KQED's Forum

Lowriders defy convention: they lean, they hop, they bounce. Their paint jobs are works of art, sometimes with museum-worthy images or a melding of colors that gleam with a lustrous sheen. Lowriding, the drivers will tell you, is not just about the car, it’s about convening with the community and celebrating art and culture. But for decades, restrictive bans in California prohibited where lowriders could cruise. Last month, activists succeeded in pushing lawmakers to lift the state’s ban, which they said discriminated against and targeted Latino and Black communities. Despite the bans, lowrider culture flourished in California and devotees can now be found across the globe, from Japan to Argentina. We’ll talk with lowriders about what the change in the law means and what riding low and slow means to them.

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You might know The Cure’s song “A Strange Day,” defined by its spooky guitar licks, eerie drone loops and funeral march drum beats. But Lol Tolhurst, the band’s co-founder, former drummer and keyboardist, says the song is not all doom and death. Rather, it’s a shining example of Goth, which Tolhurst calls the “last true alternative outsider subculture.” Goth music inherited the anarchy of punk but substituted nihilism with a desire to fully feel, talk about and confess our emotions. And Tolhurst argues that the Cure — along with Bauhaus, the Doors and Siouxsie and the Banshees — helped pioneer its sound. We talk to Tolhurst about his new book “Goth” and the subculture’s music and aesthetics, and we’ll hear from you: Are — or were — you Goth? What does Goth mean to you?

Guests:

Lol Tolhurst, musician and writer; one of the co-founders of English rock band the Cure; author "Cured: The Tale of Two Imaginary Boys" and the new book "Goth: A History"

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The de Young museum has opened its doors and cleared walls to feature the work of Bay Area artists. On exhibit through January, the 2023 de Young Open features 883 artworks across genre and subject matter — the only submission requirement being that the creator lives in one of the nine Bay Area counties. We’ll talk with the lead curator of the exhibit, along with other independent curators and artists, about the local art scene today and what Bay Area artists are saying with their work.

Guests:

Timothy Anglin Burgard, distinguished senior curator and curator-in-charge of American art, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

Trisha Lagaso Goldberg, artist; independent curator

Alice Beasley, fiber artist. Her work is now on exhibit at The de Young Open. She was also included in the 2020 Exhibition.

Callan Porter-Romero, artist based in Oakland. One of her paintings is now on exhibit at The de Young Open. She was also included in the 2020 Exhibition.

Todd Hanson, artist; founder, Four Chicken Gallery in Bernal Heights

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Since 2014, inmates inside California’s womens’ prisons have filed hundreds of complaints of sexual abuse carried out by guards, yet just four officers have been fired, and only four have been prosecuted. In a new investigation for The Guardian, reporter Sam Levin outlines the culture of silence and intimidation inside of California’s prison system, and why it’s often the victims who get punished. We speak with Levin about what he found and hear from Sister Warriors Freedom Coalition, an advocacy group that has been calling for an independent body to investigate the reports of abuse.

Guests:

Amika Mota, executive director and founding member, Sister Warriors Freedom Coalition

Sam Levin, senior criminal justice reporter, the Guardian US

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Friendsgiving can take many forms. Sometimes it’s a replacement for a more traditional Thanksgiving when gathering with family isn’t possible. For others, it’s a bonus holiday to honor friends who feel like family. The ritual has deep roots in the queer community where it emerged in the 1980s as a way to unite chosen families and challenge restrictive family norms. For our next installment of All You Can Eat, KQED food editor Luke Tsai joins us to talk about how to successfully pull off a Friendsgiving meal and what it means. And, we want to hear from you: What is your Friendsgiving tradition?

Guests:

Luke Tsai, food editor, KQED Arts & Culture

Olivia Cruz Mayeda, arts reporting intern, KQED; freelance journalist

John Birdsall, author; freelance food writer

Kim Knox, co-owner, Kim's Louisiana Fried Turkey

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Last month, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sued tech giant Meta, arguing that its Instagram and Facebook platforms use psychologically manipulative features that are harming kids’ mental health. And in September, his office sued ExxonMobil and other oil giants, alleging they misled the public about the climate effects of fossil fuels. We’ll talk to Bonta about the high profile cases he’s brought on California’s behalf and about a range of criminal justice issues, including his office’s recent decision not to charge four Anaheim police officers who shot and killed the unarmed cousin of a Santa Ana City Council member. What are your questions for Attorney General Bonta?

Guests:

Rob Bonta, California Attorney General

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In her daily politics newsletter, “Letters from an American,” Boston College history professor Heather Cox Richardson offers her two million readers a historical perspective on the news along with a dose of common sense. She launched the newsletter during the 2019 impeachment crisis, and the strains on American democracy, laid bare by the January 6 insurrection, have been a constant theme of her work. In Richardson’s new book, “Democracy Awakening” she argues that today’s Republican politics have their roots in history, going back to the New Deal. We talk to her about her book and why everyone should be a student of history.

Guests:

Heather Cox Richardson, author, "Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America." Heather Cox Richardson is a professor of history at Boston College and an expert on American political and economic history. She is the author of seven books, including the award-winning "How the South Won the Civil War." Her widely read newsletter, Letters from an American, synthesizes history and modern political issues.

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Jesse David Fox works as Vulture’s comedy critic and hosts the podcast “Good One,” where each episode features comedians like John Mulaney and Sasheer Zamata spending up to two hours breaking down one joke and why it makes us laugh. But his new book, “Comedy Book,” questions whether comedy has to be funny at all. It takes us from the premiere of “Seinfeld” and “The Simpsons” in 1989, to the new relationship between politics, journalism and humor engendered by John Stewart’s “The Daily Show,” to the — sometimes politically contentious, sometimes camp — comedy landscape of today. We’ll talk with Fox about how we use comedy to make sense of the news, social media fads, identity and both personal and collective grief.

Guests:

Jesse David Fox, senior editor and comedy critic, Vulture; creator and host, "Good One: A Podcast about Jokes"; author, "Comedy Book"

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President Joe Biden is set to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping this month in San Francisco. They’ll be here during the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, the biggest international meeting the city has hosted since 1945. Nearly 30,000 visitors are expected in the city during the conference, which officials say could bring in more than $50 million to the local economy. But some local residents are concerned about heightened security and street closures, while protesters are planning to disrupt the meeting to call attention to issues ranging from climate change to workers rights. We’ll preview APEC, which kicks off on November 11.

Guests:

London Breed, mayor, City and County of San Francisco

Vinod Aggarwal, professor of political science & director of Berkeley APEC Study Center, U.C. Berkeley

Rachael Myrow, senior editor of Silicon Valley News Desk, KQED

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Forum in Focus brings you the most compelling interviews in under 30 minutes! This week, professor and novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen on his new memoir, "A Man of Two Faces. And a special performance by multi-instrumentalist and singer Kishi Bashi and a conversation about his new "songfilm" called "Omoiyari.

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