Dangerous Memory by Charlie Angus is just the book we need right now to explain how we got to where we are today and how we can work together to build a better world.
It walks us through the path that our leaders chose, starting in the 1980s, where they sold us the idea that government is bad and capitalism is good. It covers the privatization of public utilities, the impacts of gentrification and cuts to federal housing, Purdue launching OxyContin and creating the opioid epidemic, the world moving online and how this has created increased alienation, anxiety and disconnection … plus so much more! And it provides a history of the grassroots resistance movement – which we can use as a manual for how to organize and resist today.
The book does all this through a lens of art, culture and punk rock music. Charlie paints a picture of a time when artists could get a part-time gig washing dishes or waitressing and be able to pay their rent and pursue their art. Young people could afford university tuition with what they made during their summer job and still dabble in art and activism. They could take chances without the risk of financial ruin or homelessness. This is what is missing today. The financial security that allows us to be creative, get organized, take action and create beauty.
Charlie also does an amazing job of intertwining hope in all this. By sharing important history that we didn’t learn in school, he shows us that humanity has been in dark places before – things have been bad – and we have made it through.
History like the Greenham Common Campaign – which started in 1981 with four women in Wales coming together to protest against nuclear weapons. Within two years, the movement grew to 70,000 women forming a 22 km human peace chain around the Greenham Common air force base. The proof of the power of this peaceful protest is that it inspired Mikhail Gorbachev to attend the historic Reykjavík Summit in 1986, which eventually resulted in the end to the nuclear arms race.
The book even goes as far back as the 1930s to teach us about Dorothy Day and her newspaper, the Catholic Worker, which “laid out a bold vision of economic justice and non-violence that was a challenge to both the state and the Church over their failure to address massive economic inequities”. She focused on youth, grassroots activism, mutual aid, and cooperation rather than competition. Showing us the tools needed to make things better.
This book calls on us to take action – where we are, where we can, learning as we go. It will put a fire in your belly and help you believe that you can be part of the revolution.
As Charlie says: “This is a chord, and this is another, and this is a third, now go form a band. That was punk rock.”