Usually no one bats an eye at the news of arguments between artists in the music industry. But not a lot of music beefs hit as close to home as the current ongoing feud between the members of pop punk band Blink-182.

The enduring rock trio recently announced that lead guitarist and founding member Tom DeLonge would be taking an “indefinite leave” from the band. Blink-182 defined the lives of many kids growing up in the late 90’s-2000’s, and has maintained a cult following around Elder High School.

Consisting of the trio of singer and bassist Mark Hoppus, guitarist DeLonge, and drummer Travis Barker, Blink-182 burst onto the scene with the release of Enema of the State in 1999, which contains many of the bands classic songs that are still known and played on radio today, such as “All the Small Things” and “What’s My Age Again?”

After a few more years of hits, the band seemingly broke up for good in 2005, with DeLonge starting his new band “Angels and Airwaves”, and Hoppus and Barker starting a supergroup called “+44”.

After Barker’s infamous near fatal plane crash in 2008, the group officially reunited and Blink-182 was back together again. They released an EP Dogs Eating Dogs in 2012, and a new album Neighborhoods in 2011. Blink was back doing their thing, and all was well with the world.

But no one had any idea of the dysfunction that was happening behind the scenes.

According to Barker and Hoppus, DeLonge was appearing to lose interest in anything Blink-related, and Barker received an email from his manager saying that the band’s lead guitarist and founding member was “out indefinitely”, right before the group was scheduled to play the Musink festival this March.

Both sides of the story conflict with each other. DeLonge claims that he never actually quit the band, while Hoppus and DeLonge essentially fire him, calling him “ungrateful” and “disingenuous” in his attitude towards the band.

Delonge then went on to release a pair of previously unreleased songs on his Instagram page, entitled “songs without a home”, later confirming that these were songs originally meant to be released for Blink-182.

It sounds just like one of your typical Hollywood celebrity sagas your mom hogs the TV to watch, but the difference is that Blink was supposed to represent the opposite of that lifestyle. The original purpose and message of Blink-182 was to act like you didn’t know what your age was, and to ignore what was popular in the world.

Long time Blink fan Steven Ashworth believes that while it’s tough for the band to move on, it might be necessary if they want a successful future.

“I think it sad that it is happened they have been my favorite band since I was like ten. I think that Tom is being a little immature and egotistical and he needs to realize what a big mistake he’s making,”

“I believe it was more of Mark and Travis kicking him out, which I think is good for them to see that they still care about the band and want to release a new album, and if that has to be done without Tom then good for them.”

Elder class of ’14, former Quill editor, and longtime Blink-182 fan Nick Antone believes that the band should know by now the kind of person that Tom is, given his past actions.

“I think Tom is a very unprofessional and egotistical person. To have no direct contact with your band mates is childish and almost forced considering how many ways he could communicate if he wanted to,” said Antone.“The crazy thing is this is kind of the exact same thing that Tom did when the broke up in the first place.”

It may have been fun acting stupid during the good ole’ days, but the members of Blink-182 need to learn that everyone has to grow up at some point, and that they need to stop acting like children about this whole breakup situation and go back to their original roots of just playing awesome music and having fun while doing it.

Hopefully Tom will make the right decision to come back to Blink-182 and let the new generation know why a lot of us still think they’re awesome.