KQED's Forum

In the past decade, we've gone from relying on meet-cutes and set-ups to "swiping right" in hopes of making a connection. The 2010s provided a renaissance in dating and opened up new opportunities for finding a mate — for better or worse. We'll talk to experts about the state of dating and relating to one another and we want to hear from you: what's your experience with dating and building relationships in the era of websites and apps?

Cirque du Soleil, the renowned Quebec-based circus, has returned to San Francisco with its production of "Amaluna," a women-centered narrative about renewal and rebirth. A collaboration with theater director Diane Paulus and loosely based on Shakespeare's "The Tempest," "Amaluna" features a majority of women in its cast and an all-women band. We'll talk to two of the cast members — including alumna of San Francisco's Clown Conservatory, Kelsey Custard — about the show's current Bay Area residency and about dazzling audiences across the globe.

More than 40 percent of U.S. adults aged 65 and older take five or more prescription drugs. That's according to a 2017 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which found that so-called "polypharmacy" is on the rise. But some experts are concerned about the medical risks of overprescription, which can happen when patients rely on automated refill services or see multiple specialists. We'll talk to UCSF's Michael Steinman, who heads a new national research network focused on deprescribing medications. We want to hear from you: do you or a loved one take a laundry list of prescription drugs? What concerns do you have?

The internet — which turned 50 this year — has revolutionized the way we live, work and connect with each other. It's also put our security at risk and left our personal data vulnerable to exploitation. Forum looks at where the internet has taken us so far and where it's headed.

In 1967, a 24-year-old singer from Bay Area band Big Brother and the Holding Company performed at the Monterey Pop Festival. Following that performance, the singer — Janis Joplin — became an international star. Joplin was an icon of 1960s counterculture, influencing a generation of musicians with her fiery performances and bluesy vocals. Music writer Holly George-Warren joins Forum to talk about her new biography, "Janis," which follows Joplin from her childhood as a blues-obsessed white girl in Texas to her tragic death at age 27.

In the past 10 years, Elena Ferrante's quartet of books, the Neapolitan Novels, so captivated readers that many swarmed Naples, Italy, searching for mentioned sites. Colson Whitehead's "The Underground Railroad" sparked deep conversations on slavery nationwide. Some books of the past decade will stick with us for years and others will drift out of our memories. As we enter the final days of the decade, Forum reflects on its best and most beloved books. Tell us: what is your favorite book of the 2010s?

In his new book "Catch and Kill," journalist Ronan Farrow exposes the ways in which Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein and his associates attempted to block reporting on the sexual assault claims that engulfed him. But the biggest obstacle of all, as Farrow tells it, was his then-employer NBC News, which killed his reporting on the scandal. Farrow eventually took his story to the New Yorker and later won the Pulitzer Prize for his reporting. We'll talk to Farrow about the cover-ups and obstruction he encountered as he reported this blockbuster story.

You may have crossed into middle age, but why do you feel like a teenager around your parents' holiday table? Experts call this phenomenon "holiday regression," and it explains why we revert to old roles — such as the family jokester or the appeaser — when we're reunited with kin. We'll talk about what triggers regression and how to avoid it, and we'll also look at how culture and ethnicity inform family roles. And we'd like to hear from you: do you role-revert — or role play — when you go home for the holidays?

'Tis the season... to travel. But for frequent flyers who try to cash in points during the holidays, clouds are looming. With heightened concern over climate change, there are industry rumblings about possibly ending or taxing frequent flyer programs as a way to mitigate carbon dioxide emissions from planes. We’ll talk with experts about what's to come for travel rewards programs, how airline consolidations impact them and how to get the most out of your reward miles.

As the only member of Congress to have been involved in all three presidential impeachment inquiries of the past five decades, Rep. Zoe Lofgren knows the gravity of the process. Lofgren calls President Trump's actions "more serious" than those of Richard Nixon and has accused Republicans of a double standard on their impeachment stances for Donald Trump and Bill Clinton. Rep. Lofgren joins Forum to share why she voted for President Trump's impeachment and the Democratic strategy moving forward.