To elaborate on
mcSey, the 1980's
punk band
Minor Threat, lead by vocalist
Ian MacKaye, was most probably the founders of the
Straight Edge movement. They honestly belived that one could have a lot of fun, even without artifical stimuli like
alcohol,
drugs,
religion or promiscuous
sex. Their stance was not necessarily anti-commercial, but since they refused to buy anything, they were frowned upon by the established
community.
After the break-up of
Minor Threat (sob), the
straight edge-movement was dormant for a short while, but experienced an upsurge in the post-
grunge mid-90's as young people tried to find a new
niche in a world suddenly filled with a lot of new quasi-religions. Always ready to take things to the next level, the retro-straight edgers adopted the cross on the back of their hand (used by a lot of nightclubs to denote minors, so they would not be served alcohol),
vegetarianism (and later
veganism),
environmentalism and a host of other annoyingly
Politically Correct attitudes.
The founder of the movement,
Ian MacKaye, is said to be very displeased with the way his happy-go-lucky
philosophy of cheap living turned out to become an militant anti-everything movement for disgruntled teenagers. I know I would be.