In a world gone mad, Charlie Angus is on a mission to inject some sanity.
To that end, the 62-year-old author, musician, and former NDP MP well known for his grassroots activism is bringing his Meidas Canada Resistance Tour to Peterborough on Wednesday, October 15.
Tickets for the 6:30 p.m. event at The Venue on George Street North, priced on a sliding scale at $15, $25, and $40 (plus fee), can be purchased at eventbrite.ca/e/1628950046439, with proceeds after expenses benefiting the YES Shelter for Youth and Families.
Co-sponsored in part by the Community Foundation of Greater Peterborough, the Home Care Workers’ Co-operative, and the Peterborough and District Labour Council, with kawarthaNOW serving as official media sponsor, the tour stop will feature remarks by Angus followed by a question-and-answer session moderated by event host Kate Story.
Angus, who served Timmins-James Bay riding as an NDP MP from 2004 until 2025, sowed the seeds of his lifelong activism in the 1980s when he and his wife founded a homeless shelter for men, in particular former prisoners and minority refugees.
Now, years later, dismayed and angered by the rise of divisiveness and authoritarianism, he’s taking his message of hope on the road to inspire others to fight for the deeply rooted Canadian values that are being increasingly threatened.
“With the Trump election, we saw the rise of really ugly gangster, fascist-kind of politics,” says Angus of his motivation for the Resistance Tour.
“People being arrested on the streets. Elon Musk giving the fascist salute. We saw, in Europe, the destabilization of years of negotiations between American allies with the Putin invasion of Ukraine. People were frightened. And then Trump threatened our country. I felt I need to start speaking up.”
“We’re not going back to normal. There’s no normal to go back to. We were very much back in a dark 1930s dystopian world, so I started to try to articulate and speak out, and people began reaching out to me. I was overwhelmed, not just by the interest but the emotion behind it.”
“When Trump threatened our country, I sensed a determination amongst very ordinary people. They were going to stand up to defend our country and values. People said ‘We need you to come. We need you come rally the troops.’ That marked the beginning of the Resistance Tour.”
Angus says his Peterborough audience will hear a few key messages.
“No one is coming to save us,” he says.
“The idea that the Democrats will get their act together for the mid-terms and we can all back to sleep, or some politician is going to negotiate (with Canada) — there’s no negotiating with gangsters.”
“In the age of gangster fascism, there’s no such thing as being a bystander. You’re an enabler or you resist. Resistance seems overpowering at first, but part of what the tour is about is how do we build resistance? How do we build that sense of willingness to stand up? How do we build a democratic movement in the age of fear and intimidation?”
Angus notes he has been “inundated” with messages from Peterborough and area residents in advance of his tour stop here.
“The team on the ground in Peterborough, they get it. I don’t have to explain to them how we use the rally. We bring people together and we start an action plan.”
Among those “on the ground” in Peterborough are event co-organizers Justin Sutton and Danielle Turpin. Both stress the event is non-partisan, and anyone who wants to strengthen both democracy and community is most welcome.
“If we see each other, face to face, we’ll begin to resist the urge to see one another as enemies,” says Sutton.
“We’re friends and neighbours. We live together. We need to create our community together. That’s the way democracy thrives. We solve problems by coming together and talking to one another. I know that we have difficult problems to work through, but the only we can do that is in conversation with one another.”
For her part, Turpin feels Angus’ words will inspire hope.
“He’s going to give us the energy to realize that if we work together, not against each other, things will change. He fights for democracy, which is about engaging all people in the community — young, old, left, right — and that’s what this event is going to bring out: that by working together, we can bring about positive change.”
Angus says his tour “is absolutely a call to action.”
“What the far right wants us to believe is that there’s no resistance and that they’re going to get their way. They’re not going to get their way. They’re just a bunch of grifters. We’ve got to call them out. We can’t be afraid of them.”
VIDEO: “Why Meidas Canada is stepping up”
After his appearance in Peterborough, Angus will be taking his Resistance Tour to British Columbia the following week. What does he hope happens in the aftermath of his Peterborough visit?
“Every time I speak, I say to people ‘It’s over to you,'” he says.
“I can’t tell you how, in Peterborough, to build resistance. You know how to do it. You can figure it out. But you’ve got to start meeting people. Get off Zoom and get into community town halls. You’ve got to meet people that weren’t politically active before. People resist when they’re asked to do something. You know what to do at the local level. My job is to give you the larger framework of what we’re dealing with.”
As for the notion that Canadians’ widely recognized reputation for being overly polite and non-confrontational is a resistance roadblock, Angus doesn’t buy it.
“Canadians are nice until they’re not,” he says.
“Just ask the poor Jerrys (German soldiers) that faced off against us when we landed on Juno Beach. We come from a long line of fascist fighters. We’ll not be pushed around when it comes to standing up, not just for ourselves but for other people. We’re sorry until we’re not sorry, and then you’re sorry.”
To those who think Canada is immune to the vitriol and divisiveness seen south of the border, Angus says think again.
“That MAGA ideology is here in Canada,” he says.
“We saw it with the convoys. We saw it with the death threats against politicians. We saw it with people shouting at the prime minister at events. We can’t let that hate come here. I think the one thing Trump has done is woken us up. Canadians were sleepwalking in a very bad way. We were not recognizing the threat. This is an opportunity for us to take the lead.”
“People ask if I’m I optimistic? Nope. I’m not optimistic at all. Am I hopeful? Damn right I’m hopeful. You can push a Canadian on an issue of justice, you can push a Canadian about backing down when someone else is being picked on, but a Canadian will always stand up and do the right thing.”
For all that Angus has done — outside politics, his life journey has seen him co-found and perform with the bands L’Étranger and Grievous Angels, write eight published books, and launch a magazine devoted to Northern Ontario life and culture —— he says his Resistance Tour experience has reset his priorities.
“I’ve been a New Democrat my whole life, but my focus now is speaking up for my country. I’m going to do what I have to do. I’ve received I don’t know how many death threats over the last three or four years. Nothing is going to stop this work. If I can do anything, I’m going to do it. If there’s better voices, smarter voices, bring it on. I’m glad for it, but I’m going to be that voice for democracy in the age of gangster fascism.”
And his message to anyone on the fence about coming out for his talk?
“You know exactly what’s going on in the world. You may tell yourself it’s going to go away, but you know it’s not. This is your opportunity to stand up … to be there in history. You may think you’re one small person and your voice doesn’t count — your voice does count, and joined by other voices, you become empowered.”
“This is a call to arms. We are the grandchildren of those great heroes who took Juno Beach and freed the Netherlands and kept the seas open and chased the Luftwaffe from the skies. It’s our turn. We’ve got to do it for our kids so they don’t have to fight in the trenches against gangsters like Putin.”
kawarthaNOW is proud to be the official media sponsor of Charlie Angus’s Peterborough appearance.
