Video Details
Laura Flanders Show
| Website: | https://lauraflanders.org/ |
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THE LAURA FLANDERS SHOW is an award-winning public affairs series that reports on community-led initiatives across the U.S. creating a more inclusive society. Host Laura Flanders - a New York broadcast journalist, author and contributing writer to The Nation - talks with experts and people on the front lines of artistic, cultural, social and economic movements. Each episode blends reporting with in-depth interviews of leaders in the arts and small business world, profiling individuals and organizations uplifting and revitalizing their communities.
Episodes:
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#50YearsOfHarm: Rep. Ro Khanna & Lisa Graves Call Out ALEC / The American Legislative Exchange Council
Many people have never heard of the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC - but for 50 years, the group has been the driving force behind some of the most extreme policies in this country. Behind closed doors, ALEC brings corporate lobbyists and state politicians together to draft and vote on model bills that aim to free corporations from regulations, regardless of the impacts on people and the planet. Labor law, environmental law, health and safety, voting - no cause is off-limits. Our guests say ALEC and its wealthy pool of funders are a real threat, but there are ways to take action and progress has already been made. In 2023, a diverse coalition of groups, including Greenpeace, Color of Change, the Center for Media and Democracy and more, is calling out the anti-democratic impact of ALEC by using the hashtag #50YearsOfHarm. Congressman Ro Khanna of California's 17th Congressional District, a leading progressive in the House, and Lisa Graves, Executive Director of True North Research and President of the Center for Media and Democracy, two of the preeminent national watchdog groups investigating dark money, join Laura Flanders to unpack it all. And in her closing commentary Laura fills us in on the other side of the story in state houses: the Democrats' have their own project in place these days. But is it any match for ALEC? "ALEC recognizes that on many of these issues, there's a 70, 80, 90% consensus against them and they're trying to distort the democratic process by the use of big money." - Ro Khanna "I still believe that for many people, not all people, knowledge is power, facts matter, and knowing who the real special interests are behind this [legislation] can help expose and block them." - Lisa Graves Guests: Lisa Graves: President, Center for Media & Democracy; Executive Director, True North Research Ro Khanna: Congressman California's 17th District
Length: 00:26:46 Usage rights: 4/1/2023 to 4/5/2024 -
Colette Pichon Battle On Climate Justice Reparations
What can we learn from the experiences of people living on the frontlines of climate catastrophe? "There's beautiful resistance out there," says Colette Pichon Battle. She is a Louisiana native who began her work in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005 when she and so many others lost their homes. A leading voice in climate justice and Black liberation movements, Pichon Battle founded the Gulf Coast Center for Law & Policy (GCCLP) that focused on equitable climate resilience in the Gulf South. Now she has expanded her vision into Taproot Earth, to include work in Appalachia, the global Black diaspora and geographies across the world with a focus on climate migration and Taproot's work around Global Climate Reparations. According to a 2022 report by the International Organization for Migration, in the US, anywhere from 4.2 to 13.1 million people could become victims of floods by the year 2100. It is the reality that Pichon Battle has been alerting us to for years climate change isn't looming, it's here. With suffocating orange wildfire smoke, deadly heat waves and drenching rain; with hurricanes, floods and landslides we have crossed what some call the change horizon. Can it also be a liberation horizon? Colette believes it can. Today's program is devoted to her evolving understanding of how the crises of climate, migration, capitalism and over-policing are connected, and what is our work to do. Plus a commentary from Laura. "If we choose to be our best selves in this moment, if we choose to work through fear in this moment, if we choose courage and each other, we can actually stop not just the oppression of my people, but the oppression of yours." - Colette Pichon Battle "What I need is white allies learning about whatever ethnicity, whatever cultural tradition they come from, and how did they live with the land and how do we put those things together? Why aren't we fighting together for the sake of this planet?" - Colette Pichon Battle Guest: Colette Pichon Battle, Esq.: Co-founder, Vision & Initiatives Partner for Taproot Earth.
Length: 00:26:46 Usage rights: 4/1/2023 to 4/5/2024 -
Emergent Strategies for Abolition: Andrea J. Ritchie's Toolkit for Activists
Movement lawyer and organizer Andrea J. Ritchie's forthcoming book is unlike anything she's written before. In "Practicing New Worlds: Abolition and Emergent Strategies", published by AK Press and out at the end of October 2023 as part of their Emergent Strategies Series, Ritchie has written a toolkit for organizers. Both visionary and practical, Ritchie believes we can live the "future" world we want, and offers actionable steps we can take to get there. A self-described "Black lesbian immigrant survivor," Ritchie has been engaged since the 1980s in anti-violence, labor, and LGBTQ organizing, and in movements against state violence and for racial, reproductive, economic, environmental, and gender justice. In this wide-ranging conversation, Andrea J. Ritchie and Laura Flanders discuss what's changed and what hasn't after the police killing of George Floyd in 2020, and the emergent strategies for abolition that we should all pay attention to. The Right has strategies too - and so far, they're working. How do we create the necessary conditions that foster collectivity and liberation leading to increased public safety and well-being? All that, plus a commentary from Laura on the power we recognize, and the other sort too. "Change happens by acting as though the future that you are dreaming of is present now. And then practicing that with people who share your vision and values and then bringing more and more people into the conversation." - Andrea J. Ritchie "[Emergent strategies are] a way of approaching a world that interrupts violence in all its forms and creates new possibilities that we can't imagine yet." - Andrea J. Ritchie Guest: Andrea J. Ritchie: Author, Practicing New Worlds: Abolition and Emergent Strategies; Co-Founder, Interrupting Criminalization.
Length: 00:26:46 Usage rights: 4/1/2023 to 4/5/2024 -
Idaho's United Vision Project: Confronting Extremism in America's Heartland
As the 2024 presidential election campaign heats up, Idaho is not a place that Democratic campaign strategists will be thinking much about, but writing off places like Idaho is a mistake, say two anti-authoritarian activists based in the US Northwest. Adrienne Evans is the executive director for United Vision for Idaho, the state's only multi-issue, progressive coalition. Scot Nakagawa, director of the new 22nd Century Initiative, has worked for decades to counter extremism, starting in the 1980s, confronting white militias in Oregon. In this episode, Laura asks her guests why places like Idaho - one of the most conservative states in the country - remain so important to US democracy, and Laura participates in a rural tour around Boise, Idaho's capital. All that, plus a commentary from Laura on how Americans once toppled autocracy - and what the writers of the Constitution did in response. "People on both sides of the political spectrum no longer believe that government is for them; that they have access or the ability to change the things in their lives... When you lose faith in institutions like that, no wonder authoritarianism comes in and offers to break that, it sounds pretty good." - Adrienne Evans "It's often in the most difficult places that people come up with the best ideas, that kind of repression can be the mother of invention... What we can learn from Idaho about the future is tremendous." - Scot Nakagawa Guests: Adrienne Evans: Executive Director, United Vision for Idaho Scot Nakagawa: Director, 22nd Century Initiative
Length: 00:26:46 Usage rights: 4/1/2023 to 4/5/2024 -
Post Dobbs Crisis: Visions for Abortion Access & Radical Care
There are more anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers than there are abortion clinics in the U.S., even in states like New York where abortion is legal. Fake clinics are feeding people disinformation, laws are criminalizing doctors and patients, and the climate of stigma and fear has only worsened since the Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health in 2022. The Dobbs decision took away the constitutional right to abortion, abandoned almost fifty years of precedent, and paved the way for states to ban abortion entirely, as more than a dozen have. In this episode, Laura Flanders and co-host Adaku Utah explore the situation in a so-called safe haven (New York), and the frameworks for care that BIPOC reproductive justice activists - whose people have never been served well by the health system - are drawing on for strength and survival today. Our guests are Elizabeth Estrada, New York Field & Advocacy Manager at the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice and Chelsea Williams-Diggs, Executive Director of the New York Abortion Access Fund. Join us to hear why community care and "chisme" are critical in this moment. "The Supreme Court went against the will of the people. What we're doing now is asking people to join in advocacy, join in the streets... Talk to your loved ones about why you support abortion access and try to do it with compassion, understanding, and a fierce heart because now is the time and we need everybody's voice." - Elizabeth Estrada "I feel both hope and heartbreak right now as we are speaking. Cops and courts are increasingly punishing and investigating people who are trying to seek basic healthcare as abortion. There is less access to gender affirming care. And of course, the genocides that are happening in Palestine, Sudan, and the Congo are stripping people of their lands and literally their lives." - Adaku Utah "The worst has already happened, and it happened under a democratic president. Let's be very clear. Dobbs happened. Abortion is no longer a nationally protected right. There are people who are struggling to access care today. They can't wait for November..." - Chelsea Williams-Diggs Guests: Elizabeth Estrada: NY Field & Advocacy Manager, National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice Adaku Utah: Senior Manager of Movement Building Programs, Building Movement Project; Organizer, Grassroots Strategist, Politicized Healer Chelsea Williams-Diggs: Executive Director, New York Abortion Access Fund
Length: 00:26:46 Usage rights: 4/1/2023 to 4/5/2024 -
Power Grids Under Attack: The Threat is Domestic Terrorism - Not Drag Artists
On December 3, 2022, an attack on two electrical substations in Moore County, North Carolina left 45,000 households and businesses without power for up to five days. It was the biggest domestic terrorist attack on the electricity grid in U.S. history, but one year later, no arrests have been made and authorities have named no suspects other than to say that whoever did this "knew what they were doing." In this installment of The Laura Flanders Show's investigation into the local roots of the January 6 insurrection in one state, North Carolina, Laura speaks with the North Carolinians who were at a drag show in Moore County when the lights went out. "Downtown Divas" had been harassed for months by anti-LGBTQ leaders - did the sabotage attack have anything to do with that harassment or the drag performance scheduled that night? As legislators and local leaders continue to roll back LGBTQ rights, they remain largely silent about the real threats facing North Carolinians and the nation from domestic terrorists with their sights set on U.S. power grids. Why? This episode also looks at how the LGBTQ community in North Carolina is standing up to hate and creating safety - with Drag operatics - for all. "When the lights went out, it didn't matter who was Black, who was Latino, who was Asian, who was a person of color, didn't matter if you were Catholic, if you were Baptist, if you were Christian. We were all in the same space, all in the same boat, which was that we didn't have any power." - Naomi Dix 888"[After the attack] I remember thinking, I have to start speaking more... I have to start sticking up for myself and the trans community more, because that's what prevents things like this." - Alex Lafferty "We aren't the villains in this situation. We have a right to exist and be performing and what I love about drag is the joy that we bring not only to LGBT people, but the whole community." - Tori Grace Nichols "We are talking about a great harm that happened here in North Carolina, but this is a national problem and not a new one... This is a domestic terrorist threat that people really need to be paying attention to." - Serena Sebring "... That show and that incident brought out two different sets of people. It brought out the lovers and it brought out the haters... Those haters have found a way to attack our youth through the school board and our communities." - Erica Street Guests: Naomi Dix: Drag Artist, Activist & Member of Durham NC BIPOC Operated House of Coxx; Co-Chair, Pride: Durham, NC; Alex Lafferty: Daughter of Erica Street, High School Student & Youth Activist; Tori Grace Nichols: Drag Artist & Cultural Organizer; Serena Sebring: Executive Director, Blueprint North Carolina; Erica Street: Mother of Alex Lafferty; Co-founder, PFLAG Southern Pines.
Length: 00:26:46 Usage rights: 4/1/2023 to 4/5/2024