The Rebel Citizens

From pubs and football clubs to housing and music venues, community shares are a way for ordinary people to pool their resources and take ownership of the places and services that matter most. Dave Boyle has spent years helping groups do just that, proving that another way of running our economy is not only possible, but already happening. --- 00:00 Co-ops & Community Shares 05:53 The power of...

This week we’re joined by Manasa Narayanan , a journalist and researcher looking into issues at the intersection of politics and technology, including Big Tech/AI, misinformation, online hate and misogyny, surveillance and data rights. In this episode, we unpack the stories we’re told about Big Tech and AI, and why so many of them are misleading by design. --- 00:00 Big Tech Narratives 02:00 Tech...

This week we’re joined by Johnbosco Nwogbo from We Own It to ask: what can 21st century public ownership look like? From buses to rivers, health to food, we get into why privatisation sucks, and how we can build services that put people (and planet) first. --- 00:00 21st Century Public Ownership 04:51 Goodbye to PFI 08:18 Why privatisation sucks 13:31 What can public ownership look like? 18:24 Win...

Our Rebel Citizens this week are Dan Edelstyn and Leonie Rousham from Power Station : the East London art-activism project turning rooftops into solar stations and neighbours into co-owners of their own energy future. --- 00:00 Community Energy & Ownership 01:03 Who are Power Station? 06:38 Bank Job: Creditocracy 08:30 Stop murdering everyone in Gaza 13:52 How to set up your local power statio...

This week, your dedicated PhD-holding, newsletter-writing, Dr. Tom Chivers finally gets his own episode on how we turn the BBC into a democratic media mutual, and why the time to act is now (...with the BBC Charter review looming and whatnot). 00:00 The Mutualisation of the BBC 01:13 Dr. Thomas Chivers 03:13 The “syphilitic” academic loan system 06:23 What should be headline news but isn’t? 09:00...

British-Palestinian journalist and writer Hamza Yusuf joins us to talk fearless reporting on Palestine, the power of our collective conscience, and the need to create infrastructure that sustains real change. 00:00 Fearless and Committed Journalism 05:52 What should be headline news and isn’t? 10:56 Not interested in the Guardian 15:05 Building power, building structures 18:19 How to do an intervi...

From tackling monopoly to defending media freedom, Dr. Courtney Radsch , Director of the Center for Journalism at Open Markets Institute, joins us to unpack the global state of AI, tech regulation, and why democracy depends on it. 00:00 AI: means everything and nothing 02:18 What should be headline news, but isn’t? 07:55 The need for regulation 10:55 Errors, not hallucinations 16:47 What motivates...

00:00 - Who is Irrational Technology? 02:50 - The leftist guide to AI 06:34 - Seemful vs seemless design 10:48 - What about social media? 14:58 - Big tech fascism 18:08 - Artificially engineered serendipity 23:15 - Co-design and the future 28:54 - Autonomy 🤖 Irrational Technology – they make sense of technology so that you don’t have to. 📄 Media Reform Coalition – Our Mutual Friend: The BBC in t...

00:00 - Think Global, Act Local 00:12 - What should be headline news? 04:51 - Doing, not just talking 11:42 - The ideal refugee 15:15 - Connection in struggle and movements 21:38 - Who is Maxine Betteridge-Moes? 26:48 - What can we do? (News Clubs!) 28:49 - NI News Clubs in practice 37:44 - Project 2029: how we prepare 🗞️ New Internationalist – a multi-stakeholder co-operative owned by its workers...

00:00 - Community Media & Ownership 04:28 - Govanhill, Glasgow 07:39 - Community Interest Companies are cool! 10:41 - Lessons from the USA: Civic media & rethinking journalism 16:32 - Community needs us to listen 20:08 - Building up & building out 26:58 - Launch your own community-centred media project! Mentions to check out! 📜 A manifesto for Greater Community Media – media as social...

🎙️ What connects Welsh independence, a music mogul’s decades-long abuse, and BBC coverage of Gaza? Keep listening to find out. 00:00 - It Was Capitalism All Along 00:28 - An independent Wales? 03:21 - An independent Scotland? 07:57 - Devolved broadcasting & Welsh telly 14:29 - From Cardiff to Combs 21:41 - Exploitation in the arts 27:25 - CfMM Report 31:55 - Media as a mouthpiece for state vio...

🎙️ Can a socialist magazine survive multi-millionaire ownership? Should planning a protest land you in jail? This week, we cover two stories: The takeover of Tribune, Britain’s oldest democratic socialist magazine, by the multi-millionaire founder of Islam Channel, and the jailing of four Just Stop Oil activists before they could even glue themselves to the Airport runway. We're talking ownership,...

🎙️ This week, we speak plainly: what's happening in Gaza is genocide. Thousands of children in Gaza are dying of starvation under a brutal blockade. Hospitals are constantly bombed. Entire families are being (and have been) erased by the Israeli state. The 77th anniversary of the Nakba is marked not only in memory, but in the ongoing reality of ethnic cleansing. And yet, our media remains silent....

🎙️ Rebel Citizens: Ask Me Anything 00:00 - Rebel Citizens: A Toby Jug Full of Piss 00:12 - Will Farage end the two party system? 06:36 - How do I effectively chair a meeting without sounding like a dictator or worse, a massive dick? 12:16 - Am I just collecting CV brownie points by joining a board of trustees? 19:02 - Can 'political' art actually count as activism if the artist is basically a recl...

🎙️ What if the BBC wasn’t just public in name, but actually shaped by the public? This week, we talk disability rights, proposed welfare cuts, and what it means to radically democratise our media and culture. From people's assemblies to mutualism, we explore what dignity, care, and creative freedom look like when built from the bottom up. 00:00 - What is it to be human? 00:38 - Welfare cuts: state...

May 05, 2025 | 🎙️ Everyone’s talking about change — but not all “change” is created equal. While Reform UK cosplays as anti-establishment (with billionaire backing and prep school flair), maybe (just maybe) the Green Party's leader-in-waiting — Zack Polanski — should elevate his suit game. 00:00 - So Shit Even Trump Can't Save 'Em 00:27 - Be the wind, not the weathervane 34:21 - Anti-woke barmcake...

Apr 28, 2025 | 🎙️ What if Google wasn’t a tech monopoly but a global commons? What if organising meant more than selling newspapers and referencing dead Russians? This week, we dig into the digital and political cartels we’re stuck with — from the enshittification of the internet to the Socialist Workers Party's long shadow over the UK left. 00:00 - Cartels & Commons 00:16 - Google: Natural Mo...

Apr 21, 2025 | 🎙️ In light of the Supreme Court’s nonsense ruling, solidarity with the queer and trans community has never been more crucial — Queer AF breaks it down further here . Meanwhile, behind the curtain, the BBC is on life support — but what if we actually got to control it? Oh, and the Pope is dead. Long live the Pope. We talk solidarity, media collapse, and building something better. Fr...

Apr 14, 2025 |🎙️ What do overflowing bins, skyrocketing water bills, and 24/7 media chaos have in common? They’re all signs it’s time to stop coping and start organising (aka reaching out to your friends). From collective non-payment campaigns pushing back against water privatisation, to the psychological warfare of media saturation, to the lessons learned from Birmingham’s bin strikes — this epis...

Apr 06, 2025 |🎙️Trump promised to drain the swamp — and now it looks like he might do it by blowing the whole thing up, with the rest of us in it. Closer to home, the Hillsborough Law has been quietly gutted by a Labour government intent on breaking its promise to tackle corruption. But don’t worry — we might still have a chance to drain the swamp in our own backyard… with a bit of Blue Steel. Kee...

Mar 31, 2025 |🎙️We’re back with a long one this week. Not sure if you noticed, but a hell of a lot of news happened while we were away. But we weren’t just twiddling our thumbs—we were in the lab, working on the perfect product. And now? We’re back. We’re here every week. No more month-long gaps, no more cramming a ton of stories into one episode. This week, we’re tackling: 1. Is America a fascist...

Feb 10, 2025 | 🎙️ Deportation, immigration raids, trans rights, moral panic and Uruguay. This week we got into some pretty heavy and tough topics. Look into your local anti-raids groups ( via the Anti-Raids Network ) and check out @wearequeeraf_ , @migrantsorganise , @whatthetrans, @theabigailthorn , Trans Writes and The Trans Agenda by Lee Hurley on Substack, to name a few of the brilliant mentio...

Feb 03, 2025 | 🎙️ If taking back control means taking back our energy then why is GB energy so shit? Is David Mitchell really the defender of democracy we need? And does the media actually love Trump and if so should tell them to get a room? Keep listening and read up on this week's newsletter for even more from the News Club cru. "sit on the sidelines, let things happen to you, here's a pat on th...

Jan 27, 2025 | 🎙️ Overborne metaphors, non-consensual doom and clapping for growth. Keep listening and check out this week's newsletter ( Grow, you bastard, grow! ) for even more from the News Club cru. "All of these AI and Bitcoin miners are stealing the graphics cards I need to play my video games and they're burning the planet in the proccess" ~ C

Jan 20, 2025 | 🎙️ Welcome to: Got News? News Club: A place to talk about the news and how to change it. These last few weeks have shown the catastrophic consequences of our broken news media. Corporate news outlets are emboldening the far-right . The online platforms we use to communicate with one another are controlled by egotistical billionaires. And mainstream journalists are cheering on govern...