Season 2, Episode 8:  “Pragmatism and Revolution” ft Victoria Ruiz 

NARRATION: Punk is the first music I grew to love because of its ideas. When I was a kid I used to see punk rock teenagers roaming around Brooklyn. You know, the hair spray Mohawks, torn leather, safety pins pretty much everywhere,the colorful hair long before you could buy blue dye at any old corner pharmacy. And to be honest, they kind of freaked me out. They seemed like they were living in an alternate reality. And on top of all that, the music itself was chaotic and loud. I didn’t get it. I made a hard and fast decision that punk was not for me. 

But tastes, of course, change and as a college student when I was trying to find myself as a person, who very much did not flow with the mainstream, punk started to make more and more sense. There was no moment, there was no one concert that changed my mind about it. It just grew on me, slow. It was anti-establishment, I was anti-establishment. It was anti-racist, I was anti-racist. Legacies of black punk? Check. Punk believed in bucking authority and showing that to the world with your body. I believed that too. The ethics of it, the principles, the intentions were irresistible. That’s when I got it when I understood punk. That’s when I fell in love with it. 

But ideals and ethics are one thing. They can be lofty. They can live at 10,000 feet. Punk and action? Punk creating real change on the ground? Within a community? Within a country? Thats always more complicated, especially for Victoria Ruiz.

Victoria Ruiz: It’s my number one tension.

Meklit Hadero: Pragmatism versus idealism

Victoria Ruiz: Yeah.

Meklit Hadero: As your number one tension, that's like a big, you know, life is full of them.

Victoria Ruiz: Because like after this interview, I'll have to like, interact with a bunch of people. They all think I'm like crazy.

Meklit Hadero: Wow.

Victoria Ruiz: That I’m like a crazy leftist. And so it's just like this really wild tension where you're just like, you know, when I do get to use my platform as an artist, I do feel like I have to kind of advocate for this, like, you know, the dissonance space of like pragmatism and revolution.

NARRATION: Pragmatism and revolution.

Victoria Ruiz fronts the leftist punk band Downtown Boys. When I first saw her in a 2017 KEXP live radio performance, she seared her way into my memory, wearing a Frida Khalo style flower headband, belting emotionally charged political songwriting in both Spanish and English. It was like she was telling me don’t worry, the rage you feel against the inequities of the world have a place. Put it in the music.

But what you might not see right away is that Victoria is also strategic, disciplined, practical. In her work as a performer and an activist, she doesn't shy away from the big stages and powerful institutions. She finds a way to harness their platforms to create change. Pragmatism and revolution.

Victoria has been walking that line for over a decade now, often in extremely visible settings, and often with painful consequences.

My name is Meklit and this is Movement: Music and Migration, remixed.

Victoria graduated college in 2009. Peak recession, as she recalls, and with all her education, she landed a job at a hotel in Providence, Rhode Island, where she was instructed to greet customers with the line, “Hello, delighted to serve!” But at that hotel she also met a kindred spirit, a room service worker, guitar player, and labor organizer named Joey DeFrancesco. Together, Victoria and Joey started organizing the hotel workers, and then other minimum wage workers in Providence. And pretty quickly, the organizing collaboration grew into a musical one.

Victoria had never sung in a band before, but she knew how to lead chants at a union rally. And in 2011 Joey brought her into a group he had started, Downtown Boys.

Politics was always at the core of the band. Their first full length album was called “Full Communism.” It included titles like “100% Inheritance Tax” and “Break a Few Eggs.” And it definitely drew attention.

The band got write-ups in Pitchfork, The New Yorker, and then Rolling Stone – who dubbed them "America's Most Exciting Punk band." Then in 2017 they released their second album, this time with the legendary indie label Sub Pop. This is the kind of breakthrough that young bands dream of, but Downtown Boys were not just in it for the fame and attention.

Meklit Hadero: Like as a punk musician and activist and advocate, did it feel strange in the moment where you like, or what did it feel like in the moment where you started getting written up in Rolling Stone? Was that a disconnect for you or did it feel like part of one journey? 

Victoria Ruiz: Yeah, you know, the moment when the band started to get the attention, I suppose, you know, outside of like our local Providence scene.

Meklit Hadero: Mm hmm.

Victoria Ruiz: The narrative of the band was always nestled in our politics and our activism. And I say that for better or for worse. Because it made it very, very difficult to be seen as anything. It was hard to understand what came first in the narrative, the music or the politics. And so we received a lot of expectations on both.

NARRATION: Downtown Boys were in the odd position of being an activist leftist punk band breaking into the mainstream corporate music industry. Naturally, a lot of their fans expected the band to use that platform, that power, to act on their politics. And at first, it seemed like that was possible.

Victoria Ruiz: Back in 2017, we had a huge campaign around how South By worked with international artists contracts.

NARRATION: This was March of 2017, just weeks after the Trump administration’s Travel ban went into effect, blocking entry to the country from seven muslim majority countries. There were protests in the airports, lawsuits in several states, and in the midst of all that artists started getting their contracts for South by Southwest, the buzzy music and tech festival that takes over Austin every year.

Victoria Ruiz: There was a band that tweeted about the contract and so that's how I learned about it, actually.

NARRATION: What Victoria and other artists saw in that contract was infuriating.

The way South By Southwest works is that they book bands to play at the official festival shows. And they want those artists to only perform at the official festival shows. The reality is that Austin is a big music town with lots of venues and so bands will book their own gigs outside the festival. I mean you've traveled all the way there, you might as well get some extra money and exposure. The festival, no surprise, does not like that their acts are playing all these informal events, but it was always hard to crack down on. So that year, for international artists specifically, the festival included a very pointed threat, if they performed outside of their official festival showcase, South By Southwest would report them to ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement. For Victoria, it was especially outrageous because the official showcases don't even pay that well. The bands are often going under financially, just to show up.

Victoria Ruiz: And it shows that these capitalists, they feel they have so much control over musicians when there's not a reciprocal relationship there.

NARRATION: Music and politics were now rubbing right against each other. Downtown Boys were scheduled to perform at a big South By Southwest showcase put on by Pitchfork. Passing on that show would be a sacrifice, a missed opportunity to be on a big stage. But could they stomach being on that stage under these conditions?

For big decisions like this, the band always takes a vote, even if it’s just by text message, and the majority rules. The band decided, they could not be part of a festival that treated artists this way.

Victoria Ruiz: And so that's when we then Realized, okay, the demand is going to be really clear. The demand is going to be to take out the deportation clause in the contract.

NARRATION: Downtown Boys signed an open letter, refusing to perform unless South By Southwest changed the contract. Then they helped share that letter amongst some of the other artists scheduled to perform.

Victoria Ruiz: I think that unfortunately we've seen retaliation and retribution against artists and musicians for speaking politically. And I'm sure that's why some people didn't sign it. But fortunately, a lot of musicians signed on right away.

NARRATION: They were not alone. Soon the music press started to pick up on the story too -- there was even a piece about it in Pitchfork, the same publication that was curating the showcase Downtown Boys was part of.

Four days after the open letter was released, the festival backed down. And Downtown Boys went to Austin.

NARRATION: It was a clear victory. But Victoria could see that using their new platform to effect social change would not always be so easy. That the choices would not always be so clear cut. That same year an interviewer asked her: “Do you have concerns about mainstream exposure neutralizing your message?” Oof. Victoria responded: “I don’t think that’s really in our control.”

Victoria Ruiz: And so, you know, when that started, when we began to get more attention, there was the like weird, punk politics and purity politics of it all. And then I think that there’s

Meklit Hadero: What do you mean by that? Where you, where people wanted you to be, like, just one thing?

Victoria Ruiz: Where people wanted us to be just one thing or they saw us as maybe sellouts. Or, you know, why would we agree to speak to such a publication that has X, Y or Z? Or why would we play X, Y, or Z festival? Or like, I remember, you know, when we played Coachella, people had a meltdown that we played Coachella.

NARRATION: Just a month after the South By Southwest appearance, once again, the band's career and their principles were in conflict. The specific issues were different, it had to do with Coachella’s owner, billionaire Philip Anschutz, and his support for anti-LGBTQ organizations. But the basic question was the same, were they prepared to withhold their labor and withhold their art in the name of their politics? Or should they use this opportunity to grow their audience and try to affect change from the festival stage. This time there was no mass movement, no coalition of other artists.

Victoria Ruiz: Because Coachella is a lot of bigger bands an organized boycott against playing the music festival, would need to be led by a band much bigger than Downtown Boys, it would need to be led by like a Beyonce or an Ariana Grande.

NARRATION: Beyonce and Ariana Grande were not calling for a boycott. Downtown Boys were more on their own this time, and it was not clear what they could realistically accomplish. Would they try and force the owner to sell the festival, or change his own political activities? And would this one punk band refusing to perform really change anything at all?

Downtown Boys made the choice to go ahead with the festival, playing two Saturday night sets. It was a chance to grow their audience, reach new listeners with their message -- and that felt worth it.

Victoria remembers right before one of the sets at Coachella, she ran into Ian MacKaye backstage. MacKaye was the frontman of the hardcore punk bands Minor Threat and Fugazi; she describes him as something like the king of punk. It should have been comforting,  like if any one person could signal, it's OK that you're here, it would be him.

Victoria Ruiz: And 24 hours after hanging out with Ian McKay at Coachella, we were getting dragged through the dirt for playing it. Which is so crazy because so many punk bands since us have played and it's like, go get it, girl. And you know, the next year Beyonce played and everyone thought Coachella was this like radical space for liberation. So yeah, it's, really,

Meklit Hadero: The irony,

Victoria Ruiz: Yeah, yes.

NARRATION: The criticism was coming from their own allies, people who shared their politics. And at first, Victoria was taken aback by it. Like, do you not see the other punk bands playing at this festival? Do you not see the lead singer of Minor Threat hanging out backstage? It seemed like Downtown Boys was being held to a different standard, and no one was rushing to their defense.

Victoria Ruiz: So then we decided, you know, let's do a letter about Coachella, being propped up by this person.

NARRATION: They released an open letter criticizing the festival's billionaire owner. And in it, the band also promised to donate part of their fee to pro-LGBTQ organizations. The letter did not change anything about the festival itself, but it could at least raise awareness.

Victoria Ruiz: And we just did it as a band and it got picked up.

NARRATION: Once again, there were pieces in Pitchfork and other outlets. Once again, the band's politics was driving the narrative. But not in a triumphant way. If anything, the letter only fueled the backlash against Downtown Boys. To their critics on their left the letter was just proof that the band had sold out. That they had only spoken up once the festival was over, and the check had been cashed. For Victoria, it was a devastating and eye opening experience.

Victoria Ruiz: And I think a lot of activist communities have this where like, sometimes we eat each other alive because there's just so much pressure and then I think we also felt

Meklit Hadero: That’s painful.

Victoria Ruiz: It's painful. It's like one of those things where like the instinctual feeling is definitely, you know, pain or with some betrayal. Ultimately though, I think that there's a rationale out of it. I also think that I really don't like preaching to the choir. Like I don't think that people who already have my politics, like need to hear yet another song about them. So I really, really appreciate that, you know, my comrades and my friends, and like, I don't know, like a lot of my friends who are organizers have come to like the band.

And I know that they don't care that much about, Like loud screechy screaming music, but they support me because they're my friends. But then likewise I just really appreciate all the people who have listened to the band and read the interviews who would have never ever ever found out about us if we hadn't been in lots of different publications, and if we hadn't hit the internet at the moment we hit the internet and if we hadn't been on sub pop records. I think that all that gave us more of a platform and helped reach people who we would have never reached. And I will always stand by our decision to do that.

Meklit Hadero: That's really interesting. I think that the whole idea of just that not wanting to preach to the choir. It's so, it actually takes a lot of labor. It takes a lot of labor to be able to do that because it's so easy, or there, there's such a momentum behind staying insular. It's very difficult to get out of that.

Victoria Ruiz: It is. And it's pushed me as an artist too. Like, you know, one artist I really admire is Sasami. And I, yeah, I really admire what she's managed to do with the vessel of music. I've seen her fundraise for Palestine, in the same, you know, Instagram story as being in a big publication and doing a photo shoot for a big pub.

Meklit Hadero: Yes.

Victoria Ruiz: And I just like, that ability to move past the cognitive dissonance that I think the purity politicians, especially in punk, try to keep us in is really admirable. And then likewise, I've seen musicians. I mean, like Mitski is one of my favorite musicians and I find myself pushing myself not to put the expectation that she would speak out publicly on genocide because she hasn't. 

And it's hard for me because I'm like, but I don't appreciate her music because of, you know the leftist politics, even though I read my own leftist politics on her beautiful beautiful heart wrenching songs and it's her choice as an artist. And I can't put these expectations on individuals. I can put expectations on art and her art will always meet the highest artistic expectation I may ever have. So it's like, it's great to get to be pushed and think about power in music.

NARRATION: After the whirlwind of 2017, the touring, the endless interviews, the scrutiny, Downtown Boys decided to take a break that turned into a long hiatus. Victoria took the chance to go back to school and finish up a law degree. In a way, the move was inspired by her experience at Coachella and all the criticism she faced.

Victoria Ruiz: Like if I’m going to be expending this much time and energy, let me do it, in another forum where I'm not just dealing with online attacks, but I get to cross examine.

NARRATION: And yet, the same dilemma Victoria had to face as an artist, she would also have to face it as a lawyer.

This story played out just this last year. Victoria was working as a public defender. And outwardly, she looked pretty different from the images that once appeared in Rolling Stone and the New York Times. Victoria wore glasses, and in her professional headshot her hair was pulled neatly back over a gray blazer. No spiked bracelets, no visible tattoos. The only outward trace of a punk aesthetic was the bleached tips of her hair.

Once again, Victoria had built a platform for herself. A platform to project her values and affect change in the world. But once again, it came with limitations. Last fall, as Victoria followed the genocide in Gaza carried out in the aftermath of October 7th, she knew she had to speak up. She knew there might be professional consequences. As an organizer she's always been prepared for that, but she was not prepared for what happened next.

Victoria Ruiz: I was working for a non profit as a public defender, and I went to a vigil for Palestine and it got taken over by a lot of Zionists who put up these really confusing and contradictory posters that stood for no one. I took one down because I was kind of confused and was like, wait, why are you guys literally here heckling our vigil, and putting these up.

NARRATION: A video of Victoria removing the poster soon appeared online, identifying her as a New York County public defender. Within days, that image was on Fox News and the New York Post, usually displayed right next to an older image of her on stage screaming into a microphone, or moshing in a crowd, as if that was proof of a bad character.

In that same media coverage, the poster was described as simply an image of missing Israeli hostages. Victoria says it also included a handwritten message justifying the bombing of Palestinian civilians. That's why the poster felt contradictory, it condoned violence as it condemned it. But that nuance and context did not satisfy her critics, or her employer.

Victoria Ruiz: And I lost my job as a public defender. I was forced to resign.

Meklit Hadero: But I'm wondering, like, do you think you'll continue to try to work from within institutions? Or do you feel more comfortable as, like, an activist from the outside?

Victoria Ruiz: I Think you always need both, like both within and also outside. I think that for some people who are very dogmatic on one side or the other, I understand that and I get that. And then I think that there are those of us who are principled and disciplined and can be work within and without. And, you know, there's a way to turn that dissonance into an energy as well. And I think that dissonance is probably where I'll end up. Where I will end up like for the rest of my life.

NARRATION: My producer and I had heard about Victoria’s resignation last fall. That was part of the reason we wanted to talk to her now, for this episode. At the time I honestly didn’t know what she was up to music-wise, or if she had any intention of returning to the pressures that came with being a public figure.

Meklit Hadero:  So where are you musically right now, in this moment?

Victoria Ruiz: Musically, we're, we’ve written a batch of new songs, and I think that the songs are still very much about power. I think that they're not as explicit. Like, a wall is a wall and nothing more at all is just a complete quote of, you know, from Angela Davis. It's very explicit. Or like, somos chulas, no somos pendejas. If you speak Spanish, it's just very literal, like, literal. So I think the new songs are a little bit, require some more reading between the lines.

So one of our newest songs is called La Sirena, which, you know, a lot of people would translate as like the mermaid, but it was written as the siren. And so we were talking about sirens and I just couldn't get over that idea of like the voice calling you and the, that the ocean and the sea being so powerful. And the ocean being like the beginning and the end of the world.

And there's this voice that feels not necessarily at all in competition with the ocean, but ready to speak alongside the ocean. And that takes like so much fearlessness to do. And so like La Sirena is basically about that idea of like always giving in to the gem or the joy of liberation. And not giving in to that feeling of failure or nihilism, and ultimately that's gonna come from that siren that makes you realize your self-worth.

You know, whether you believe in God or not believe in God, the idea that you have your, this siren and that the siren has to constantly be calling you, constantly be calling you.

NARRATION: That was Victoria Ruiz. You can't hear the siren song just yet, but you can find all the band's other music at downtownboys.bandcamp.com. 

After I talked with Victoria, I thought a lot about what it takes to live your values. From 2020 through 2022, this was a daily struggle for me. Because during those years, I was not just Meklit, independent artist, I was also Chief of Program at San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, AKA YBCA. When I first got offered the job of Chief of Program, I said a hard no, because I treasured my freedom as a full time musician. But I was eight months pregnant, and the need for stability was very much on my mind and literally in my body. So I said yes, and made a commitment to use the platform to make change.

I was not at all prepared for how much that role changed the way others saw me. I was suddenly a gatekeeper of power and resources. Sometimes, folks even talked to me like I was the man. Me? I was used to being in rooms where I’d call for others to recognize the power and privilege within their role. Now, I had to live that.

For example, YBCA had been founded decades before on the displacement of 4,000 people, many of them Filipino elders. So I, along with other colleagues at YBCA pushed the organization to confront this history head on. And invest dollars and resources into Soma Pilipinas, the cultural district we were part of. That was a good moment. But there were so many other moments when communities would come to us and tell us that we had to do better. Come to me and tell me I had to do better. And they were right.

What I learned was that living your values is a decision you have to make over and over every day. It’s not something you do once. I left YBCA because an entirely different values conflict crept into my life. But this time, it was internal. Between me and my own soul. See, in those years, I entirely stopped making music. So did I value music? My heart and my spirit said yes, but in the fall of 2022, I had to face the fact that my actions said no. And when the realization hit me, I knew I was done as Chief of Program.

Soon after, I returned to life as a full time artist. That struggle to live your values, to turn ideals into a practice that works, it is hard. It is one of those frictions that will probably just always be there. And whenever I’m wondering what to do with those difficult emotions, I remember, just put it in the music.

NARRATION: Movement is produced by Ian Coss and myself, Meklit Hadero. Our editor is Megan Tan. Our co-creator and podcast godmother is Julie Caine. Our broadcast partner is The World. We are supported by the Mellon Foundation and distributed by PRX.

If you enjoyed this story, consider sending it to a friend, or leaving us a review on Apple Podcasts. Believe me, this stuff really does help people find the show. If you happen to be curious about my albums, or performances, you can learn more at meklitmusic.com. Movement will be back with new episodes every other Tuesday through the summer and fall.