Sex Pistols: Anarchy in the U.K. Meaning

Song Released: 1976

Anarchy in the U.K. Lyrics

Right ! now ! ha ha ha ha ha

I am an antichrist
I am an anarchist
Don’t know what I want but
I know how to get it
I wanna destroy the passer by cos i

I wanna be anarchy !
No dogs body

Anarchy for the u.k it’s coming sometime and...

1. 1TOP RATED

   #1 top rated interpretation:
   Kitty22

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   Apr 15th 2006 !⃝

   The Sex Pistols were the FIRST punk band. People did not know how bad things were until the Sex Pistols told them. I think the song is in response to societal failures regarding youth. The economic system had Disenfranchised youth - limited their schooling and job possibilities, etc. Therefore, the state of young people was anarchy itself. I think they are saying Society has f***ed us so lets f*** them.
2. anonymous

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   Sep 11th 2022 !⃝

   1977 DAY OFF
   As with all artists what they meant is not nevesarily what their songs mean to people. I was a 12 year old in britain in 1976. A year later i was suspended from secondary school for refusing to attend the visit of the old bag lizzie to Newcastle.
   We were given the day off and told to go to the train station in our uniform. I said i would not. I told the teacher that i was a republican that i thought it was well overdue to abolish the monarchy and that i did not like that woman or her family or what they stood for. I got a round of applause from the majority of children in my class. I was then allowed by that teacher to give further explanations of my views. The class had a heated debate.
   I explained that we were all working class and that the only teason we were sitting in school getting an education was due to Socialists who campaigned and then were elected to parliament and eventually won the General Election and became the first Labour Government. My mother was on the executive of a national union and knew poverty both personally and through her work for a national charity.
   I said that this worship of a woman simply for being born in a palace was disgusting.
   Explained that she never did anything and that she had sat dining in that palace with some of the worlds worst dictators.
   The teacher was decent about it but later that day i was called to the geadmasyets office and told to hold out my hand to be belted. Punishment for what i had said. I refused and was given a rollicking about being a subject and that woman being my monarch my sovereign the queen. I refused and when he tried to force me to hold my hand out i instrad caught the strap and pulled it from his hand saying i would not be punished for what i believed, that woman was simply a human being and a relic of primitive times. I was suspend for three days. I did not attend the railway station. I stayed home with my mother who had taken a days leave as she would not take part in the celebrations which were happening at her workplace.
   We went to the beach which was empty except for some families and adults who felt exactly as we did. I was the only child in the school who owned a copy of the Sex Pistols single. Envied by many. My mother had bought it from a friend at work. Another Anarchist who had took leave.
   He said there had been a big party in Jesmond of Anarchists and other Anti Royals on the day.
   
   What this song meant to me and other kids was a rejection of an older generation of fascists who were miserable domineering christians. Similar to evilgelicals in todays USA.
   
   The song words said how many of us felt
   and although Satire can be understood ny children i can assure you non of us children thought the song took the piss out of Anarchists.
   
   We ALL considered the song a revolutionary anthem against a horrible miserable war time generation.
   
   I got laughs on local buses on several occasions when i would ne accosted by some smelly old man telling me to get a haircut and saying "i fought a war for the likes of you" and i would reply "oh really which side were you on?"
   
   They would often say "i gought for your freedom."
   and i would say
   "I don't think so, if that is true why are you trying to take away my freedom now."
   
   and
   
   i would say,
   
   "actually, your generation mostly fought because you did'nt want to be called a coward and because you had been brainwashed into worshiping your king,
   if hitler was the british leader the majority of you would have fought for him just like the majority of germans did."
   
   The sex pistols song completely fitted with the attitudes of my generation.
   
   and i still love it today.
   
   It is still a fascist regime. The sickofans are still morons and potential h bombs.
   
   Good Riddance to a useless parasite
   who died on 8th september 2022.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. anonymous

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   Mar 4th 2020 !⃝

   This is the first punk band. I’m an anarcho-punk girl myself. This song was the birth of that genre. This is what made people realize how fucking screwed up the world is
4. anonymous

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   Jan 26th 2018 !⃝

   About the time when JOHNNY ROTTEN of THE SEX PISTOLS was striking out his anger on the system, like a cornered rat, turned Anarchist with this song. Who's ''REVOLTING AGAINST ALL'' the damage done by Liberalism's long run affect on his country's youth that became mad hungry and angry. Growing up with and through the confusion of the political, religious,cultural and sexual revolution of the sixties onward. Which was promoted by the ungodly radical Revolutionary left wig leaders that had have infiltrated the culture that chaotically corrupted the Christian moral values off the Brit[ish] youth in the U.K. not to act like godly human beings anymore. Anotherwords the King Of Punk Rock, known as Johnny Rotten was at the time ''throwing back The Establishment's infiltrated shitty left wing liberal ways of Marxist cultural Revolution back in Their Faces. Like an angry modern day Jesus, compare to being sarcastically labeled an antichrist, who was turning the tables on Liberalism's radical left wig revolutionaries of the time. In order to make them a little uncertain of their gamblings that was going on in his Father's House.
5. anonymous

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   Nov 16th 2013 !⃝

   It's about society and the government and about how f***cked up today's government bullshit these days. The Sex Pistol's kick Miley Cyrus's ass! >:3
6. anonymous

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   Oct 18th 2013 !⃝

   It's clearly about social impacts and the government.
7. RebeccaSmith2000

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   Feb 27th 2013 !⃝

   Look, Malcolm McLaren did not copy the new york dolls. The dolls was formed in 71 and The Strand (early pistols group) in 72 on opposite sides of the pond. Much of this stuff happened organically and simultaneously. The Sex Pistols didn't sound anything like the NYD.
   
   As far as any dolt who says the Ramones were THE FIRST punk rock band, please note they formed in 1974.
   
   McLaren credited Richard Hell for clothing style, not musical influence.
8. anonymous

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   Jan 24th 2012 !⃝

   Are they being sarcastic or not? Are they mocking anarchism and anarchists or are they, in fact, rebelling against the government?
   
   The last verse seems to suggest that they are mocking anarchists.
9. anonymous

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   May 4th 2011 !⃝

   its a joke
   its the core-message
   sex pistols werent the first ones
   but they gave it its soul
   with a sarcastic humor driven agression
10. megan

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    Oct 20th 2010 !⃝

    I really love sex pistols! this song "Anarchy in the uk" its disclosure would prove against the British government and show their rebellion against them
11. anonymous

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    Apr 28th 2010 !⃝

    The Sex Pistols were infact not the first "punk" band but the first well known punk band. They were the first British band to appear from the punk genre, and were the most popular. They have left the biggest mark on society from what they did.
    As for the song, it's an image of the bands opinions of the politics of the times.
12. anonymous

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    Sep 24th 2009 !⃝

    don't you all be stupid, malcolm maclaren just copied The New York Dolls, Johnny Thunders and Richard Hell, put it all together and gave us The Sex Pistols, a completly made-up band. The pistols are from 75, and in early 60's Lou Reed was already showing what rock was all about with The Velvet Underground, and what punk would be. Lou Reed, Iggy Pop and The New York Dolls are the true first punks.

    This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
13. anonymous

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    Aug 3rd 2009 !⃝

    I think the first three verses are mocking the fake anarchists and the fourth is mocking government.
14. kolocow

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    Mar 28th 2009 !⃝

    Perhaps the only track that moves me every time I hear it. Always it will be ...'Right..Now...' then the laughter. So menacing.
    
    Its pretty meaningless which reflects a state of alienation. UDA,IRA,UK. Who gives a fuck when your alienated and the place is as negative as the UK was in 1976.
    
    John Lyndon later went onto say how much he respected the Queen. The perfect gentleman.
    
    Its now a fragment of history, but not without its raw emotion. It was never really about fashion. Youngster to day, who are much wiser than we were see through messages, but unfortunately they have lost their will to put two fingers up to the world.
15. anonymous

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    Sep 22nd 2008 !⃝

    Sex Pistols have great punk songs but this would definitely be the best because it's about what all punks think about ANARCHY anarchy is anything against the government and we gotta fight for what we believe in the sex pistols did exactly this the megadeath version was shit
16. anonymous

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    Sep 7th 2008 !⃝

    Actually, all the Sex Pistols believed in was Nothing. They were nihilists, and the song is intended to shock people. Of course, shocking the status quo is always good, the best way to beat dogma is to challenge it directly in the way that offends it most, but this song does nothing but defame anarchism.

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