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Brightness of Courage: The Fight for Transgender Access to Gender-Specific Spaces
On this edition of Making Contact we look at some of the struggles and victories in the fight for transgender access to gender-specific spaces and programs. Like this program? Please show us the love. Click here and support our non-profit journalism. Thanks! Featuring: Gavin Grimm, high school senior whose case is scheduled to be heard by the US Supreme Court in 2017 Joshua Block, attorney representing Gavin Grimm, American Civil Liberties Union Stephanie Paige, US Army veteran Michelle Lael-Norsworthy, founder of Joan’s House, a non-profit...
read moreDonate Today!
Click here OR return your envelope plz! Making Contact staff and volunteers working hard on snail mail fundraising. #MakingContact6000 Thanks to listeners like you Making Contact has been able to produce 52 weekly shows in 2017: That’s 1500 minutes of programming, broadcasting on 120+ radio stations around the world, working with 30 US & international freelance reporters during 21 years of community and public radio! In honor of our work, please make a generous donation today. Thank you for supporting independent media and stories that...
read moreResistance and Resilience: The Cultural Legacy of the Black Panther Party
The Black Panther Party combined Black Power’s militancy with socialist ideology, and infused funk music with Franz Fanon’s writings. Their impact on American Culture, from music to style to community organizing, continues to resonate today. Fifty years after the birth of the Black Panther Party, we take a look at the lasting cultural legacy of the Black Panther Party through the eyes of the generations that followed. Special thanks to this show’s host Eric Arnold. Like this program? Please show us the love. Click here and...
read moreThe Murder of Fred Hampton
Dec 4th is the 47th anniversary of Fred Hampton’s murder. We are presenting this program to provide historical context amidst current media dis-information and government surveillance of groups organizing for Black Lives and Liberation. Trump’s legitimization of white supremacist ideas and actions makes Fred Hampton’s words from 1969 apt today. The Murder of Fred Hampton began as a film portrait of Hampton and the Illinois Black Panther Party, but halfway through the shoot, Hampton was murdered by Chicago police. In an...
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Native Power: Language, Land, and Water NoDAPL
Special thanks to the Christensen Fund for supporting Making Contact’s indigenous storytelling fellows. The actions at Standing Rock against the Dakota Access Pipeline in North Dakota continue. On the night of November 20, 2016, militarized police forces used tear gas, water cannons and rubber bullets, hospitalizing a dozen water protectors and injuring 160 others. While mainstream media coverage is sorely lacking and distorting, Native and independent journalists have been using social media to share anything from live Facebook video...
read moreThe Electoral College’s Dirty History
Given the Trump Election and the difference between popular votes and Electoral votes, we explore the Electoral College. Who are the electors, anyway? And will the United States ever join the rest of the world, and adopt a popular vote for president? Yale University Law & Political Science Professor Akhil Reed Amar says the Electoral College discourages voting, lessens the power of the states, and could work to the disadvantage of either major political party. On this edition of Making Contact, Akhil Reed Amar speaks with Angela...
read moreOur Lives are NOT for the Taking
Dear friend, Corporate-owned media contributed to Trump’s win as much as this country’s entrenched racism and white supremacy, patriarchy and xenophobia. At Making Contact we value transformative storytelling and create a space for OURcommunities to be heard. An alternative to the empty calories of breaking “news” shows.Let’s take our stories back! People are in motion and in this period we’re redoubling our work: Slow cooking radio pieces that provide historical and political context, and highlight...
read moreWomen Rising 32: Pt 2 Phasing Out Nuclear Power
As nuclear plant accidents mount, and nuclear waste becomes a greater threat to health and safety worldwide, {and a new President Trump will influence nuclear policy} Women Rising Radio features veteran activists at the center of the movement to phase out nuclear energy, power and research. We revisit Chernobyl, Fukushima, Three Mile Island and many less well known disasters – and hear about real solutions to the problem of nuclear energy. Featuring: Claire Greensfelder, International Forum on...
read moreGreg Palast on Voter Suppression, and Buying Democracy
Like this program? Please show us the love. Click here and support our non-profit journalism. Thanks! Greg Palast, is an investigative reporter and documentary filmmaker. His new film, “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: a Tale of Billionaires and Ballot Bandits,” unmasks the continuing and unrelenting Jim-Crow attempts by America’s “Billionaire Bandits” to prevent minority communities from exercising their constitutional right to vote. Featuring: Greg Palast, Investigative reporter, documentary filmmaker...
read moreImmigrants & Elections Pt. 2: Barriers to the Ballot
Photo of Florita & Joseph Campbell at the Halo Halo Restaurant in Phoenix, AZ by contributing producer Valeria Fernández In the US, the right to vote is one of the country’s most cherished and hard-fought rights. But it doesn’t mean that everyone has equal access to the polls. In 2013 the Supreme Court struck down a key civil rights provision of the Voting Rights Act. This November will be the first presidential election in 50 years where voters will not have the full protection of the original law. In this second installment of...
read moreThwarting Democracy, the Battle for Voting Rights
Since the 2013 Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Act, many states have pushed changes to voter laws that raise disturbing connections to the past. Before the anniversary of the Voting Rights Act on August 6th, we revisit the hard fought battles for voting rights and the implications of new laws. Featuring: Reverend Tyrone Edwards, civil rights historian in Plaquemines Parish Louisiana Tyrone Brooks, Georgia State Representative Clifford Kuhn, Professor of History at Georgia State University JT Johnson, civil rights organizer Allen...
read moreWomen Rising 31: Nuclear Weapons Abolitionists
As relations between the United States and Russian governments continue to deteriorate, people are growing concerned that we’re on the brink of another nuclear arms race. Both the U.S. and Russia are modernizing their nuclear arsenals. According to Jackie Cabasso, Executive Director of the Western States Legal Foundation, “it’s frighteningly easy to imagine how something could go wrong in that situation.” Women Rising Radio takes us inside the movement for nuclear disarmament, to meet the women on the front...
read moreDemographic Danger: A Look at Maternity Wards and Segregation in Israel
Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem was founded on a promise to serve all patients with the same, excellent care. This week, against the backdrop of military occupation, we go inside Hadassah’s Mount Scopus maternity ward. There, the separation of Jewish and Arab mothers resulted in conflict between midwives at the hospital. Featuring: Drorit Hochner, Dept. of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Mount Scopus Hospital Rabbi Benny Lau Dikla Aharon, journalist Dori Adar, online developer Tami Doron, Avia, and “Rivka” nurse-midwives and Jewish and Arab...
read moreRetaining Rondon: Creole Food in a Changing World
In a world that increasingly seems to strive for uniformity, afro-descendant Creole people on the eastern coast of Nicaragua seek to hold on to their unique culture through their food. Incoming palm plantations are fragmenting traditional Creole farmland and making it difficult for local coconut oil businesses. Overfishing and pesticides from the palm fields are reducing stocks of fish in the lagoons, making it more difficult to access traditional protein sources. In the towns and cities along the coast, an influx of foreign products is...
read moreOccupy, 5 years later
September marks the 5 year anniversary of Occupy. We go to Zuccotti Park, and Oakland to talk to individuals that were part of Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Oakland to gain insight and reflection on the movement that swept the nation. Featuring: Samara Ward, Occupy Oakland participant Joyous DeAsis, Young Oakland organizer, Occupy Oakland participant Marisa Holmes, Filmmaker, Occupy Wall Street facilitator Needa Bee, Occupy Oakland participant Krystof Lapour, Occupy Oakland participant Samsarah Morgan, doula and birth worker, Founder of...
read moreRosa Brooks on How Everything Became War and the Military Became Everything
The US military didn’t shrink much under President Obama, and our perpetual state of war has barely waned since 9-11. Author Rosa Brooks says the consequences of this ‘new normal’ reach deep into our society; far beyond the body count of those killed overseas. On this edition, Rosa Brooks speaks about her new book, How Everything Became War and the Military Became Everything. Special thanks to Politics and Prose Bookstore in Washington DC Featuring Rosa Brooks, author of How Everything Became War and the...
read more15 Years After 9/11, Still Searching for Monsters to Destroy
September 11, 2001 ushered in an era marked by the unending War on Terror, dragnet government surveillance programs, and escalating attacks on people perceived to be Muslim. Just last month, Khalid Jabara, a 37-year old Lebanese American man was shot and killed on his front porch in Tulsa Oklahoma by a neighbor who had harassed his family for years, calling them ‘dirty Arabs’ and ‘Mooslems’. This is just one of the many reported attacks on people perceived as Muslims in the United States. Last year, there were 174 incidents of anti-Muslim...
read moreInvisible Workers, Laboring in the Shadows
* This program won the award for Explanatory Journalism in radio/audio from the Society of Professional Journalists, Norther California Chapter in Nov. 2016. Congrats to all ! Please add your congratulations here. Millions of people around the world work in jobs that aren’t formally recognized or afforded legal protections typical of wage earning jobs. They’re often not even thought of as legitimate work. On this edition of Making Contact, we’re going to meet people making work where there is no work for them. From...
read moreCoffee: Trouble Brewing?
It’s the second most-traded commodity in the world after oil but how much do you think about your cup of coffee? From coffee farmers in Colombia to the trash produced by your single-cup coffee machine, Making Contact and Green Grid Radio team up to count the costs of your morning cup o’joe. Featuring: Jairo Martinez, Mariana Cruz, Suzana Angarita, coffee farmers Jeff Goldman, former executive director Fairtrade Resource Network Jeff Chean, Principal and Chief Coffee Guy Groundworks Roasters John Hazen, single-cup coffee machine owner Rebecca...
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