Cascade PBS Ideas Festival

New Tech’s Threat to Civil Rights with Shalini Kantayya and Meredith Broussard

'Coded Bias' filmmaker Shalini Kantayya and researcher Meredith Broussard dissect the inequities perpetuated and created by emergent technologies.

Every day, human beings use technology that would have been unthinkable just a few decades ago. But while the biometric computation and artificial intelligence that drive much of this tech have the sheen of something new, a growing chorus of researchers argues that they also contain something very old: the racism, sexism and other discrimination that have long been part of our history. 

The machines we have made don't just suffer from the ills of our society, they argue, but also  threaten to perpetuate them. And, as this technology becomes more ubiquitous and invasive, it may become a serious threat to our civil rights.  

For this week's episode of the Crosscut Talks podcast, we are speaking with Kantayya, whose film Coded Bias serves as a warning against the widespread, unregulated adoption of these technologies. Joining her is Broussard, one of the expert voices from the film and the author of Artificial Unintelligence: How Computers Misunderstand the World.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Event producers: Jake Newman, Andrea O'Meara

Engineers: Resti Bagcal, Viktoria Ralph

Racism and the Health Care Industry with Dr. Ben Danielson

The former medical director of Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic shares his surprise at the support he received in his protest against the hospital and thoughts on what’s next.

When Danielson resigned in protest from his position as medical director of the Odessa Brown Children's Clinic late last year, he ended two decades in a role he regarded as his "dream job." And when that decision was made public, it thrust the doctor into a new role, as an unofficial spokesperson and high-profile advocate for equity in our healthcare systems.

In the weeks following the publication of a Crosscut report detailing the doctor's claims of racism at Seattle Children's Hospital, which runs the clinic, supporters came out in droves and the Seattle institution responded by firing one of its leaders and launching an independent investigation. 

Four months later, Danielson is in a new role at University of Washington Medical Center and is continuing to tell his story. For the latest edition of Crosscut's Northwest Newsmakers event series, host Mónica Guzmán sat down with the doctor to reflect on the last few months and to talk about how we might address systemic racism in the health care industry and beyond.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Event producers: Jake Newman, Andrea O'Meara

Engineers: Resti Bagcal, Viktoria Ralph

Militias, White Supremacy and the Insurrection with Leah Sottile and Bill Morlin

Journalists Leah Sottile and Bill Morlin talk about how America’s history of racist, anti-government action culminated in the Jan. 6 attack.

It appears that the first chapter of the Jan. 6 insurrection has come to a close with the acquittal of former President Donald Trump in his impeachment trial earlier this month. But this isn’t really the first chapter of this story.

While the House impeachment managers laid out a strong argument that placed the former president and his false claims of a rigged election at the center of the violent riot, there were forces at play in the storming of the U.S. Capitol that predate Trump and the current iteration of the Republican Party: the persistent presence of white supremacy, the rise of anti-government militias and the history of domestic terrorism.

For this episode of the Crosscut Talks, we are speaking with Leah Sottile and Bill Morlin, two journalists who cover anti-government groups in the Pacific Northwest. They share what they saw while watching the insurrection unfold, what they are looking at right now and what the political future of the former president might mean for the anti-government movement.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Event producers: Jake Newman, Andrea O'Meara

Engineers: Resti Bagcal, Viktoria Ralph

Making Seattle Schools Safe and Equitable with Denise Juneau

The Seattle Public Schools superintendent discusses her plans to keep students and teachers healthy while reopening, and reflects on how the district could have better responded to the pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made this one of the most unusual and challenging school years in modern history. The arrival of multiple vaccines in recent months has not made it any easier.

As the number of Americans who have been vaccinated has slowly climbed, the pressure to bring students and teachers back into a classroom setting has also increased. Along with that pressure have come fears from some teachers and families over the safety of congregating before a vaccine has been widely distributed.

In the midst of this conflict, Seattle Public Schools has announced plans to begin a phased reopening later this winter, but the details are still murky. To help clarify things, Crosscut invited the outgoing superintendent to join us for a live Northwest Newsmakers event last week.

Juneau, who will be leaving her post in June, discussed what the district has planned to keep students and teachers safe, where the district went wrong in its response to the pandemic and what she hopes it will learn from this historically challenging year. She also reflects on her three years in the job, the challenges she has faced in targeting inequity in the schools and how the district has set itself up for success in the future.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Event producers: Jake Newman, Andrea O'Meara

Engineers: Resti Bagcal, Viktoria Ralph

The Beginning of the Biden Administration with Evan Osnos

Evan Osnos, presidential biographer and staff writer at The New Yorker, tells us what he sees in Biden’s early actions.

Over the course of three weeks in January, the U.S. Capitol was the site of three major events, each of which could have filled its own chapter in the history books. Taken together, the insurrection of the U.S. Capitol, the second impeachment of Donald Trump and the inauguration of Joe Biden as the 46th president of the United States amount to a historic turning point. 

What, exactly, the country is turning toward is hard to say. But one certainty is that the administration of President Biden will have a major influence on its direction. 

For this episode of Crosscut Talks, we are featuring a live conversation with Biden biographer and New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos about the challenges before the new president. 

Through an examination of Biden’s early actions and statements, as well as the president’s life experience and political acumen, Osnos shares with us what he believes is in store for the presidency and the country.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Event producers: Jake Newman, Andrea O'Meara

Engineer: Resti Bagcal

A Brief History of Antitrust with Katie Wilson

Columnist Katie Wilson tells us how the law created in the Gilded Age will help shape the next chapter of the Digital Age.

As a concept, antitrust may seem fairly simple. Companies that get too big and abuse their powers to unfairly eliminate competition, and maybe drive up prices, must be brought to heel, either through regulation or a breakup.

But the reality is not so simple, and the history of trustbusting in the United States has been uneven at best. Still, the government has managed to employ this power to interfere in the market to manage Big Oil, Big Railroad and Big Steel. Now it looks as if those powers will again be used, this time against Big Tech, in particular on Apple, Facebook, Google and Amazon.

For this week's episode of the Crosscut Talks podcast, we are speaking with columnist Katie Wilson about the mounting efforts to rein in these digital behemoths and what the history of antitrust can tell us about this latest effort and its possible outcomes.
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Links

A new era of trustbusting could begin with Amazon, tech giants (Oct. 22, 2020)

Capitalism, competition, and why antitrust is so confusing (Oct. 28, 2020)

1912: When antitrust views collided in a presidential election (Nov. 4, 2020)

How Big Tech landed in the crosshairs of antitrust law (Nov. 12, 2020)

Why 21st century trustbusters are picking on Amazon (Nov. 19, 2020)

Imagining a future where Amazon runs the world (Dec. 9, 2020)

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Producer: Jake Newman

Engineer: Resti Bagcal

How Seattle Made Hip-Hop Its Own with Daudi Abe

Daudi Abe talks about four decades of hip-hop in the isolated, disrespected, idiosyncratic Northwest. 

From the moment "The Rapper's Delight" first played over the air of KYAC in Seattle, the trajectory of culture in the Pacific Northwest shifted. That song, performed by New Jersey's Sugarhill Gang and one of the earliest tracks in the history of hip-hop, was a clarion call for a youth culture hungry for something new.

Seattle was not alone in this respect. But the way that hip-hop hit in the city and the music its artists made in response to those early influences was unique.

Nestled in the Northwest, isolated from the major culture centers and largely disrespected, these artists were exposed to many of the same factors shaping much of hip-hop culture elsewhere — gentrification, gangs, mass incarceration — but they interpreted it differently. It can be heard in the music of artists throughout the four decades of Seattle hip-hop, from Sir Mix-a-Lot and Macklemore.

Abe, the author of 'Emerald Street: The History of Hip Hop in Seattle,' walks us through a history that he lived, discusses the cultural pressures that shaped it and details the distinct way that Seattle artists made an art form their own while telling a universal story.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Producer: Jake Newman

Engineer: Resti Bagcal

The Life and Death of an Asylum Seeker with Lilly Fowler

Reporter Lilly Fowler discusses what years of reporting on Mergensana Amar tell us about U.S. immigration policy.

The first time that Amar made news in the United States he was in the middle of a hunger strike, a protest against his failed bid for asylum and his imminent deportation after being held at the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma. The next time he made the news, he was fighting for his life after a suicide attempt. At least that was the story pieced together from the information provided by officials of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

As newly discovered documents now make clear, Amar was officially dead days before authorities acknowledged as much, counter to agency policy that ensures quick notice in matters of death. He was also kept shackled to his bed against the wishes of hospital staff, even after hopes for recovery had been abandoned.

This week on Crosscut Talks, Fowler recounts the story of the Russian national, who sought asylum in the United States. She discusses how these recent findings illuminate the confusing days following news of the suicide attempt and considers what his story tells us about the state of immigration in the United States and the agency charged with caring for those in the system, in life and death.

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Links

New details of a death at Tacoma ICE facility raise questions over care (Dec. 3, 2020)

An asylum seeker vowed never to return to Russia. His death in ICE custody sent him back (June 10, 2019)

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Producer: Jake Newman

Engineer: Resti Bagcal

The Kamala Harris Effect with Ruchika Tulshyan

Author Ruchika Tulshyan talks about the change that diversity can bring to a workplace when that workplace is the White House.

When Kamala Harris walks into the White House on Jan. 20, she will be carrying with her a lot of firsts. She will be the first woman vice president of the United States, not to mention the first woman of color to hold the office. She will also be the first Black person to be vice president and the first Asian American to achieve such a height of elected office.

In some ways it will be a moment reminiscent of January 2009, when Barack Obama became the country's first Black president. But there are many ways it is very different, aside from the fact that leading Harris into office will be a septuagenarian white man, Joe Biden.

One of the main differences is, of course, Harris' gender. Another is that, unlike Obama, she has arrived at her post as a part of a larger wave that swept a record number of women of color into elected office at the federal and state levels.

This week on the Crosscut Talks podcast we are speaking with Tulshyan about Harris' ascent. The author of The Diversity Advantage: Fixing Gender Inequality in the Workplace discusses how Harris will change the White House, what Obama's presidency can tell us about the challenges she will face and how Tulshyan imagines the new vice president might lead.

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Producer: Jake Newman

Engineer: Resti Bagcal

A Republican Win in Deep-Blue America with Melissa Santos

Reporter Melissa Santos discusses the politics and path for the GOP's great West Coast hope. When Kim Wyman won re-election as Washington state's secretary of state earlier this month, she outperformed her party's gubernatorial and presidential candidates by double digits and became the GOP's only statewide elected official on the West Coast of the lower 48. Some in the party see her appeal to split-ticket voters as the path to statewide relevance, perhaps as a candidate for governor. Yet, the rightward swing of the base during the Trump era complicates the equation. This week on the Crosscut Talks podcast we speak with Santos about Wyman, how she is able to keep her office in such a deep blue state, and the tough choices ahead for the Republican party.  

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Links

How Republican Kim Wyman keeps winning in blue Washington state (Nov. 11, 2020)

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Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Producer: Jake Newman

Engineer: Resti Bagcal