left were generally more concerned with working-class labour type politics. Those that had no political agenda tended to shun both sides.

In the early 80’s, the skinhead movement began to appear throughout the rest of Europe and the United States. Around this same time, many leftist skins began to fight back in an effort to throw out the racist and facist skinheads that had infiltrated the group.

Skinheads have been consistently stereotyped by the press since the late 60s. The racist tag that skinheads have been labeled with has pretty much excluded them from ever being an ‘acceptable’ subculture. Violence and drugs can be forgotten, but not racism. It is pretty clear that skinheads haven’t died out despite the negative representation that the media have tarnished them with. Older skinheads, or those who used to be part of the scene before, have tried to keep the culture alive and ensured it is passed down. Skinhead culture is never going to become ‘cool’ in the way other cultures have and while some are still drawn to it on their own, it’s the old skinheads who have kept the flame burning.