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13: 2020
Shows
Available from Pirate
Television
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Shows
are listed in reverse chronological order:
Peggy Orenstein: Boys and Sex, Monday 4/6/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
I first became aware
of Peggy Orenstein in 2012 when I taped her talk about her book "Cinderella
Ate My Daughter". This was a
big hit on Free Speech TV. They
played it repeatedly. It also hit
the spot with me as I was raising a young daughter at the time.
As anyone who has raised daughters can’t help but know, Cinderella is
going to eat your daughter and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Your little “princess” is going to get that Barbie house and all the
furnishings or suffer social ostracism. Who
would allow that?
See: Peggy Orenstein: A New Generation of Girlie-Girls:
Continuing on in her investigation of the role of the ubiquitous marketing
machine in shaping our daughters’ identities and futures, her next
best-seller, Girls & Sex broke ground, shattered taboos, and launched
conversations about young women’s right to pleasure and agency in sexual
encounters. As she explains, this
prompted calls from her audience- “What about the boys?”
And so be it. Orenstein gave this
talk at Town Hall Seattle with insight from her latest book, Boys & Sex to
examine how young men understand and negotiate the new rules of physical and
emotional intimacy. She outlines how
boys are subject to the same cultural forces as girls—steeped in the same
distorted media images and binary stereotypes of female sexiness and toxic
masculinity—which equally affect how they navigate sexual and emotional
relationships. Drawing on
comprehensive interviews with young men, psychologists, academics, and experts
in the field, she dissects so-called locker room talk; how the word
“hilarious” robs boys of empathy; pornography as the new sex education;
boys’ understanding of hookup culture and consent; and their experience as
both victims and perpetrators of sexual violence. By surfacing young men’s
experience in all its complexity, Orenstein unravels the hidden truths, hard
lessons, and important realities of young male sexuality in today’s world.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle and Elliot Bay Books
Recorded 1/20/20
Karen Sherman: After the Genocide, Monday
3/30/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
After a twenty-five-year
career spent fighting for women’s rights around the globe, author Karen
Sherman moved to Rwanda with her three sons to oversee the construction of
a first-of-its-kind women’s opportunity center. Sherman makes her way to
Town Hall to tell the story of valiant women who survived the Rwandan
genocide with insight from her book Brick by Brick: Building Hope and
Opportunity for Women Survivors Everywhere. In conversation with physician
and volunteer Dr. Rosita Van Coevorden, Sherman recounts her year-long
journey to better the lives of women survivors, highlighting the grit and
determination they poured into building lives and raising families despite
the brutal challenges of war, genocide, and inequality. Sherman shares how
the strength of these women helped her confront corrupt officials,
navigate conflict zones, face trauma in her own past, and renew her
commitment to her family. Listen in as Sherman and Van Coevorden delve
into the struggles of women everywhere—striving to balance work and
family, fighting for real options and choices, trying to make their voices
heard.
Karen Sherman has spent her life advocating for women in war-torn and
transitional countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Congo, Nigeria,
Rwanda, South Sudan, Kosovo, and the former Soviet Union. Sherman serves
as President of the Akilah Institute, Rwanda’s only women’s college,
and was a senior executive at Women for Women International, an
organization that helps women survivors of war to rebuild their lives.
Dr. Rosita van Coevorden is a retired physician, entrepreneur, and active
community volunteer in women’s and children’s causes. She is the
Founder and Co-Chair of Vital Voices Northwest Council and serves as a
director of Vital Voices Global Partnership, Art of Hope, and Kindering
Center. She currently serves as the ED of DSC of Puget Sound, a non-profit
providing programs and services to individuals with Down syndrome and
their families.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle And Third Place Books
Recorded 2/20/20
Rob Larson: Bit Tyrants, Monday 3/23/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
If the stories they tell
about themselves are to be believed, all of the tech giants—Apple,
Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon—were built from the ground up
through hard work, a few good ideas, and the entrepreneurial daring to
seize opportunity. But economist and author Rob Larson aims to set the
record straight. With searing wit from his new book Bit Tyrants: The
Political Economy of Silicon Valley, Larson provides an urgent corrective
to this narrative of Silicon Valley corporate benevolence. Larson skewers
the official histories that celebrate the innovative genius of Steve Jobs,
liberal commentators who fall over themselves to laud Bill Gates’
selfless philanthropy, and politicians who will tell us to listen to Mark
Zuckerberg for advice on how to protect our democracy from foreign
influence. Larson provides us with maps to all the shallow graves,
skeleton-filled closets, and invective laced emails Big Tech left behind
on its ascent to power. He offers us the tools to crack the code of the
economic dynamics that allowed these companies to become near-monopolies.
Join Larson for a blistering commentary on Big Tech and a call for digital
socialism that urges us towards a viral movement for online revolution.
Rob Larson teaches Economics at Tacoma Community College in Washington. He
is active with Occupy Tacoma and Jobs with Justice, and writes regularly
for Dollars and Sense and Z Magazine. He is the author of Bleakonomics: A
Heartwarming Introduction to Financial Catastrophe, the Jobs Crisis and
Environmental Destruction, and Capitalism vs. Freedom: The Toll Road to
Serfdom.
Thanks
to Town Hall Seattle & Elliott Bay Bookstore, recorded 3/9/20
Robert Trebor: The Haircut Who Would Be
King, Monday 3/16/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
A movie and TV star, Robert
Trebor reads from his book THE HAIRCUT WHO WOULD BE KING, a satire about
the Donald J. Trump presidency. The
discussion of what compelled him leads into revelations of the actual
history and personality of the Donald, and Trevor's conclusion that
laughter and ridicule may be good medicine in the face of the current
absurdity.
Robert Trebor, is an accomplished character actor widely recognized for
playing a fictional salesman, Salmoneus, in the cult hit series
"Hercules: The Legendary Journeys", "Xena: Warrior
Princess", and a real-life serial killer, David Berkowitz, a/k/a the
Son of Sam, in the movie "Out of Darkness" opposite Martin
Sheen.
Thanks to Barnes & Noble, Northgate
Recorded 2/29/20
Free Speech TV
Schedule:
Two shows alternate throughout the
week:
3/9/20
E.J. Dionne: Can Progressives and Moderates
Unite?
Dennis Kucinich and Joe Dobner: The Fight For Public Power
3/16/20
Robert Trebor: The Haircut Who Would Be King
E.J.
Dionne: Can Progressives and Moderates
Unite?
Check the FStv website for
show times.
E.J. Dionne: Can Progressives and Moderates
Unite?, Monday 3/9/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
Broad and principled
opposition to Donald Trump’s presidency has drawn millions of previously
disengaged citizens to the public square and to the ballot boxes.
Journalist E.J. Dionne steps up to Town Hall’s stage to comment on this
inspired and growing activism for social and political change—an
outpouring of engagement which hasn’t been seen since the days of
Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal policies and the Progressive and Civil
Rights movements. He draws from his book Code Red: How Progressives and
Moderates Can Unite to Save Our Country to call for a shared commitment to
decency and a politics focused on freedom, fairness, and the future.
In
conversation with KUOW’s Ross Reynolds, Dionne cautions that if
progressives and moderates are unable or unwilling to overcome their
differences, they could not only enable Trump to prevail again but also
squander an occasion for launching a new era of reform. Offering a
unifying model for furthering progress, Dionne encourages progressives and
moderates to explore common ground and expand the unity that brought about
Democrat victories in the 2018 elections. Breaking through the partisan
noise and cutting against conventional wisdom to provide a realistic look
at political possibilities, Dionne offers us a strategy for progressives
and moderates to think more clearly and accept the responsibilities that
history now imposes on them.
E.J.
Dionne writes about politics in a twice-weekly column for The Washington
Post. He is also a government professor at Georgetown University, a
visiting professor at Harvard University, a senior fellow in governance
studies at the Brookings Institution and a frequent commentator on
politics for NPR and MSNBC.
Ross
Reynolds is the Executive Producer of Community Engagement at KUOW. He
creates community conversations such as the Ask A events, and occasionally
produces arts and news features.
Thanks
to Town Hall Seattle Recorded 2/26/2020
Dennis Kucinich and Joe Dobner: The Fight For Public Power, Monday 3/2/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
De-privatizing Public Utilities
Two counties in Washington State are engaged in a struggle to convert
their private, for-profit energy utilities into public utilities that
would provide cleaner energy, safer infrastructure and be accountable
to the people. Residents in East King County are fed up with Puget
Sound Energy, which provides the dirtiest energy in the state and is
deeply invested in deadly fossil fuels. Native tribes and residents
have united in a fight to stop the construction of PSE’s liquid
natural gas plant in Tacoma and dangerous coal trains traveling from
Montana coalfields. Many people in this area are doing their part by
buying electric cars, but when 56% of their energy comes from coal, it
defeats the purpose. Meanwhile, the publicly owned utilities in the
state provide clean, renewable energy and better service.
Dennis Kucinich, the former mayor, congressman and presidential
candidate visited Washington to support and advise activists on how to
establish their own Public Utility District. They are organizing an
initiative campaign that will take investment firms that put profit
over climate and the public interest out of the loop. Dennis Kucinich
fought successfully to save Cleveland’s public municipal
electrical utility when he was the young mayor in the late 70’s.
He stood firm against the big banks, which threatened to cut off credit
and bankrupt the city if he blocked the sale. The ratepayers responded
by organizing an initiative campaign that stopped the privatization and
the banks duly bankrupted Cleveland. A little known fact is that
Kucinich survived two assassination attempts.
The fight to wrest back control of energy is not going to be easy.
Kucinich noted that PSE reports making between 6.5 to 10 percent
returns on their investments. “ Public utilities are cash cows.
In this case, you’re the ones getting milked,” he quipped.
Kucinich estimated that over the course of about 15 years, preserving
Cleveland's public utility saved Cleveland hundreds of millions of
dollars.
Join us and learn how we can win.
Thanks to East King Co. Public Utility District campaign & Bibi Restaurant. Recorded 2/5/20
Host Linda Boyd Introduction - 0
Sara Papanikolaou --02:04
A founding member of 350 Eastside, identified Puget Sound Energy as a
huge source of greenhouse gas in our own backyard. She said, “it
is utterly unacceptable, in 2020, for our local utility to have 56
percent fossil fuel based power generation. It is unacceptable for our
local utility to continue to build out fracked gas infrastructure that
locks us into decades of emissions and the worst effects of global
warming. PSE's recently built North Seattle Lateral Upgrade Fracked gas
pipeline expansion in South Snohomish County is raising our statewide
greenhouse gas emissions 5% annually.”
Joe Dabner Presentation 9:05
An organizer for EKC-PUD, described the transformation of Puget Sound
Power and Light, which generated power using about 50-50 coal and
hydro-power. After the purchase of the Washington Energy Company, Puget
Sound Power changed its name to Puget Sound Energy, and became heavily
invested in gas plants. Even after increasingly dire IPCC reports on
Global Warming, PSE still intends to continue to burn coal as long as
they can.
Dobner said that since we can’t afford to wait until 2040 to
curtail emissions from burning gas. Since PSE continues to invest in
carbon-based energy, we need to get ourselves out of PSE by forming a
public utility district. Dobner laid out the initiative process and
organizational steps necessary to put the EKC-PUD on the 2020 ballot.
Cong. Dennis Kucinich -35:48
Former U.S. Representative from Ohio, 53rd mayor of Cleveland,
candidate for the Democratic nomination for president of the United
States in 2004 and 2008
State Rep. Maralyn Chase -1:15:20
The former Washington State Senator talks about how she tried to stop
foreign investors from acquiring PSE and why it is important to get
good commissioners to run PUD’s. She elaborates on how even if
you have a PUD, it can still become a captured agency. This happened in
the case of SNOPUD- Snohomish County Public Utility District.
Thanks to the East King County
Public Utilities District Campaign
Josephine Ensign: Catching Homelessness: Stories Matter, Monday
2/24/20
8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
At the beginning of the homelessness
epidemic in the 1980s, Josephine Ensign was a young, white, Southern,
Christian wife, mother, and nurse running a medical clinic for the
homeless in the heart of the South. Through her work and intense
relationships with patients and co-workers, her worldview was shattered
after losing her job, family, and house—and she became homeless
herself. Ensign joins us decades later to tell her story through her
book Catching Homelessness: A Nurse’s Story of Falling Through
the Safety Net. With intense empathy and deep human perspective, she
highlights the ways her experience of being homeless reconstituted her
life with altered views on homelessness and on the healthcare system.
Ensign provides a piercing firsthand look at the homelessness industry,
nursing, and our country’s health care safety net. Join Ensign as
she reflects on how her understanding of homelessness has changed her
work, perspective, and life experiences—and changed her.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle and the League of Women Voters, recorded 1/26/20
William Wheeler: El Salvador’s World of Violence, Monday
2/17/20 8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
El Salvador is in the news again this
week as armed police and troops stormed the parliament. This came less
than a week after Human Rights Watch issued a scathing report that
found that more than 200 refugees and asylum seekers the United States
has sent back to El Salvador have been killed or seriously abused -
including sexually assaulted and tortured.
To take a closer look at the horror show wrought by three decades of US
foreign policy in Central America is award-winning journalist and
producer William Wheeler, reading from his first book, "State of War:
MS-13 and El Salvador’s World of Violence".
Thanks to Elliott Bay Bookstore, recorded 1/21/20
Diane Ravitch with Jesse Hagopian: The Fight to Save America’s Public Schools, Monday
2/10/20 8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
According to Diane Ravitch, citizens
across America are successfully fighting to stop corporations from
privatizing our nation’s public schools. Ravitch joins us with
insight from her book Slaying Goliath: The Passionate Resistance To
Privatization And The Fight To Save America’s Public Schools. She
highlights how parents, teachers, activists, bloggers, religious
leaders, and others are stepping forward to fight against the
disruption of one of America’s most fundamental public
institutions. Ravitch identifies corporate interests, political voices,
and economic disruptors who believe America’s schools should be
run like businesses, modeling the structure of our schools on a gig
economy in which students are treated like customers or products and
teachers are incentivized with threats and bonuses. Join Ravitch to
learn about the nationwide story of brave individuals who, spurred on
by the power of ideas and passion, are fighting back to successfully
keep their public schools alive.
Diane Ravitch is a research professor of education at New York
University and the author of eleven books, including The Language
Police: How Pressure Groups Restrict What Students Learn and Reign of
Error: The Hoax Of The Privatization Movement And The Danger To
America’s Public Schools.
Jesse Hagopian teaches Ethnic Studies and is the co-adviser to the
Black Student Union at Garfield High School. He is an editor for the
social justice periodical Rethinking Schools and is the co-editor of
the book Teaching for Black Lives.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle, recorded 2/4/20
Robert Frank: Putting Peer Pressure to Work to Save the Planet, Monday
2/3/20 8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
Psychologists have long understood that
social environments profoundly shape our behavior, sometimes for the
better, often for the worse. But social influence is a two-way
street—our environments are themselves products of our behavior.
Author Robert Frank joins us with insight from his book Under the
Influence: Putting Peer Pressure to Work, identifying ways to unlock
the latent power of social context—perhaps even on a level that
could save the planet.
Frank draws our attention to the threat of a changing climate,
asserting that robust measures to curb greenhouse gases could help us
curtail droughts, flooding, wildfires, and famines. He draws our
attention to new research that shows how the strongest predictor of our
willingness to support climate-friendly policies, install solar panels,
or buy an electric car is the number of people we know who have already
done so. Frank explains how altering our social context could help us
redirect trillions of dollars annually in support of carbon-free energy
sources, all without requiring painful sacrifices from anyone. Join
Frank to learn how fostering more supportive social environments could
lead individuals everywhere to make choices that benefit everyone.
Robert H. Frank is the Goldwin Smith Professor of Economics at Cornell
University, where he has taught since 1972 and where he currently holds
a joint appointment in the department of economics and the Johnson
Graduate School of Management. He has published on a variety of
subjects, including price and wage discrimination, public utility
pricing, the measurement of unemployment spell lengths, and the
distributional consequences of direct foreign investment.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle and Third Place Books
Recorded 1/20/20
Samuel Woolley: The Reality Game, Monday 1/20/20 8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
Despite Samuel Woolley’s warnings
as early as 2013, the problem of online disinformation stormed our
political process in 2016 and has only worsened since. Woolley shares
urgent perspectives from his book The Reality Game: How the Next Wave
of Technology Will Break the Truth. He cautions that technology may
soon play an even deeper role in the rise of disinformation—with
human-like automated voice systems, machine learning,
“deepfake” AI-edited videos and images, interactive memes,
virtual reality, and more. Information literacy is an essential
ingredient in a healthy democracy, and Woolley shows how the breakneck
rate of technological change is making it nearly impossible. Woolley
argues for a new culture of invention, one built around accountability
and transparency. Sit in for a treatise on preventing technological
manipulation in our future, and a call for us to use our new tools not
to control people but to empower them.
Samuel Woolley is a writer and researcher with a focus on emerging
media technologies, propaganda and politics. He is an assistant
professor in the School of Journalism at the Moody College of
Communication at the University of Texas-Austin. Woolley’s work
looks at how automation, algorithms and AI are leveraged for both
democracy and control.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle and Elliott Bay Books. Recorded 1/9/20
Michael Lerner: A Political Manifesto to Heal the World, Monday 1/13/20 8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
Many liberals and progressives yearn for
coherent alternatives to capitalism, but previous visions of socialism
do not necessarily account for anything beyond material benefits.
Social theorist and psychotherapist Rabbi Michael Lerner talks about
his strategy for a new socialism built on love, kindness, and
compassion for one another. Drawing from his book “Revolutionary
Love”, Lerner proposes a method to replace what he terms the
“capitalist globalization of selfishness” with a
globalization of generosity, prophetic empathy, and environmental
sanity.
Lerner challenges liberal and progressive forces to move
beyond politics and build a movement that can reverse the environmental
destructiveness and social injustice caused by wanton pursuit of
profit. Revisiting the hidden injuries of class, Lerner shows that much
of the suffering in our society- including most of its addictions and
the growing embrace of right-wing nationalism and reactionary versions
of fundamentalism- is driven by frustrated needs for community, love,
respect, and connection to a higher purpose in life. Yet these needs
are too often missing from liberal discourse. Lerner contends that even
if progressive programs are smartly constructed, they cannot be
achieved unless they speak to the heart and address the pain so many
people experience. Join Lerner to explore his idea of a “Caring
Society” and develop the courage to stop listening to those who
tell us that fundamental social transformation is unrealistic.
Rabbi Michael Lerner is the editor of Tikkun magazine. He is
the author of eleven books, including two national bestsellers,
“Jewish Renewal” and “The Left Hand of God: Taking
Back Our Country from the Religious Right”. Lerner, who has PhDs
in philosophy and social and clinical psychology, was chosen for the
2019 Humanitarian Award by the International Association of Sufism. He
has also received Morehouse College’s King-Gandhi Award for his
work for peace and nonviolence.
Thanks to Town Hall Seattle & University Book Store. Recorded 12/12/19
Joshua Douglas: How to Take Back Our Elections, Monday
1/6/20 8pm, Thurs. 1pm, Sat. Morning 12am on SCM
In contrast to the anxiety surrounding
our voting system, with stories about voter suppression and
manipulation, there are actually quite a few positive initiatives
toward voting rights reform. Professor Joshua A. Douglas, an expert on
our electoral system, examines these encouraging developments in this
talk discussing his new book "Vote for Us: How to Take Back Our
Elections and Change the Future of Voting". We learn how regular
Americans are working to take back their democracy, one community at a
time.
Told through the narratives of those working on positive voting rights
reforms, Douglas gives examples of citizen activists expanding voter
eligibility, easing voter registration rules, making voting more
convenient, enhancing accessibility at the polls, providing voters with
more choices, finding ways to comply with voter ID rules, giving
redistricting back to the voters, pushing back on big money through
local and state efforts, using journalism to make the system more
accountable, and improving civics education. At the end of his book,
Professor Douglas includes an appendix that lists organizations all
over the country working on these efforts.
Professor Douglas gives anyone fed up with our current political
environment the ideas and tools necessary to affect change in their own
communities.
Thanks to the League of Women Voters WA, Fix Democracy First & Third Place Books. Recorded 7/2/19