Discrimination is one of those words that everyone just throws out every time they don’t get their way, but I can’t help but feel that I am being discriminated against all the time.

Not discriminated against because of my face, or upbringing. Not because of my social status, or education or my parents. No, I am discriminated against everyday because of the way I dress.

What I wear and how I cut my hair seems intrinsically bothersome to so many people that I have often wondered whether I should just bite the bullet and conform. But my image is who I am and I refuse the change that for anyone but myself.

To give you a basic overview of what I am talking about I will describe an average days outfit.

A pair of 18-holed Dr. Marten boots, black bondage pants (yes those are exactly what they sound like), a t-shirt with a band no-one has heard of scrawled across the front and a large, black mohawk to top it off. Throw in some facial piercings, safety pins, bracelets and a studded jacket and you pretty much have the look.

Yes, I am the person your Grandmother crosses the road to avoid. I am a punk.

I am a punk and I am proud of it. The way I look and dress, the music I listen to, the books I read, the things I believe in all define the person that I am and I refuse to apologize to anyone.

Yet for most people, me being an individual is not what they want to see. People are scared by what they don’t understand and I guess I am unfathomable to the masses.

Every day I have people stopping and staring. When a child, enthralled by my mohawk, tugs on his mother’s arm and tells her to look, she silences him and briskly drags him away. What do these people think I am going to do? Eat their children? Bite their head off because they get a kick out of seeing a guy with hair standing straight up? Please, I may look pretty funny but it doesn’t mean I am a cold-hearted animal.

I know what the stereotype is, but give me a chance to change your mind.

I am a well-read, well-educated, polite person. I am a socially conscious pacifist and I would go out of my way to avoid a confrontation, let alone a fight.

I don’t use drugs, I am a very hygienic person and I don’t sleep on the street. I have a good job, and I work hard.

I watch sappy movies with my girlfriend, listen to Jewel and Sarah McLaughlan and I tell my mom I love her everyday.

Yes I wear nail polish and no I am not gay.

I don’t dress this way because I want to shock people. I don’t have piercings so people will stop and stare. I don’t cut my hair the way I do because I am trying to do everything I can to not fit in-I am just being me.

I know this will change nothing, and the stereotype will still exist that punks are snotty, loutish drop-outs who spend their time fighting and vandalizing property. But for a change, take a read of the first few chapters of a book before you decide that it is rubbish, rather than looking at the cover and tossing it.

It would be all to easy for me to just give in, cut my hair and shop at Abercrombie at Fitch, but that just wouldn’t be me.

I will end my rant with a famous punk mantra that I live my life by: You laugh at me because I’m different, I laugh because you’re all the same.