Positive Force

Positive Force DC is an activist organization founded in 1985 by members of the punk community in Washington, D.C. It has organized hundreds of benefit concerts for community and activist groups, and worked alongside Fugazi, Bikini Kill, Nation of Ulysses, Girls Against Boys, Q and Not U and other bands arising from the capital’s punk scene. Positive Force has also engaged in many other forms of progressive activism in the D.C. area, and from about 1985 to the mid-1990s there was a Positive Force house in Arlington, Virginia where various members of the group lived and which the organization operated from.

Founding

The original Positive Force group started in 1984 in Reno, Nevada, with people in and around the band 7 Seconds. Several members of Reno Positive Force moved to Las Vegas and started a chapter there later that year. The idea spread across the United States following the March 1985 publication of an article in Maximum RocknRoll. Positive Force came together in Washington, D.C. in summer 1985 - Revolution Summer, influenced by the straight edge movement, according to Dance of Days, a book on the history of D.C. punk by Positive Force DC co-founder Mark Andersen and Mark Jenkins. While up to a dozen chapters existed at one point or another, the Washington, D.C. group is the only one to survive the 1980s. It continues to operate today.