KQED's Forum

The US Department of Justice is considering breaking up tech giant Google, according to media reports. That news comes after a court ruling earlier this month that the company, which controls 90 percent of the search engine market, violated antitrust laws. “Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta wrote in his decision. But some expe...

You are walking down a dark dungeon hallway lit by torches and covered in cobwebs. You hear ominous squelching sounds. Wait! It’s the GIBBERING MOUTHER. Do you pull out a sword or cast a spell? If this is a scenario you have faced, it’s likely you have been playing Dungeons & Dragons, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. The goal of the tabletop game is not to win, but for players to i...

In late June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that cities can dismantle homeless encampments on sidewalks and other public places and make people move without running afoul of the constitution. The ruling by the Republican-appointed majority was cheered by many Democrats, including Gov. Gavin Newsom who issued an executive order calling on cities to remove the tents and the people living in them quic...

Amid the Bay Area’s dire need for more housing, California Forever has set out a bold vision for a new city in east Solano County on 17,500 acres of mostly farmland. But the company, backed by various Silicon Valley billionaires, has so far struggled to garner enough local support. In July, California Forever scrapped plans to ask for voter approval for the project on this November’s ballot, but s...

The Darién Gap, the perilous mountain region connecting Central and South America, was thought for centuries to be all but impossible to cross. But now, hundreds of thousands of migrants are doing just that to reach the U.S. Pulitzer Prize-winning immigration reporter Caitlin Dickerson took three trips to the Darién Gap over five months, following groups of migrants on their 70-mile trek from nort...

If you are a fan of kimchee like your grandmother made or are looking for the freshest curry leaf, you’re probably well acquainted with stores like H Mart, Patel Brothers, and 99 Ranch. These outlets go beyond the international food sections that you’ll find in conventional chains like Safeway and Whole Foods. Instead they offer aisle upon aisle of products that signify home to the Asian diaspora...

More adults are now relying on their parents for financial support, career advice and emotional regulation well into their 30s — challenging the notion that a parent is only responsible for their child until age 18. One poll found that about 45% of adults under 30 are living with their parents — “the most common living arrangement for that age group for the first time since just after the Great De...

As the A’s wrap up their final season in Oakland, the future of the Coliseum – the team’s home for 56 years– may finally be coming into focus. The African American Sports and Entertainment Group (AASEG), a local Black-led development company, is set to purchase the site from the A’s and the City of Oakland for over two hundred million dollars. The final signing of those deals, supporters say, will...

Feminist scholar Roxane Gay has no fondness for guns, no interest in gun culture and rarely thinks about guns unless, as she says, “the news cycle demands it.” But she’s a gun owner, having bought one after she and her family became targets of online death threats. “When I aim and pull the trigger and absorb the recoil,” Gay writes in a new essay, “I try to shoot straight and true. I revel in how...

In the debate about immigration, the voices of immigrants are often left out of the conversation. For his new book, “We Are Home,” veteran journalist Ray Suarez collected a series of oral histories from people who have recently arrived in America. He centers immigrants like Samir, who was born in Kenya of Yemini descent and moved to suburban Maryland as a teenager and Nelson Castillo, a successful...

Tina. Aretha. Serena and Venus. In one word you know who these women are. And that word is DIVA. In her new book “American Diva,” Deborah Paredez argues we need to take a fresh look at what it means to be a diva. She traces the evolution of the word, using the stories of powerhouse female performers, musicians and athletes to examine how we can reclaim and celebrate the divas we know and love. Ind...

In the 1990s, Eugene Rodriguez wanted to help his teenage students learn Son Jarocho, a regional folk music style from Mexico. So he organized a weeks-long road trip from the Bay Area to Veracruz where that genre of music originates. That is one of the memorable experiences Rodriguez has had as founder of Los Cenzontles, a music group and nonprofit organization based in San Pablo. Hundreds of East...

California’s home insurance market is a mess. Across the state, major insurers are canceling policies or leaving the market altogether – citing disaster risks that outpace their ability to set rates and cover potential losses. Meanwhile, the state’s FAIR plan, conceived as a temporary policy of last resort for homeowners, has seen an enrollment spike. State regulators are now attempting to bring i...

Busy and frazzled people often say, “I wish I could clone myself!” Journalist Evan Ratliff did just that. Using easily available technology and artificial intelligence, he created a voice clone that could answer calls, carry on conversations, and literally do his job. The brave new world he created spawned all sorts of weird and unsettling moments, like when his voice clones began talking to each...

If global temperatures continue to increase, new research suggests that by 2050 past Winter Olympics host cities — like Oslo, Vancouver and Lake Tahoe — likely won’t be cold enough for the Games. And some summer events may be in jeopardy too. In her new book “Warming Up,” sport ecology expert Madeleine Orr explains why “climate change is threatening sport in every corner of the world,” including w...

After more than a century in the Bay Area, Chevron announced it is moving its headquarters from San Ramon to Houston, but the company’s refineries in Richmond and El Segundo remain for now. California was once a leading producer of oil, and today remains the nation’s seventh largest oil producer. But Governor Gavin Newsom has vowed to phase out the oil and gas industry by 2045. As California trans...

Vice President Kamala Harris chose Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate for the 2024 presidential election. Walz is a former school teacher and veteran of the Army National Guard. Under his leadership as Governor, Minnesota enshrined access to abortion in the state constitution, expanded universal meals in school, legalized marijuana, and enacted gun control measures. Walz has been crit...

Across social media, people are posting about their experiences ending contact with family members, which experts say is a growing trend. Studies have found that about a quarter of adults in America are estranged from a relative with parent-child estrangements as the most common. Becoming estranged from family can provide an escape from abuse or problematic relationships and allow space for healin...

When an elderly loved one starts to show signs they’re having trouble living independently, initiating conversations about elder care can be challenging. We talk to gerontologist Dr. Louise Aronson about how to broach sensitive topics like giving up driving, accepting in-home assistance or transitioning to a care facility. And we’ll hear from you: how have you navigated conversations about elder c...

Why is the ocean full of moon jellies? How do snails use fishing nets made of slime? What’s actually happening when a mosquito sucks your blood? These are just some of the questions that the producers and scientists behind “Deep Look,” KQED’s Emmy-award winning video series, take on. Now in its 11th season, “Deep Look,” uses ultra-high definition video to give viewers an up close – and sometimes m...

Firefighters are battling the massive Park Fire near Chico which has already burned an area larger than the city of Los Angeles – making it the fifth largest wildfire in state history. Meanwhile, the Borel fire, which last weekend destroyed the town of Havilah, continues to burn in Kern County, and parts of Riverside county remain under evacuation orders because of wildfires there. We look at the...

The summer of 1982 was a blockbuster for sci-fi movies. Over the course of six consecutive weekends, eight movies in that genre premiered: E.T. Poltergeist. Tron. Blade Runner. Mad Max: Road Warrior. Conan the Barbarian. The Thing. Some were hits. Others were bombs. But all changed the course of filmmaking according to film critic Chris Nashawaty. In his new book, “The Future Was Now,” he shares b...

“My own life has been defined by a search for lesbian spaces.” So says journalist June Thomas, whose new book “A Place of Our Own” explores third spaces for queer women, places that are not work or home. Tracing the history of lesbian bars, coffee shops, bookstores, communes, sex stores, vacations and softball teams, Thomas argues for their importance in community building, political organizing, f...

After a video of republican vice-presidential candidate J.D. Vance resurfaced that features him mocking “childless cat ladies,” child-free Americans erupted with outrage. A growing percentage of Americans under 50 — 47%, according to a new study from Pew — say they are unlikely to have kids because they simply don’t want them. Vance’s comments also touched a nerve with people who are childless bec...

Nathan Thrall won a 2024 Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction for “A Day in the Life of Abed Salama.” It tells the story of a school bus crash in 2012 outside of Jerusalem; the bus was carrying a group of Palestinian kindergartners when it collided with a truck, killing 6 children and their teacher. Thrall follows the accident’s aftermath and one parent’s frantic search for his son, exposing the...