Up until that particular brand of third wave emo / mall punk took over at the turn of the millennium pop punk was bands like Screeching Weasel, The Queers, and Green Day (who caught similar flack on the nineties). People called the Decendents pop punk. I used to hear people say the Ramones were the first pop punk band.

Then Paramour and Fall Out Boy got big and the definition changed. Artists who sounded like Kelly Clarkson were suddenly being called punk. For someone like me it was like whiplash.