Alyssa Milano: Sorry Not Sorry

The Republican Party is in chaos. The far-right GOP in the House of Representatives is at the mercy of the extreme right GOP in the House. Matt Gaetz and a handful of GOP extremists ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy and holds the entire government hostage. It doesn’t have to be this way. Over the years, we’ve had a number of Democratic members of the House on the show. Today, we’ll revisit just a few...

This shouldn’t shock any woman in the world: most medical research is based on male bodies. The effects of that reach out across our societies, leaving women behind not only in medicine but in so many other parts of our cultures. Cat Bohannon is working to change that—painting a picture of the evolutionary history of women in her stunning new book “EVE: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years...

Nefarious groups, driven by hate, are challenging books in school and public libraries at an unprecedented pace. To discuss the problem, what's being done about it, and the state of this year's Banned Books Week, we've invited American Library Association President Emily Drabinsky on the show.

The United States imprisons more of its population than any other nation on earth. We also incarcerate more people than any other nation. This reality, combined with the conditions and injustices inherent in those statistics, has driven a growing movement for prison reform. Colleen Eren has looked inside that movement in her new book “Reform Nation: The First Step Act and the Movement to End Mass...

46,000 - That's the number of Americans who die every year from gun violence. More than double that number are shot but survive. Fred Guttenberg knows the toll of that devastation more than most: his daughter Jaime was murdered in the Parkland, FL mass shooting at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School. He joins us to talk about President Biden's new effort to close the background check loo...

It is no secret that there are different standards for Black families than for white families in the United States. Our guest this week, Dr. Esau McCaulley, has a new memoir titled How Far to the Promised Land that explores these differences and the effects they have on our nation. Esau is an Associate Professor of the New Testament, the author of several books, and a contributing columnist for th...

Student debt is a crushing burden to millions of families in the United States. Recent efforts by the Biden Administration to relieve some of the burden for some borrowers were dashed by the Supreme Court. To help put it in perspective and fill us on what can be done about this issue, we've invited Natalia Abrams back on the show. Natalia is the founder and president of the Student Debt Crisis...

The world is full of hate. Alyssa certainly sees a lot of it sent her way online—but people who hold less privilege see so much more. That hate, always present around us, has taken some of the joy out of being human. Our guest this week is trying to fix that. Kai Cheng Thom is the author of several books, including the newly released “Falling Back in Love with Being Human: Letters to Lost Souls.”

Our guest this week is Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut. Senator Blumenthal is right at the heart of legislative initiatives that are so important for our nation, whether it’s regulating the role of AI, protecting kids online, or protecting kids offline in efforts to reduce gun violence. He's also been able to work across the aisle on critical initiatives in this incredibly polarized...

One of the things Alyssa has been very open about is her mental health. We have stigmas in our culture which not only affect those who struggle with mental health conditions, but also new and exciting treatments for those conditions, like psychotropics and wearable technology. Dr. Dave Rabin helps people face these stigmas. He is a board-certified psychiatrist, neuroscientist, entrepreneur, and in...

We live in a time where right-wing politicians and activists are stoking anti-trans fear and hate for political gain. Around the country, legislators are enacting laws which prevent trans youth from receiving gender-affirming care, putting them and their families at risk. Our guest this week, Kate Brookes, is raising a transgender daughter. Her new memoir, Transister, brings us into her world in a...

2023 has been a tumultuous year in the House of Representatives, to say the least. Kevin McCarthy barely won the speakership and has been chained to the whims of the furthest extremes of his party. The theatrics of McCarthy and the GOP have often overshadowed the important work sitting before Congress —issues that affect us all. California Congressman Ro Khanna is focused on those issues, and he j...

One of the things that makes Alyssa angriest is when she sees men denying the scope of our national sexual violence epidemic by claiming that there are many false reports of sexual assault, and therefore victims cannot be trusted. In their stunning documentary Victim/Suspect, reporter Rae de Leon and director Nancy Schwartzman dig into cases where women were charged with filing false reports but i...

Once again, the Supreme Court ended its term with monumental decisions which will affect the way millions of Americans are able (or not able) to do important things in their lives. As usual, we covered many of those issues over the past year, and in this episode we revisit that coverage to contextualize the importance of the court's decisions and efforts to reform the court.

We live in dangerous times. Zealots on the extreme right are working to ban books which actively teach our history, particularly around civil rights and racial justice. That’s why it’s so important to remember and share our history on these issues. Our guest today is Samuel Freedman. Samuel is a journalist, author, and Pulitzer-prize finalist. His new book, Into the Bright Sunshine: Young Hubert H...

It’s hard to believe we have to say this in 2023, but across the nation, right-wing forces are banding together at all levels of government to ban access to books in schools and libraries. Florida, in particular, has been a hotbed of these bans under the dubious leadership of Ron DeSantis. Our guests this week are suing to make sure literature remains accessible. Nadine Farid Johnson serves as the...

Fighting sex trafficking is a cause that we are passionate about at Sorry Not Sorry, and our guest this week has made it her life’s work. Ruchira Gupta is a former journalist and founder of Apne Aap, an NGO that works to end child sex trafficking. She’s the author of the acclaimed new novel I Kick and Fly which is based on her experiences. Praise for I Kick and Fly : "In I Kick and I Fly, Ruc...

This week marks a year since the Supreme Court's immoral and dangerous Dobbs decision. Unless you’ve been hiding with your head in the sand, you know that abortion rights are under threat in the United States, where many people now have little or no access to abortion healthcare. The Catholic Church has been a driving force in that charge to deny women and pregnant people the right to control our...

Just a few hours before George Floyd was murdered, Christian Cooper was birdwatching in Central Park when he was the victim of a white woman who attempted to weaponize race and policing against him. The video of the event went viral, and luckily Christian was able to leave the area before police arrived, and is here with us today. His new book, Better Living Through Birding: Notes from a Black Man...

It’s no secret that there are huge cultural and structural barriers which prevent many people in the United States from accessing education.  These barriers are even higher when it comes to those who are incarcerated. And yet, there is good evidence that shows that obtaining an education makes huge differences in the lives of the incarcerated.  To discuss, we’ve invited Mneesha Gellman on the show...

One of the interesting side effects of the post-Covid economy has been a surge in the power and influence employees hold. Wages in service industry jobs have risen dramatically as employers struggle to find workers. However, there have also been increasing stories of worker exploitation, leading to a surge in new unionization efforts. To discuss all of it, we’ve invited Michelle Eisen onto the sho...

Many of us know about the Tulsa Massacre. But fewer of us know about the long history of innovation and the struggle for equity that continues in Greenwood to this day. Author Victor Luckerson aims to change that. Viktor is a journalist and author based in Tulsa who works to bring neglected black history to light. He is a former staff writer at The Ringer and business reporter for Time magazine. H...

Over the past decade, bad policing has been a constant presence in the headlines, particularly in coverage of police violence against people of color. It makes us wonder if policing can be improved and changes in culture can be achieved. In his new book Walk the Walk, today’s guest Neil Gross examines three cities where he argues police chiefs were able to make significant improvements and culture...

Since the right-wing activist judges on the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade, pregnant people across the country have been put in great jeopardy. Our guests today are fighting back. Amanda Zurawski nearly lost her life when a Texas law prevented her from receiving an abortion after a medical emergency made her pregnancy nonviable. Molly Duane is an attorney helping Amanda and four other women...

46,000 deaths in America, every single year. We have more guns than people in the United States. And yet somehow, many states across the country are working to make it easier to get guns, easier to carry guns, and easier to kill people without consequence. This is partly because of the lies of the gun industry. To help us sort through the myths and find the truth, we’ve invited one of my favorite...