KQED's Forum

In January 2020, Atlantic senior editor John Hendrickson wrote an article about Joe Biden’s stutter. Like Biden, Hendrickson has a stutter. And while stuttering wasn’t something that Hendrickson hid, it wasn’t something he liked to talk about either. But the viral response to his piece led Hendrickson to reconsider how to talk and think about his stutter. His relationship with stuttering and its impacts, both good and bad, on his life, are the focus of his new book, “Life on Delay: Making Peace with a Stutter.” We talk to Hendrickson, and hear from you: Has your life been affected by a stutter, yours or someone else’s?Guests:John Hendrickson , Author, "Life on Delay: Making Peace with a Stutter" - Hendrickson is a senior editor with Atlantic magazine.Courtney Byrd, Professor, Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, University of Texas at Austin - Byrd is also the founder and executive director of the Arthur M. Blank Center for Stuttering Education and Research Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The U.S. continues to grapple with poverty, economic inequality, and racial inequity more than 50 years after the death of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. In some lesser known speeches, King advocated for revolutionary ideas to eradicate poverty and provide economic justice such as a guaranteed basic income. We’ll look at King’s proposals for combating inequality, the evolution of those ideas over the decades, and current campaigns for economic justice in the Bay Area and nationally.Guests:Michael Honey, Professor of Labor and Ethnic Studies and American History, University of Washington, TacomaDorian Warren, Co-President, Community ChangeTinisch Hollins, executive director, Californians for Safety and Justice - co-founder of SF Black Wall Street, Vice Chair of SF African-Americans Reparations Advisory Committee Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

2022 MacArthur fellow Martha Gonzalez describes herself as an ‘artivista’ – at once an artist and an activist. The frontwoman of the East Los Angeles band Quetzal, Gonzalez focuses on the ways communities of color use music and creative expression as political tools toward social justice. From community fandango workshops to recording projects between women in L.A. and Veracruz, Mexico, Gonzalez makes music a conduit for conversation centering communities and their challenges. We’ll talk with Gonzalez about how her music practice and her activism influence each other.This segment originally aired Oct. 25, 2022Guests:Martha Gonzalez, Associate Professor in the Intercollegiate Department of Chicana/o Latina/o Studies, Scripps/Claremont College Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last year, poet and writer Clint Smith wrote the book, “How the World is Passed,” exploring how the US has failed to come to terms with the reality and legacy of slavery. Now, for an Atlantic cover story, “Monuments to the Unthinkable” he’s traveled to Germany to see how that country has grappled with memorializing its own ugly history. On this Martin Luther King Jr day, we talk with Smith about history, memory, and the stories a nation tells itself.This segment originally aired Nov. 17, 2022Guests:Clint Smith, poet, "How the Word is Passed;" staff writer, The Atlantic Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Former content moderators for Reddit and TikTok filed class action lawsuits against the sites last month alleging they suffered trauma from the graphic and violent content they reviewed. Content moderators review everything from innocuous misreports to horrifying videos of abuse — and experts say that vacillating between the two can create an anxiety of its own. We’ll talk about what content moderators face both domestically and abroad, why the work can’t be automated and the moral questions raised by the industry’s current structure.Guests:Sarah T. Roberts, faculty director, UCLA Center for Critical Internet Inquiry; author, "Behind the Screen: Content Moderation in the Shadows of Social Media"Niamh McIntyre, reporter on the Big Tech team, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The useful lifespan of items all over your home from clothes to kitchen gadgets to cell phones has been shrinking, according to a recent article in Vox. At the same time, manufacturers increasingly design products, especially tech devices and electronics, so that they are not easy or cost-effective to repair. “We buy, buy, buy, and we’ve been tricked — for far longer than the last decade — into believing that buying more stuff, new stuff is the way,” writes Izzie Ramirez of Vox. We’ll talk about the modern version of planned obsolescence and the “fix-it” movement that’s trying to combat it.Guests:Izzie Ramirez, deputy editor of Future Perfect, Vox Media; author of the recent article, "Your stuff is actually worse now"Kyle Wiens, co-founder and CEO, iFixitMatthew Bird, teaches industrial design, Rhode Island School of Design Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“If the storm had a theme, it was in the uprooted and broken trees that seemed to blanket the rain-soaked landscape,” writes California correspondent for the New York Times Shawn Hubler. All across the state, one of the most visible signs of destruction by California’s storms are uprooted trees, their curling roots violently airborne. They’ve smashed through roofs, toppled power lines and taken lives, affecting Californians across the state as we weather a series of Pineapple Express storms. We’ll hear why the state’s trees – already stressed by drought – are particularly vulnerable to storms and how the destruction they’ve caused has affected you.Guests:Shawn Hubler, California correspondent, The New York TimesKarla Nemeth, director, California Department of Water ResourcesPaula Peper, retired U.S. Forest Service urban ecologist in Sacramento Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After 119 citizens in Oakland joined a class action lawsuit against the Oakland Police Department for vicious and sadistic beatings, evidence tampering, and other abuses by a notorious group of officers known as the Riders, the department was placed under a federally mandated consent decree in 2003. Now, two decades later, Oakland is finally nearing the end of federal oversight and meeting mandated reforms . “A half dozen police chiefs have come and gone. The reform program has outlasted four mayors, two judges, and two monitoring teams,” write reporters Darwin Bondgraham and Ali Winston in their extensive history of the Oakland police department and the efforts to fix it. “More has been done to reform the Oakland Police Department than any other police force in the United States,” they write. We talk with Bondgraham and Winston about why police reform, in Oakland and across the county, is so difficult and so often fails, and their book, “The Riders Come Out at Night: Brutality, Corruption, and Coverup in Oakland.”Guests:Ali Winston, Independent journalist covering law enforcement and criminal justiceDarwin BondGraham, news editor, Oaklandside Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fatphobia takes an enormous physical and psychological toll on fat people, writes culture critic Evette Dionne, who says it “robs us of our joy, our ability to progress in our careers, and sometimes… our lives.” Dionne contends with heart failure and a rare type of hypertension, conditions that doctors overlooked because of her size. “Weightless” is Dionne’s new collection of essays exploring fatphobia in settings as diverse as doctors’ offices, schools, TV and film. She joins us to talk about how we can begin to dismantle society’s deep prejudices against those who are overweight and how self-love can counter fatphobia.Guests:Evette Dionne, author, "Weightless: Making Space for My Resilient Body and Soul" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

¡Hella Hungry! is a regular series from KQED food writer Alan Chazaro that profiles Bay Area foodmakers who help shape the region's culinary culture. Flor Martinez Zaragoza, a 27-year-old from San Jose, uses her Instagram account to advocate for farmworker rights and highlight how local produce makes it from the farm to the table. The Vegan Hood Chefs, a San Francisco duo, serve Southern-inspired comfort foods while “revolutionizing hood nutrition.” Joog co-founded SMAX, an East Bay pop-up and test kitchen, to reimagine Asian flavors and create artfully designed sandwiches and treats. We’ll talk about the series, the local food scene and what qualities make a restaurant, food truck or pop-up feel distinctly Bay Area.Guests:Alan Chazaro, food reporter, KQED; poet and educatorLuke Tsai, food editor, KQED Arts & CultureFlor Martinez-Zaragoza, farmworker rights advocate; nonprofit leader and influencer, @flowerinspanishJoog, co-founder, SMAX, an East Bay pop-up and test kitchenRonnishia Johnson, co-founder, The Vegan Hood Chefs, a food truck that offers Southern-inspired comfort foodsRheema Calloway, co-founder, The Vegan Hood Chefs, a food truck that offers Southern-inspired vegan comfort foods Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices