By Crispin Sartwell

I have a 20-month-old daughter. She is alert and inquisitive, and has the charming habit of pointing at things and saying "what dat, Daddy?" "Tree, Janie."

My 11-year-old son is also alert and inquisitive. And he's a skateboarder, which in these halcyon days entails that he loves punk music. He asks Daddy his own questions. For example, he recently asked me to interpret this lyric for him:

[Anti-Flag sings "no justice, no peace/ no racist police."]

They aren't against peace and justice, are they? No Vince, they're saying that if you don't give us justice, we won't give you peace.

That's the band Anti-Flag, which, like a lot of punk bands these days, is a left-anarchist collective. I find myself parsing such phrases as "free all political prisoners" and "racist cops and racist judges don't equal justice." [snatch of song]

Now I also happen to instruct skater punks on the other side of their adolescences, when they've basted in the music for awhile. By the time I teach them philosophy at art school, they're full-fledged, pierced-up, anti-capitalist, anti-gloabalization activists. They're ready to tear down the WTO brick by brick.

The ancient Chinese sage Hsun Tzu argued that good music makes a well-ordered state, while bad music creates chaos. I think he had it backwards, since I think Anti-Flag and such spiritual and musical allies as Against All Authority make pretty damn good music.

But music really does tend to work its way into you and change who you are. Whether you're listening to the Battle Hymn of the Republic, The Ring of the Nibelungen, or Britney Spears, it says something about you. And if you keep listening long enough, the stuff starts to remake you in its own image.

So under the auspices of political punk music, I'm predicting a massive shift to the left in the youth of today, similar to what we experienced in the sixties, when my generation was lured to starboard by Bob Dylan and CSNY. I'm hoping, though, that this time they turn out to be anarchists rather than communists.

Meanwhile, I suggest to you, the powers that be, that you free all political prisoners. 'Cause Vincie's coming, and he's pissed.