Mic Check Radio

The fourth and final in episode in our We're So Fucked series  (We're So Fucked - We're So Fucked 2: Bringing Down the System - We're So Fucked 3: Don't Do Anything) ends on a happy note, sort of...We start the discussion with the idea that there are no easy fixes for all of the worlds problems and how personal a choice it is to actually get up everyday, take in air and keep trying to function as a human being on a fucked planet.  What do you spend you time working towards?  Everybody's answer is different, so we attempt to discuss the big picture issue that can apply to everyone...the potential of the human brain and the wonderful, creative, artistic impulses that reside inside of us all.  Especially the youngest human beings among us, kids.  Before their brains are taught all that social baggage we adults carry around in our brains, they are (or can be) free to explore, create, question and express themselves in the most spectacular ways imaginable.  It might not save all of us

On this episode we discuss the four steps the State has already set up that allow them to kill activists.  Step 1: Redefine and/or blur the lines of definitions (ex. Terrorism, Domestic Terrorism, Eco-Terrorism)[Link].Step 2: Create a precedent for killing US civilians [Link].Step 3: Federal authorities are already cool with targeting activists [Link 1] [Link 2]. Step 4: Get pundits on corporate news shows to tell us why this is a great idea.[Click to Listen]

On May 26th, 2013 we put out an episode called The FBI Creates Terrorists - which was, itself, a follow up to What is Terrorism? - and just about one year later...not a single thing seems to have changed.  On this weeks episode we take a look at a few specific cases.  Farooque Ahmed, Liberty City Seven, James Cromitie, Derrick Shareef and Nicolas Michael Teausant. [Click to Listen]

The wonderful folks over at CrimetInc have posted a superb article about how the current Ukrainian Revolution is/was hijacked by the Fascist and Nationalist of that particular country.  The example used in this article is specific to Ukraine, but the details will sound familiar to anyone who has read a news story in the past three years about similar uprisings in Spain, Turkey, Tunisia, USA, Venezuela, Brazil, Egypt, etc.  If you don't get off the couch and into the street, your ideas will not be heard -  and you never know what ideas will be presented in your absence. [Click to Listen]

It's that time of year again...the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) was re-uped for another year.  What devious items were snuck in this year?  In the last two years, indefinite military detention of United States citizens (NDAA 2012) and overturning the 63 year old Smith-Mundt Act which prohibited domestic dissemination of government propaganda (NDAA 2013) were just two of the highlights.  This year, the war rhetoric is amped up to get the Department of Defense ready for the coming (or currently raging) cyber war by not only creating another government database for storing digital information, but laying out the rules for selling and exchanging that information with other governments and individuals all over the world. [Click to Listen]

This episode follows We're So Fucked and We're So Fucked 2: Bringing Down the System.  On today's installment of this sporadic series we look at one of the two options that are laid out before us: Do Something or Don't Do Anything.  The later is the focus for this episode.  Doing nothing has never been easier or more entertaining (assuming you live in a so-called First World Country).  Thousands of TV channels, Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Google Play, iTunes, pornography, Soundcloud, YouTube, drugs (both legal and illegal), video games, social media, food and consumer electronics gadgetry that allow for the access of  most of the above at the touch of a finger.  Why the fuck would a First World human being want to do anything more than passively move thru their life, enjoying the entirety of human created entertainment that is available on small computer that fits in a pocket? [Click to Listen]

Activist Cinema Episode 8 - The Square (2013) is an excellent example of a journalistic documentary.  It covers the protests in Egypt's Tahrir Square that started in 2011 and stays with several citizens (protestors, activists and lawyers) over a two year period.  The ups and downs of seeing two presidents removed from power, violent military crackdowns and counter protests in a very short period of time.  It ends with the current (as of fall 2013) 'transitional period' in which the citizens are under military rule and all their victories are now under threat. [Click to Listen]

As a tangent series to the Activist Cinema episodes we've been doing for awhile now, here is short playlist of fantastic Activist Music - The Punk Rock Edition Vol.1.Transmission - S.T.U.N.Punk Rock Song - Bad ReligionControlled Opposition - Anti FlagSuburban Home - DescendentsLady Liberty - RancidJerk of All Trades - LunachicksDwindle - Falling SicknessBoredom - S.T.U.N.

On this episode we take a closer look at the so called 'Russian Anti-Gay Laws' with the help of a very insightful white paper - Russian Federation Anti Gay Laws: An Analysis and Deconstruction by Brian M. Heiss.  Why are these laws getting so much corporate media coverage?  Is it all just to remind people to tune into the Winter Olympics and by Coke and Nike products?  Is it possibly a distraction story so no one investigates the most expensive and corrupt Winter Olympics in history?  After we discuss these cynical questions, we take a quick look around the Middle East and Africa to see if there are any other countries whose anti-gay laws could stand some scrutiny by our oh-so-concerned corporate media.  And while we're looking into anti-gay laws and anti-gay hate crime statistics, it's always a good idea to check in here at home and see how the United States is faring.  (Hint: it's no better than Russia.  In fact, it's a lot worse in some areas). [Click to Listen]

It's story time on Mic Check Radio this week.  While this is a follow up to the We're So Fucked episode from two weeks ago, the bulk of this show is a reading which diagnoses just how fucked we human beings are by the industrial-technological system that we human beings have created...and what some potential options are for dealing with this system. [Click to Listen]

As the sports world gears up for the bread and circus spectacle of Super Bowl XLVIII, we take a look at the benefits and importance of sports on a local level-where, unlike the NFL, it isn't ruled by money and corporate sponsorships.  Then we take a quick look at what sports fans could be doing with their time, brains and energy instead of "playing" fantasy sports.  And finally, at the end of the show, we play some audio from a "news report" on the Legends Football League (aka Lingerie Football League) and how the corporate media once again asks all the wrong questions. [Click to Listen]

We (human beings) are quite literally fucked in numerous ways...on this episode we take a look at just a few of the main reasons.  Financial collapse, poor food quality, weather, climate, consumerism, garbage, diseases, air pollution, water pollution, industrialization, population growth, and just plain good old fashioned war (traditional, biological, nuclear, etc.). Oh, and solar flares, asteroids, earthquakes and volcanoes. [Click to Listen]

So, our part II of this series turned out to run so long that we broke it up into two parts.  On this weeks show we take a look at the history of Affluenza [Defined by Wikipedia as "a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more"], starting in 1870 with the appearance of the first luxury department stores and end with the madness of the post-WWII economic boom.  Are we, as human beings, natural consumers or have we just been programmed to be obedient shopping slaves?  Trick question; it's the latter. [Click to Listen]

Our final installment in the Affluenza series.  On this weeks show we finish taking a look at the history of Affluenza [Defined by Wikipedia as "a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more"].  We start with the explosion of TV in the post-WWII economy and work our way thru the introduction of credit cards, presidential campaigns that employ advertisers (1952), the philosophy of retail shopping, the hippie movement, Jimmy Carter's stunning anti-consumerism speech, the deregulation of the Reagan era and how Microsoft convinced millions of consumers to install active cameras and microphones in living rooms across the country. [Click to Listen]

Consumers in the United States just spent nearly 60 billion dollars (mostly with credit cards) over the Black Friday weekend on products made with slave labor (in countries with little to no environmental regulations) that will eventually fill up landfills and ruin this planet a little faster.  What else could we have spent that money on? [Click to Listen]

In part I of a two part series, we take a look at the disease know as "affluenza".  Defined by Wikipedia affluenza is "a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more".  On this episode, we take a look at the way affluenza harms the youngest among us - children.  Before they can form a coherent thought or utter a coherent word, advertisers (working with child psychologists) try their hardest to get inside children's heads and make them mindless consumers for life.  [Click to Listen]

Activist Cinema Episode 6 - What Would Jesus Buy? (2007) is a documentary that follows Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping on their North American tour in the month leading up to Christmas 2005.  As we head into the capitalist orgy of Black Friday and the holiday shopping season, this film works as a great antidote to the consumer frenzy that is about to be unleashed.  Also, it is available free on YouTube (as of this posting).  Rev. Billy and Nehemiah are both currently (11.24.13) facing a year in prison.  Please follow this link to sign a petition for their charges to be dropped. [Click to Listen]

As a tangent series to the Activist Cinema episodes we've been doing for a few months, here is short playlist of fantastic Activist Music - The Hip Hop Edition.Introduction - Boots Riley (The Coup) Public Enemy - Fight the PowerLMFAO - ShotsThe Coup - Laugh, Love, FuckTha Truth - Power to the PeopleDead Prez - Police StateImmortal Technique - Rich Man's WorldStreet Sweeper Social Club - Fight Smash Win[Click to Listen]

On the heels of our 5 part series on the Corporate Media, we tryout the Zen TV Experiment.  Instead of passively watching TV, try this:-Watch 15 minutes of a scripted sitcom without the sound.-Watch 15 minutes of a news program without the sound.-Watch the TV for 30 minutes while it is turned off.It only takes 1 hour and we promise, it will be a more memorable 1 hour than anything on the TV you would normally be watching.  The places your mind will go and the thoughts you will come up with in that 30 minute period may just surprise you. [Click to Listen]

We have come to the end (for now) of our Corporate Media series.  On this episode we take a look at several examples of the corporate/government hijacking of the public airwaves that have been exposed.  After that...the numbers don't lie!  Alternative media outlets are growing in numbers and listeners.  We examine the Pew Research Centers 2013 State of the Media report and the many reasons it gives us to celebrate.  Mainly the low, low, low viewership of the Corporate Media's flagship "news programs". [Click to Listen]