Or why I always found the term confusing. Leaving aside for a second whether more than just Cyberpunk, Steampunk, and Deiselpunk should exist (or that people are diluting the meaning of the word punk ... to mean literally anything they want it to mean).
The exception being Punk genre, that started right when Punk did happen.
I've always found the term Deiselpunk confusing: apparently according to TV Tropes, it means that the thrust of the plot happens inside of dungeons. But simply being inside of a dungeon doesn't necessarily mean something is Punk. And I think that's the crux of my issue with other Punk genre: punk generally implies a certain kind of protagonist going against authority.
When I hear the term Dungeon Punk, what immediately comes to mind is a plucky anarcho-syndicalist, travelling ancient ruins in order to search for long lost civilizations. Indiana Jones fighting against his government masters. I wouldn't be irritated by such misusing of the term, except it makes it that much harder to find out exactly what the sub genre is suppose to mean for that kind of science fiction.
I like ancient ruins exploration, and I've liked that for far longer than I've liked Cyberpunk, and generally crosses over with some kind of heroic fantasy/epic fantasy plot.t But I'm not really sure what Deisel punk would even be, if that's not what's being implied.
This kind of thing is the danger of using punk, without really know what the word means. I mean, there is no way to tell whether any given science fiction story has any Anarcho-Political antics and environment grittiness, if all I had to gone on was it being called "Steampunk."
I call on those who still write science fiction, to stop being lazy.
Start inventing your own labels. Or get rid of genre altogether.
