There may be more to say about how it feels to watch one’s native country slide, rapidly, towards fascism; but that is for next week.

For now, I feel we all need a pick-me-up, and so I’m sharing excerpts from this inspiring gem of a letter written by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés in 2001, but still forcefully relevant and moving today:

Mis estimados queridos, My Esteemed Ones:

Do not lose heart. We were made for these times.

I have heard from so many recently who are deeply and properly bewildered. They are concerned about the state of affairs in our world now. It is true, one has to have strong cojones and ovarios to withstand much of what passes for “good” in our culture today… Ours is a time of almost daily astonishment and often righteous rage over the latest degradations of what matters most to civilized, visionary people.

…You are right in your assessments. The lustre and hubris some have aspired to while endorsing acts so heinous against children, elders, everyday people, the poor, the unguarded, the helpless, is breathtaking. Yet… I urge you, ask you, gentle you, to please not spend your spirit dry by bewailing these difficult times.

Especially do not lose hope. Most particularly because, the fact is that we were made for these times. Yes. For years, we have been learning, practicing, been in training for and just waiting to meet on this exact plain of engagement.

Do not lose hope in these difficult times

I cannot tell you often enough that we are definitely the leaders we have been waiting for, and that we have been raised, since childhood, for this time precisely.

Look around: you are not alone

…I grew up on the Great Lakes and recognize a seaworthy vessel when I see one. Regarding awakened souls, there have never been more able vessels in the waters than there are right now across the world. And they are fully provisioned and able to signal one another as never before in the history of humankind.

I would like to take your hands for a moment and assure you that you are built well for these times. Despite your stints of doubt, your frustrations in arighting all that needs change right now, or even feeling you have lost the map entirely, you are not without resource, you are not alone.

Look out over the prow; there are millions of boats of righteous souls on the waters with you. …Even though your veneers may shiver from every wave in this stormy roil, I assure you that the long timbers composing your prow and rudder come from a greater forest. That long-grained lumber is known to withstand storms, to hold together, to hold its own, and to advance, regardless…

We all have a heritage and history of being gutted, and yet remember this especially … we have also, of necessity, perfected the knack of resurrection.

Over and over again we have been the living proof that that which has been exiled, lost, or foundered – can be restored to life again.

This is as true and sturdy a prognosis for the destroyed worlds around us as it was for our own once mortally wounded selves.

…Though we are not invulnerable, our risibility supports us to laugh in the face of cynics who say “fat chance,” and “management before mercy,” and other evidences of complete absence of soul sense. This, and our having been ‘to Hell and back’ on at least one momentous occasion, makes us seasoned vessels for certain. Even if you do not feel that you are, you are.

…Believe the evidence of any one of your past testings and trials. Here it is: Are you still standing? The answer is, Yes! (And no adverbs like “barely” are allowed here). If you are still standing, ragged flags or no, you are able. Thus, you have passed the bar. And even raised it. You are seaworthy.

Remembering we are needed

…In any dark time, there is a tendency to veer toward fainting over how much is wrong or unmended in the world. Do not focus on that. There is a tendency, too, to fall into being weakened by dwelling on what is outside your reach, by what cannot yet be. Do not focus there. That is spending the wind without raising the sails.

We are needed, that is all we can know. And though we meet resistance, we more so will meet great souls who will hail us, love us and guide us, and we will know them when they appear…You have all the resource you need to ride any wave, to surface from any trough.

In the language of aviators and sailors, ours is to sail forward now, all balls out…

How do we intervene in a stormy world?

Stand up and show your soul

Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely. It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom, will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good.

What is needed for dramatic change is an accumulation of acts, adding, adding to, adding more, continuing. We know that it does not take “everyone on Earth” to bring justice and peace, but only a small, determined group who will not give up during the first, second, or hundredth gale.

One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these – to be fierce and to show mercy toward others; both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity.

There can be no despair when you remember why you came to Earth

Remember who you serve, and who sent you here

Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it. If you would help to calm the tumult, this is one of the strongest things you can do.

There will always be times…when you feel discouraged. I too have felt despair many times in my life, but I do not keep a chair for it. I will not entertain it. It is not allowed to eat from my plate.

The reason is this: In my uttermost bones I know something, as do you. It is that there can be no despair when you remember why you came to Earth, who you serve, and who sent you here. The good words we say and the good deeds we do are not ours. They are the words and deeds of the One who brought us here. In that spirit, I hope you will write this on your wall: When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. But that is not what great ships are built for.

Clarissa Pinkola Estes is an American poet, post-trauma specialist and Jungian psychoanalyst, and author of Women Who Run With the Wolves.

First published on LinkedIn on 9 May 2025:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/we-made-times-letter-young-activist-during-troubled-jen-ang-louxe

And that means my attention was fully captivated 24/7 by the spectacle of a democratically-elected government enacting policy after policy, aimed – fundamentally – at destroying the livelihood, homes and lives of people it was elected to serve.

Taking stock: Fascism in the White House

In just two months, Trump has shut down or curtailed the roles of institutions that protect people (like the Department of Education, the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Institutes of Health) and is well on his way to tanking the US economy.

Elon Musk, as head of the shadowy Department of Government Efficiency, which somehow has the power to email every federal employee in America, celebrated his rise to power with a Nazi salute, and has recently demanded access to private and sensitive data for millions and millions of Americans.

As someone who has lived for two years in Communist China in the late 1980s, and in Ba’athist Iraq in the early 1990s, I think I have a good gut feeling for what cruel and totalitarian governments look like – and what happens to people when those who hold power rule only in their own interests, robbing everyone else of their dignity and their futures – and when there are no means left to hold state authority to account.

It’s not good. Both the US and the UK are heading that way – but now, the US has been pushed off a cliff, and the only question left: who or what forces remain in play, with the power to slow or halt this fall?

The political, economic and social landscape is shifting, globally.  Change is coming at a radical pace, so for those of us who remain committed to ensuring that all people can live their lives in equal safety and dignity, we’re going to need a radical shift in tactics to meet this challenge.

How?

History lessons: Learn from anti-fascist movements

Last night, I had an interesting conversation with middle child. She said that her teacher had brought the poem that I have in my office to her Nat 5 History class, for discussion. (This poem, above, by Pastor Martin Niemoller)

Middle child was surprised to learn that some of her peers (aged 15) did not know that the Nazi regime built concentration camps, where they tortured and killed millions of people during WWII.

Her teacher had told them that concentration camps are not strictly part of their Nat 5 History curriculum – which directs students to focus only on the rise of the Nazi state – but that she felt it was important to also teach them what happened after the rise of the Nazi state.

I told middle child that she has an excellent secondary school history teacher.

Any student of modern history can tell you that the rise of fascism today – especially the tactics – are drawn directly from historical and contemporary lessons about how authoritarian regimes steal and guard state power.

But we also know this thing: anti-fascists have won victories. Over time, popular uprisings have brought down fascist governments.

So how did they do it?

For inspiration, try this excellent article by Professor Bart Cammaerts at the London School of Economics “Five lessons from past anti-fascists struggles” – he urges us to:

connect – dream – make cool art – litigate – resist

Here’s a direct quote from the “taking action” part of his article:

1. “Build transnational and cross-ideological coalitions of anti-fascist resistance within civil society and beyond: The anti-fascist movement not only bridged the geographical boundaries but also the ideological ones. Through the anti-fascist struggle, a strong chain of equivalence was constructed between socialists, communists, anarchists, liberals, Catholics, and freemasons.
2. Develop democratic alternatives to the fascist discourse and its allure to young and working class people: As in the past, there is a material and socio-economic ground for the resurgence of fascism, and as in the last century an interregnum, during which the “old is dying but the new cannot be born” as of yet (dixit Antonio Gramsci), also characterises these times.
3. Re-invigorate a culture and an aesthetic of anti-fascist resistance: Emotions and the affective dimension as well as a sophisticated publicity regime were central to the fascist appeal, which was in turn contested by a creative and exuberant culture and aesthetic of resistance (f.e. Bertold Brecht, John Heartfield, Walter Benjamin, André Malraux, and indeed George Orwell). This aesthetic and affect of resistance not only de-mystified and contested fascism but also celebrated freedom, equality and democratic alternatives; we need something similarly exhuberant and contestational today.
4. Document, record and prepare future litigation: The fascist modus operandi is one of the flagrant abuses of human rights and the manifest flaunting of the rule of law and the separation of powers. History also teaches us, however, that fascist rule is never absolute nor eternal, and that there is always a moment of reckoning. Hence, anti-fascist resistance must also document, record, and gather evidence.
5. Civil disobedience, disruption and sabotage: Finally, sabotage of fascist policies and disruption of their infiltration of state apparatuses was also crucial historically. The resistance against fascism was never just an affair of elites or artists, but also of workers, civil servants, farmers, and even (small) businesspeople, all circumventing and sabotaging fascist rule and policies. This is also something that will become crucial and necessary to develop and nurture again.”

Lessons for the : Choosing optimism over despair

Finally, a reminder: we are not alone in this struggle.

Artists, thinkers, dreamers and activists have already held the ground that we stand on now. They have done the thinking, sketched out a better future and even made some of that cool art – like Mark Titchner x BUILDHOLLYWOOD whose 2025 posters are featured in the photo at the top of this article.

We just need to find their work, and share it back to people who need to see, hear and hold this precious thing: hope

Thanks for reading The Long View again this week. I would love to hear about the thinking, art and activist resistance that you draw inspiration from, and that you think people should be hearing more about, especially now.

And…

Leaving you with this quote, from Noam Chomsky, in his interview “Why I choose optimism over despair“

We have two choices. We can be pessimistic, give up and help ensure that the worst will happen. Or we can be optimistic, grasp the opportunities that surely exist and maybe help make the world a better place. Not much of a choice.

First published on LinkedIn on 14 March 2025:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-fight-new-fascism-jen-ang-ras3e

The UK Home Office said in a press release that the legislation introduces counter terror-style powers to “identify, disrupt and smash people smuggling gangs” – as if this is somehow the fix that our very broken immigration system needs.

For those of you who are not UK migration policy experts – which will be most of you, because this is a very niche sort of interest – this Bill will, categorically, not fix the most pressing issues in the immigration and asylum system.

Nor will it protect people from the harm they suffer when they are trafficked or smuggled to the UK because they are fleeing persecution and criminal gangs.

Nor will it (probably) even have any significant impact on disrupting smuggling gang activity, which is its stated aim.

It definitely will not improve the lives of people already living in the UK, or fix the damage caused by UK Conservative Government immigration policies:

employers who cannot hire or retain qualified staff from abroad

universities who are facing huge deficits because of the sudden drop in overseas student enrolment

families and communities who are facing rising immigration fees and, in most part of the UK, what is described as “legal advice deserts” when it comes to accessing credible, affordable legal advice on their essential rights.

Why does migration matter to all of us?

Between 16-18% of the UK population was born abroad (ONS, 2023), and that means that a substantially greater proportion of the British public have family members – spouses, parents, children – or friends who are, in some way, directly impacted by UK immigration law and the “hostile environment”.

Even if you are British, the “hostile environment” enforcement powers exercisable by the UK Home Office, which have increased year-on-year in the last decade, affects every part of your daily life:

• When you started your job, did you have to show your passport or birth certificate to pass a ‘right to work’ check because your driver’s licence was not sufficient photographic ID? That’s immigration law.
• If you are a student at college or university, does your lecturer require you sign a register or use a QR code or “check-in” app to report to the Home Office physical attendance by students in class? That’s immigration law, too.
• When you opened a bank account, or applied for a driving licence, whether or not you realised it, your right to live in the UK was also determined as part of the application process.

Just as we all share the air we breathe, so too the hostile environment does not just affect migrants in the UK – it cannot, by definition – it affects all of us.

Why should we fix the asylum and immigration system and dismantle the hostile environment?

Quite a lot of research has been done over the past decade which has concluded:

• The Home Office has no evidence to show that hostile environment policies actually work
• Hostile environment policies were enforced illegally – in violation of the Equality Act 2010
• They foster racist practices, which is destructive for people and communities
• And – the obvious – hostile environment policies are cruel, harmful, unfair and bad for us

There are really important issues in the UK asylum and immigration that system that also need to be fixed. There is a massive backlog in deciding asylum claims, and this together with the Home Office’s decision to use hotels for asylum seekers rather than private rented flats has directly result in more than doubling the annual cost of housing a single person – from £17k to £41k, in just a couple of years.

Just to be clear, who gets paid also matters.

In this case, all that extra money – £4.3 billion annually – is going to just three private contractors, and trickling down to a small number of private hotel owners and chains. Instead, this money could go to local authorities, public housing associations and private landlords who previously supplied asylum seeker housing (and could do so again). Returning to what we did before could also expand the social housing stock and be part of the solution to the UK-wide and very real social housing crisis.

What we needed vs what we actually got

So for a brief summary of what the Bill actually says, I always turn to Colin Yeo at Free Movement for a definitive and accessible analysis of breaking legislation and case law. If you want the detail, you can read his article here.

We did get repeal of the Rwanda Act and some particularly cruel parts of the Illegal Migration Act 2023

but other harmful and irrational parts of the Illegal Migration Act 2023 have been retained

creation of new, wider enforcement powers for UK Home Office, including search and seizure of mobile phones

creation of a whole lot of new offences, with serious penalties, and not a lot of explanation for why this was necessary

So, in conclusion, we needed serious solutions to the poor functioning of the immigration and asylum system in the UK and a commitment to dismantling the UK Conservative Government’s hostile immigration policies…

…and what we got was a UK Labour Government that has kept failed policies on the books, and created new powers and offences as well.

This Bill will not have any impact on protecting people from smuggling, or making us all safer, because it was not designed to do those things – it was designed to signal that the UK Labour Government is willing to engage in the politics of fear.

The politics of fear, and how to defeat it

The politics of fear as articulated by Ruth Wodak is a tactic, usually associated with the right-wing, that distorts the political reality of a nation in order to create a disproportionate fear in the general population that is disproportionate to the actual danger posed.

Politicians and political elites can then use this fear – once it becomes an accepted mainstream belief – as a pretext to pass laws and take actions that are harmful to the general public, but somehow in the name of the common good. Or to be seen to be “doing something” about the invented (or exaggerated) harm, when avoiding accountability for larger, actual failings of governance.

We are living in a global era of elected governments that embrace the politics of fear; what can we do about it?

Don’t let other people define your fears – rely on your own wits, develop your ability to assess the credibility of others, and trust your native ability to reason through a problem. To know your own fears, the size and shape and finiteness of them, is a gift. And it’s a gift only you can give yourself.

Take actions to reduce fear in others – I’ve written before about the importance of curious and open dialogue with people who do not share your views, but I mean something different this time. The politics of fear will thrive when people feel insecure: about their financial situation, or even their place in this world – whether they belong, whether they deserve the respect of others, and so on. For me, initiatives that reduce poverty, improve access to education and employment, housing, health and social care – will increase feelings of safety and belonging, and reduce the effectiveness of politics of fear.

Call it out, and talk about the real change we need to see – the politics of fear is just a sleight of hand; it’s a particularly cruel kind of magic trick. It works because fear is a powerful motivator for people. But it also works because people don’t call it out. Try that, the next time you think people might be listening to you. And remember to be ready with your list of actual important things we should be talking about instead. Because if you do succeed, people will be listening.

Good luck everyone! Thanks for reading The Long View this week and bearing with me, whilst I worked through what I clearly felt was a really disappointing Bill from the new UK Labour Government.

As a wee treat, here’s a short, sweet book recommendation: not for the faint-hearted, but very much a rallying cry for feminist activists to call out the politics of fear that persist in how we talk about women’s bodies … and having the courage to push for something radically different, and better.

First published on LinkedIn on 31 January 2025:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/politics-fear-how-defeat-jen-ang-qopre/

This is like that feeling you get on Sunday night, all regretful and worried, but on an epic scale…

I’m lucky enough that I lot of what I’ve got to do this year are projects that I’ve not only chosen, but actually thrown myself forward to do.

I can imagine the Sunday night feeling sits even heavier for those tasks that you did not choose yourself, or that “past you” may have chosen, which “today you” now regrets.

Finding your own kind of magic

So this week’s Long View is a short, sweet look at how we shake off all that doubt – which can stop us in our tracks – and find our mojo, the thing that makes us, us – and that somehow miraculously keeps us going.

The magic that makes you, you – that’s your mojo.

Step 1: Slow down

For me, there is no one thing, and because who I am changes every year, the things that help me slow down and get grounded, can also change.

This year, what’s working is warm and spicy flavours …

I’ve done a lot of cooking over the past few weeks, and without the weekday pressure of just having to get the food out in a hurry, I’ve really enjoyed it, remembering that spices (in particular warm Asian spices like ginger, star anise, cinnamon and cloves) bring such warmth, comfort and joy to both sweet and savoury dishes.

Step 2: Laugh (at yourself)

When’s the last time you actually laughed at yourself? I’m serious. Learning not to take yourself so seriously is a really worthwhile endeavour.

Here’s how you do it:

• Take out a piece of paper and write down this sentence: “I am really worried and anxious about the year because …. “
• Then look at what you’ve written and keep writing: “I believe the worst possible things that could happen this year are …”
• Now evaluate what you’ve done.
• Some of the things you’ve written down will be very real, possible things. For example, I worry about not making enough money this year, and about my health, and about my mother’s happiness.
• But other things (usually, your worst possible imaginings) will be totally wild – and if you are honest with yourself, totally unlikely to come to pass.
• Now get some perspective. If a friend (not you) wrote this list, what would you say? Maybe you would point out that all these worries are not for them alone? Perhaps you would gently cajole, maybe even tease your friend for some of their more outlandish fears? Might you encourage your friend to laugh a little, maybe to lighten up?

If you do this exercise, when you’re finished, tuck that list away somewhere and bring it out at the end of 2025 – I promise if you’re not laughing now, you’ll be laughing then.

Step 3: Plant a seed

Literally, or figuratively. (I don’t know why, but this year I’m also really focused on plants.)

It has been a very long time since I’ve had any new years’ resolutions, but something that I do quite consciously at the start of every year, is to try to scatter a few opportunities a few weeks or months into the year ahead.

This includes:

• getting in touch with people I like but do not see enough, and arranging coffee, or a phone call, or a walk
• planting a way marker for a work project that I will actually look forward to – for example, let’s have this fun gathering in June, so I will get something done by then but also feel happy and excited about reaching that point and sharing my work
• signing up for a lecture or a workshop, about something that sparks my curiosity, and I have never gotten around to exploring

What’s your secret sauce?

On Monday evening, I found myself planting tomato and chilli pepper seeds in my home office. This may be too optimistic, given the average winter temperatures in there, but we all know that I suffer from a chronic surplus of optimism. I’ll post photos of where we get to with those plants in June – there’s my waymarker for that project.

I hope you’re finding your own way through these tricky first few weeks – and please do share any tips for how you get motivated to start the new year… or what sorts of seeds you plant to help you on your way, down the untrodden path of 2025.

First published on LinkedIn on 10 January 2025:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-find-your-mojo-jen-ang-zvede

All kinds of books: fiction, nonfiction, poetry – but especially, banned books.

There are a few reasons for this:

For the love of books

First of all, I love books – and some of you may know or remember that my mother was a college librarian and my father was (for a time) a history lecturer at the same small farming college. This meant that I spent a lot of time in the library as a child – reading, playing, drawing, messing about, and often, falling asleep between stacks of books.

My parents also did not restrict the scope of my reading, in any way – an approach that I now realise was controversial, and one I have maintained in raising my own children. An introverted only child, I read precociously, and voraciously.

It’s true that I read some books that I never should have read, at the age I first encountered them. But it’s also true that reading opened up entirely new worlds to me – other histories, perspectives and experiences that I could never (and can never) make myself, but that fundamentally changed how I saw the world around me, and my place in this world.

Reading is good for you…

The research is not conclusive as to whether reading makes you a better person, but there is solid evidence that reading can not only increase your empathy and make you more altruistic, but can also help you better communicate with others, and navigate tricky social situations in real life.

Also, for me, reading is fun.

I know that not everyone feels this way, and some people really struggle with reading – and that’s okay. When I say “reading” and “books” here, I also mean listening to and watching literary works.

I think the key thing is the immersive experience of throwing yourself into someone else’s imaginary world, emerging into the light, many hours later, astonished, satisfied and …slightly different to who you were before you started.

Dangerous ideas: why we should pay attention when ideas are banned

This week, I taught a class for the University of Glasgow’s Lawyering for Social Justice Clinic on critical theory, including critical race theory.

Critical race theory is an approach to examining law and society from the perspective that racism in society is not just the result of individual bias, but that it is systemic – embedding in law, policies and institutions that uphold and reproduce inequality.

I studied the law in the 1990s at Georgetown University, taught by people like David Cole, Lisa Heinzerling and Gary Peller, through the lenses of critical race theory, as well as feminist theory. Queer theory was not taught when I went to law school, but it, too, is an allied form of critical analysis.

I find the idea that law and society are interlinked to be both self-evidently true, and also kind of uplifting – because it suggests that what has been made, can be un-made and re-made by us all.

The opposite view (that there is no link between institutions and social values) feels both unrealistic and depressing. This view suggests that we experience racism in society because individual people are racist and will forever be, and there’s nothing that can be done about it. I prefer not to live in that world.

Sometimes, I rehearse ideas – running through lectures before I deliver them with family or friends, basically whoever doesn’t get out of the way fast enough

This week, I did a run through with middle daughter (now a teenager) whilst she cooked dinner.

When I finished, I added, “Now if I had been your teacher, and we lived in one of 12 states in the United States, what I have just taught you could result in me being disciplined, maybe fired, and in our entire school being defunded.”

Say what?

It’s true: teaching critical race theory in public K-12 (primary and secondary education) is banned in a number of US states, most recently in the state of Louisiana.

This phenomenon goes hand in hand with a 200% rise in book bans in the US in 2023-24, according to PEN America, “including titles on sexuality, substance abuse, depression and other issues students face in an age of accelerating technologies, climate change, toxic politics and fears about the future.”

With the recent election of Trump to succeed Biden to the US presidency, together with a powerful and growing grassroots campaign to ban a wide range of books in schools and public libraries, it is likely that we will see an increase in banning books and ideas – for the next generation of American children, and maybe also, here in the UK.

Why we should all read banned books

Just to be clear: not all banned books are worth reading.

Some banned books are actually pretty hard going, or badly written, and if you think about it, setting your mind to reading only books banned by people who hate being confronted with different and controversial views is equivalent to taking restaurant recommendations from a frenemy: unclear whether the recommendation will be on point, but definite that they don’t have your best interests at heart!

Having said that, there are an extraordinary number of brilliant and thoughtful books that have been (and are being) banned, and they deserve our attention, especially now.

A story shared, never dies.

There is something disturbing about an attempt to narrow our worldviews by restricting our access to ideas, and the best way to combat that is to keep reading, talking about and sharing those ideas with others.

This year, for middle child’s birthday (who is also a precocious and voracious reader) I’ve bought a series of 24 used classic banned books, and individually wrapped them in brown paper, with a summary highlighting a snippet of plot or content. She can choose to open the all at once, or unwrap one at at time – and it’s okay to share this wee secret with you, because she does not read The Long View

So…

I hope I have made the case for picking up, reading and gifting banned books this holiday break.

If you are looking for a list of great recommendations, here is a short, accessible list from Penguin Random House as well as this longer read in Teen Vogue from independent bookshop owners in the US.

Remember our public libraries! And please, if you do buy books this year, also consider book swaps, buying used books or supporting a great, independent local bookshop like Lighthouse Books in Edinburgh or Housman’s in London.

Here’s a list of Independent Radical Booksellers in the UK – and I would be so pleased if readers would share their favourite controversial reads, the best local bookshops – or just your aspirational to-read list for the holidays … book club is in session!

First published on LinkedIn on 13 December 2024:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-we-should-all-read-banned-books-jen-ang-gapbe

Aside from how much fun it is to visit a new place, I love recognising things that feel familiar, and learning about new ways of living, working and creating.

Some things about Slovenia – the architecture, the beautiful, safe and inviting public spaces, and definitely how functional the heating and hot water systems seem to be – remind me very much of the two years I spent as a child living in (unapologetically Communist) China during the late 1980s.

But there are new things here, too. New food to try, sights to see – and of course, a whole history to learn from people who have had very different experiences of living, to me.

On my journeys, I came across this faded sticker, “Push to Reset the World” and it stopped me in my tracks.

This is a very good piece of sticker art, because after looking up the artist @SpaceUtopian – it turns out this was exactly what they were trying to achieve:

Space Utopian Art tries to trigger the soul who comes across this sticker by planting a seed for small conscientious shifts.

So let’s take up that invitation, together.

…

If you could hit the reset button, and make the world over, could you do a better job than where we are now?

This is a Long View kind of question, because we are often so caught up in our day-to-day battles, that we don’t look up and ask the big questions, like: what does good living in a great society look like?

Sometimes, we avoid asking those questions because they are too painful. We feel too alone and powerless in our space to make changes happen to get to the better place.

We may even acknowledge that change comes so slowly that we are unlikely to see “great” happen in our lifetimes.

And I have often said that when injustice in the wider world feels too overwhelming, in order to carry on, it may be necessary to stay local, and focus on the small wins.

But today, let’s consider the possibility that we are more likely to achieve goals that we can clearly picture and articulate.

For individuals, we call this “visualisation” and I’m sure there is still some debate about whether this actually works, although personally, I’m a fan.

For activists, being about to effectively communicate your vision of better to others is essential for the success of your movement.

Does your thinking lean towards: utopia or dystopia?

I have always liked both utopian and dystopian literature – I see them as the two sides of the same coin, actually. And it must be that I enjoy the thought experiment of taking an idea and exploring the biggest, most extreme version of that idea.

In school, I read extracts from Plato’s The Republic, Thomas More’s Utopia and Henry David Thoreau’s Walden.

…But what really captured my imagination were boldly dystopian works like George Orwell’s 1984, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and now, many years later, Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games.

(Right now, I’m working through Hugh Howley’s Silo series, but don’t spoil it for me, because I’m still only on the first book, Wool.)

Either way, utopian and dystopian books, movies and visuals are, to my mind, activist works of art or intellect. Only people interested in the impact of systemic ideology on human lives would think to show you the consequences of those ideas, writ large.

So, are you gonna do it? Dream big and push that button?

I hope this has been a welcome break, and maybe got you inspired to dream big today…

Because – and this may be easier for me to see, than for you – you are right now living in someone else’s vision for how you live your life.

Wouldn’t it be lovely to think that the first step towards changing that, is just setting aside a little time for dreaming up your own vision, for you?

First published on LinkedIn on 22 November 2024:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/push-reset-world-power-dreaming-jen-ang-oijke/

For a start, this week, we celebrated the launch of a new Roma Cultural Centre in Govanhill, Glasgow – my work with the brilliant Romano Lav team has included delivering a session with their Community Catalysts on the law as oppression or liberation, grounded in principles of Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

Earlier in the week, I also attended a showcase event featuring the work of law students in the University of Glasgow School of Law Glasgow Open (GO) Justice programme, and this put me in mind of the powerful connection between learning and teaching, even for students who are still themselves figuring out their relationship to the law and legal practice.

Since 2007, I have taught law at the The Open University alongside legal practice for most of my professional career. I know why I continue to teach, but I honestly cannot remember the reasons I first applied for the role. Why, at the age of 29 and many months’ pregnant – I thought adding a second part-time gig to my already demanding full-time job, just ahead of discovering for the first time what it was to be a parent – was going to be a great idea.

Teaching as an inheritance

I knew about teaching as a career option because my father was a teacher before me. He taught at a community agricultural college for about 10 years, while raising me and also trying to finish his PhD in the evenings and weekends. My mother was also a college librarian. As they did not have close family nearby, I spent many school nights, sat in the back row of my father’s evening World Civilisation lectures, or falling asleep in piles of unshelved books in the children’s section of the college library.

I knew then that my father taught a required course (history) to students who mostly did not choose to learn that material – they were attending college mainly to gain certificates in agriculture, or animal husbandry, or primary education, perhaps.

I remember the tactics my father used to make his lectures memorable, and worth attending – humour, surprise and relatability. He spoke plainly, he played the clown – and his students laughed, and learned.

The educator has the duty of not being neutral, Paulo Freire

My father was a historian and he taught me this one thing early in life: there is no neutral interpretation of history. History is written by the winners. He referred me to a book called The Whig Interpretation of History which I have never read. Now, many decades later, I reflect this is quite an odd thing to say to your seven-year-old child… I just might read that book.

Teaching as an education

Since picking up that job at the OU, I have never looked back.

My students were keen, hard-working, grateful for the opportunity of an education and – especially in the early years – exceptionally kind and forgiving of my shortcomings as a tutor.

I did a lot of trying, and failing, in the first decade – and in putting in that time, I grew wiser and more confident about what could work, less afraid to try new things in the classroom too.

My students became the reason I continued to teach.

Whoever teaches, learns in the act of teaching; and whoever learns, teaches in the act of learning, Paolo Freire

Teaching is, for me, the best way to learn. You test your own understanding when you try to communicate your ideas with others. You hold yourself vulnerable to critical feedback and to the simplest questions (which are usually the hardest).

And if you ask students the right questions, you broaden your own experiences of the world, expanding your horizons and connections.

Teaching as a revolutionary act

For many years, people have spoken to me about this book: Pedagogy of the Oppressed written by Paolo Freire, a Brazilian educator in 1967/68. He began working with illiterate peasants in 1947 in the NE of Brazil and, two decades later, had organised a popular movement to eradicate illiteracy.

But I have never read the book in its entirety, and that is what I’ve set out to do this month.

Here’s what I’ve learned so far

• Traditional education adopts a “banking” approach – teachers have a fixed amount of knowledge that they need to transmit to students, who must be filled up, or must “bank” this knowledge. If they are able to reproduce what they have banked, they have demonstrated understanding and the process is a success.
• This process is itself the product of systems that create oppression and therefore reinforces the oppression of those who are worst off in our societies. We cannot expect people who benefit from exploiting others to design systems that liberate the people they exploit.
• If educators are truly committed to uplifting people’s lives through education, we need to change and challenge the system – what we teach, where we teach, how we teach

If the structure does not permit dialogue, the structure must be changed, Paolo Freire

And finally, if we do this thing – if we challenge and question and transform how we teach… we are committing a revolutionary act.

That is the act of dismantling systems of oppression – and this work can be done both from the outside (in communities that are normally shut out from traditional education) and from the inside (in educational settings like universities that are traditionally allies of the establishment).

Concluding thoughts

I am not finished with the book yet, and to be honest it is hard going!

I would really welcome suggestions about other media for understanding Paolo Freire’s work (video, lectures, comics or animation) that might be more accessible for grasping the best of his ideas. I would share these, if I knew what they were – so please do write back if you have something to recommend.

Thanks again for reading and thanks also to all of you out there, who spend even a little bit of your time, sharing your knowledge and life experience with others

Education is an act of love; and love is an act of courage, Paolo Freire

First published on LinkedIn on 7 June 2024:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/teaching-revolutionary-act-jen-ang-cxdve/

I have no doubt – because the side of change making has always been full of visionary, creative, and also delightfully contrary people – that right at the very start, there was a division of views on how best to make that change.

And it was this: reform or revolution?

Change the system from the inside, or tear it all down and start again?

Talkin’ about a revolution

Rocky the Rooster from the brilliant Aardman Animations stop motion animation film, Chicken Run, was a revolutionary. There is no negotiating with Farmer Tweedy, whose income and livelihood depends entirely on exploitation of the flock, and who sees no intrinsic value in non-productive members of the flock once their laying days are over. This is a zero sum game: the Farmer has everything stacked in his favour, and the flock have nothing to bargain with other than their freedom.

So Rocky leads a daring breakout, proving that (*with proper planning and a total disregard for the laws of physics) – chickens can fly.

Fight the enemy, not the system

Revolution makes for great cinema. But it is also risky – because usually, after tearing down structures, new structures need to be built. And those structures are often built in conditions of instability and uncertainty, and sometimes competing interests, values and principles defeat the task of building something better, even when tearing down the old thing was clearly the right thing to do.

In the very worst cases, more people are worse off after a revolution, than they were before it.

Why take all that risk, when you can just shift the balance a little, to make things right?

This is the sort of thing that a reformer would point out.

Mr Fox is a reformer. He’s a fox-shaped Robin Hood, stealing from the wealthy food industrialist farmers Boggis, Bunce and Bean and taking personal benefit by taxing a system of exploitation run by others. Unfortunately, the taxes get too steep for the greedy 3 Bs, and they retaliate against not just Mr Fox and his family, but the entire local wild animal community, literally driving them deep underground.

In the end, Mr Fox leads the wild animals to the safety of an urban sewer (*not sure the analogy is holding any more, or maybe it is), and they emerge triumphant into an entire supermarket of food to steal.

So the lesson is: when faced with a system overwhelmingly stacked against you, don’t waste your energy tearing it down; just take your share.

So, who wins?

I think revolutionaries and reformers both have justice and the good of people at their hearts. They are just locked in a difference of opinion around how to achieve those goals.

Injustice hurts people no matter where you find it, and change makers generally want to make things right. But both options are risky, in different ways.

Do we have to choose?

Yes, and no. On an individual basis, these are choices we make every day. We make choices about how we spend our time (in work and at play), about how we share our power (including how we spend our money) and about the relationships we build with others. The rules we choose to follow also matter: if we recycle, if we pay our taxes, if we speak up when we see someone else unjustly harmed.

On a collective basis, I think you can be part of a movement that embraces both. I know that sounds wild, but it’s true. Whether we are seeking change by revolution or evolution, it is not us who decides whether we succeeded but future generations. We are, all of us, just giving it our best shot.

If that’s true, we need visionaries both within and outside the system, working for change today. We don’t have to agree on everything, but a great deal can be accomplished by focusing on the key things we do agree on, and just letting go of the rest.

Because if we don’t manage this thing, if we don’t learn how to challenge and change the system, then the system keeps working, for or against all of us.

Phew, that was serious…

Yeah, sorry, I had serious things on the mind this week!

I would love to know if any of this resonated for you, and also to hear from you if you think I’ve got it really wrong. Or you can just pitch in with the animated feature films that *should have gotten a mention instead.

Happy Friday, and here’s a wee treat from soul legend Sam Cooke, for those of you who have made it to the end.

First published on LinkedIn on 17 May 2024:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-do-we-make-change-reform-revolution-jen-ang-q9lje/