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  • Thinking Beyond Prisons

    Thinking Beyond Prisons
    Jul 1 2026
    Prisons won’t be dismantled anytime soon. So what does—or should—prison abolition mean? Anna Terwiel draws from Angela Davis’s writings a host of insights that buttress what Terwiel considers a realist political project. Among other things, she examines Davis’s prison abolitionism in light of her democratic socialist commitments and her understanding of Radical Reconstruction. Anna Terwiel, Prison Abolition for Realists University of Minnesota Press, 2025 The post Thinking Beyond Prisons appeared first on KPFA.
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  • In Search of Shade

    In Search of Shade
    Jul 7 2026
    Fossil fuel combustion has made dangerous heat waves ever more frequent. The short term answer — for those who have one — is to turn on the air conditioner. But air conditioning makes the the problem even worse. Environmental journalist Sam Bloch discusses the ways that cities used to be designed for shade, and stresses the urgent need for shelter from the sun — especially for the unhoused, farm workers, and others who labor outdoors. Sam Bloch, Shade: The Promise of a Forgotten Natural Resource Random House, 2025 Photo by Ivan Padial on Unsplash The post In Search of Shade appeared first on KPFA.
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  • America’s Drug Binge

    America’s Drug Binge
    Jul 8 2026
    Americans as a population have an unusually large appetite for psychoactive drugs, whether legal or illegal. And American history has been marked by periodic moral panics over drug use and normalization or legalization, as we’re experiencing right now. Why is that? What is it about US society that makes drug use simultaneously so appealing and reviled? Writer and scholar Benjamin Fong weighs in. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Benjamin Yen-Yi Fong, Quick Fixes: Drugs in America from Prohibition to the 21st Century Binge Verso, 2023 The post America’s Drug Binge appeared first on KPFA.
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  • Financial Censorship

    Financial Censorship
    Jul 13 2026
    Imagine, as a journalist or activist, trying to access your bank accounts and mysteriously finding them frozen. Debanking — when financial institutions close the accounts of those flagged as problematic, including at the behest of the government – appears to be growing. Civil liberties advocate Rainey Reitman, cofounder of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, reflects on the use of debanking, from Wikileaks to the Southern Poverty Law Center to the NRA. Rainey Reitman, Transaction Denied: Big Finance’s Power to Punish Speech Beacon, 2026 Freedom of the Press Foundation Photo by Engin Akyurt on Unsplash The post Financial Censorship appeared first on KPFA.
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  • Rolling Stone and the Limits of the Counterculture

    Rolling Stone and the Limits of the Counterculture
    Jul 14 2026
    It’s often argued that culture is the gateway to politics — that if you can influence cultural values, it will ultimately change society as whole. In the late Sixties, the counterculture was animated by that idea, including Rolling Stone Magazine, which began in the Bay Area. Peter Richardson reflects on Rolling Stone’s debt to the counterculture – and the limits to both endeavors. Peter Richardson, Brand New Beat: The Wild Rise of Rolling Stone Magazine UC Press, 2026 The post Rolling Stone and the Limits of the Counterculture appeared first on KPFA.
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  • The Mass Revolts of the 2010s

    The Mass Revolts of the 2010s
    Jul 15 2026
    In the decade of the 2010s, more people took to the streets than in any other time in history. And yet those horizontal protests, often spread through social media, were frequently co-opted by the right — and the decade ended with the rise of authoritarianism. Journalist Vincent Bevins spoke to activists around the world about the lessons they drew from the failed mass revolts, and discusses how democratic movements regained power in Brazil from the despotic Jair Bolsonaro. Vincent Bevins, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution Public Affairs, 2023 Vincent Bevins, “This Land Is Our Land: How Brazil’s Landless Workers’ Movement Emerged from Right-wing Rule Stronger Than Ever” The Nation, April 8, 2025 Photo credit: Jonathan Rashad The post The Mass Revolts of the 2010s appeared first on KPFA.
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  • U.S. Empire and Sexual Morality

    U.S. Empire and Sexual Morality
    Jun 30 2026
    Commercial sex and imperialism — army bases and brothels — have often gone hand in hand. But in the early 20th century an emergent U.S. empire defined itself as rooted in sexual purity. Historian Eva Payne describes how a heavy price for this notion of American exceptionalism was paid by women in the United States, who were policed and punished, along with those in U.S. colonies like the Philippines and the Panama Canal Zone. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Eva Payne, Empire of Purity: The History of Americans’ Global War on Prostitution Princeton University Press, 2025 The post U.S. Empire and Sexual Morality appeared first on KPFA.
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  • What the Movies Have Wrought

    What the Movies Have Wrought
    Jul 6 2026
    David Thomson, the great film critic, discusses his increasing disquiet with film — and how movies have helped deliver us to authoritarianism. He describes film’s adulation of power, which has been almost religiously illuminated on the screen. David Thomson, A Sudden Flicker of Light: A Revisionist History of Movies Simon & Schuster, 2026 Book Launch with David Thomson at the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley on July 12, 2026 The post What the Movies Have Wrought appeared first on KPFA.
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