Laura Flanders and Friends: Solutions-Focused Progressive Perspectives on Politics, News, and Culture

"Stocks in renewables are out performing oil and gas right now. Tipping points tip and this could be one of those...."   The F-Word is released bi-weekly featuring timely commentaries by Laura Flanders and guests. Flex your media muscles, become a monthly sustaining member for $3, $5, $12 at http://Patreon.com/theLFShow  Independent Media! Advertising free!   Laura Flanders and Friends Crew:&...

In 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court could overturn Roe v Wade, imperiling all women’s freedoms, and creating a new pipeline to prison for the vulnerable just as the world is learning how counterproductive most incarceration - solutions are. Today’s guests argue that things could have been very different. If the white dominated “choice” movement had paid closer attention to all women’s choices, or lack...

MacKenzie Scott, ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, recently made a splash by donating nearly $3 billion to more than 280 nonprofits working in historically underfunded sectors - her third such drop in a year. But while Scott has repeatedly made headlines, the media has largely overlooked the impact that women and feminists are making on philanthropy during a pandemic that has created a global...

We are independent media.  Your partnership as a monthly supporter for as little as $3 a month is what makes our reporting possible.  Join us at https://Patreon.com/theLFShow Here at The Laura Flanders Show we have a comprehensive Internship program where participants work hands-on gaining first hand knowledge about our independent movement media operation producing our TV, radio and podcast relea...

"Prison abolitionist Mariam Kaba says of struggle, “We do this 'til we free us.” Likewise, it seems to me, war is 'til we stop it.  We need to stop it."   The F-Word is released bi-weekly featuring timely commentaries by Laura Flanders and guests. Flex your media muscles, become a monthly sustaining member for $3, $5, $12 at http://Patreon.com/theLFShow  Independent Media! Advertising free!  ...

More than 20 Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCUs) received bomb threats at the start of Black History Month — including a threat on Valentine’s Day at Howard University. While the FBI is calling it a high priority investigation and threats are spreading to high schools, there is comparatively little media coverage of this assault on civil rights and education. On this month’s “Meet t...

Download the full uncut conversation featuring Majora Carter, Urban Revitalization Strategist, Real Estate Developer, Author *‘ Reclaiming Your Community: You Don’t Have to Move Out of Your Neighborhood to Live in a Better One’ (*Bookshop is an online bookstore with a mission to financially support local, independent bookstores. The LF Show is an affiliate of  bookshop.org  and will receive a smal...

Redistricting has the power to shape elections, and this year, it’s more controversial than ever. After a contentious 2020 census, the development of advanced mapping technologies, and a 2019 Supreme Court decision that put partisan gerrymandering outside the scope of federal courts, voting rights advocates contend that racial gerrymandering is rampant—in the south and beyond. In this episode, Lau...

Listen/download the full uncut conversation featuring Imani Perry, Author and Hughes-Rogers Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University and a faculty associate in Law and Public Affairs, Gender and Sexuality Studies and Jazz Studies. Her most recent book is "South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation" published by Ecco Press, a division o...

Related episode to check out- "Your Neighborhood in your Hands: A Model from the South Bronx"     "Carter, who has gone from fighting developers in the Bronx to becoming one herself, lost her family's home after her parents died when her siblings couldn't see the value in their property beyond the pittance they could get from speculators. She lost the home place, but determined to stay in the neig...

Real estate development conjures up images of gentrification with sleek buildings and polished store fronts often built under the guise of urban revitalization. Far too often, these projects displace long-standing residents and communities of color. What would it look like if real estate development were led by the people who already live in the neighborhood? In this episode, Laura interviews Sout...

Laura Flanders' full uncut conversation with Black abolitionist feminist Beth Richie and Queer southern feminist Suzanne Pharr where they discuss their work as organizers spanning 40 years fighting for an inclusive women's movement.   In 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court could overturn Roe v Wade, imperiling all women’s freedoms, and creating a new pipeline to prison for the vulnerable just as the worl...

As goes the South, so goes the nation. It may be a cliché but according to this week’s guest it’s true. In South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation, author and scholar Imani Perry makes the compelling argument that Americans need to stop dismissing the South if they’re ever going to build an equitable future for the entire United States. She takes us on...

"Justice Breyer has announced his resignation from the Supreme Court and a Biden/Harris pick is expected to win confirmation. The Democrats’ choice is unlikely to shift the court’s balance, we’re told, but the media’s milquetoast reassurance misses the point that when it comes to balance  it’s not just the court, it’s also the public debate that’s shfted dramatically to the right.  And nomination...

Even as the nation celebrated the birthday and legacy of voting rights advocate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, the right to vote for which King fought so hard remains a matter of hot dispute. States across the country are introducing laws restricting the right to vote for certain Americans, and as recently as this month, a majority of US Senators opposed changing the filibuster rules to pass a voting...

Laura Flanders' full uncut interview with Arundhati Roy where in they discussed surveillance and data mining in the age of Covid, the realities of India's pharmaceutical industry and Roy's take on trans politics where she says more about osmotic identities. Arundhati Roy, Novelist, Writer & Political Activist, Author, Azadi: Freedom. Fascism. Fiction., My Seditious Heart & Numerous Other Essays De...

In 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court could overturn Roe v Wade, imperiling all women’s freedoms, and creating a new pipeline to prison for the vulnerable just as the world is learning how counterproductive most incarceration - solutions are. Today’s guests argue that things could have been very different. If the white dominated “choice” movement had paid closer attention to all women’s choices, or lack...

Another World is Possible. Fascism Too, Is Breathing:  Listening to Arundhati Roy. Related episode to check out-   Arundhati Roy: Freedom, Fascism, Fiction and the Pandemic Portal The F-Word is released bi-weekly featuring timely commentaries by Laura Flanders and guests.  Flex your media muscles, become a monthly sustaining member for $3, $5, $12 at http://Patreon.com/theLFShow   Laura Fland...

Two years ago this month, the first cases of Covid-19 were reported in the United States. “Historically, pandemics have forced humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew,” wrote acclaimed author and activist Arundhati Roy just weeks into the shutdown. So have we? Two years on, what’s changed and what hasn’t in the US, India, and globally in a world that often seems to be teetering...

“Had the government stepped in and done its job, had they not advocated against vaccines and mask mandates, we wouldn't have been frantically gathering our children to cut up bedsheets to make masks for medical workers and everyone else.” That’s Kristina Wong, performance artist, comedian, and writer. This week, Wong tells the story of how she created a network of “aunties,” who were primarily Asi...

Year End Donations Matched 3:1!!! We are independent media, dependent on your generous support https://LauraFlanders.org/donate The last US soldier to leave Afghanistan returned home this August, but private security personnel long outnumbered US troops in that war, and the for-profit business of training guns-for-hire is booming -- literally -- in the backyards of many rural Americans. In this sp...

Year End Donations Matched 3:1, we are independent media, dependent on your generous support https://LauraFlanders.org/donate What if judges could know a person more completely before sentencing them to prison? An organization called Complete Picture uses the power of film and storytelling to give judges an in-depth, humanizing look at the lives of defendants facing prison for non-violent crimes....

The following audio exclusive  features the entire uncut interview with Pia Mancini, Co-Founder & CEO of Open Collective.  Excerpts of this interview were included in our recent episode "This New Cooperative Business Model Could Change Everything ".  Exploring the question 'Why must new and innovative ideas come to market through old and undemocratic platforms?'  What if rather than selling out, s...

Full Episode Notes are posted at Patreon.com/theLFShow We revisit an historic, inter-generational meeting of minds, Laura Flanders brings together New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and MIT professor emeritus Noam Chomsky—for the first time ever—to discuss the way forward for people, politics, and the planet. From labor strikes to racial uprisings to climate action to the Great Resign...

"When Marx was writing,  just under 200 years ago, jobs were still a relatively new and contentious concept.  "Wage slavery "as the liberal economists of the day called it, forced people to rent their labor out to others - at a loss. It wasn't slavery, but it wasn't freedom, either. ...." Related episode to check out:  This New Cooperative Business Model Could Change Everything    LISTEN / WATCH F...