This week, Robert and Dave switch gears back to the series focused on a few shows that bring meaning and potential benefit in the media. Specifically, television shows that possess themes crucial to wake us up from the dangers that we are facing, prejudices we have, and ideas that support survival on the planet. Highlighted today is The Americans. We cannot help but love the Russian family that is portrayed as spies planted in the United States in this show. Not only how the main characters love each other, but how they love their kids. These relationships humanize them in such a way as to melt the barrier between them and us watching in our living rooms. The upper echelons of the power of Putin are as corrupt as it gets, representing the most disturbed leaders like Hitler, Stalin, and the worst elements of Trump. These authoritarian influences guide us into black-and-white thinking that blocks many of us from seeing how similar all of our needs and desires are as people.

The Americans takes place during The Cold War, under the leadership of Gorbachev in Robert's eyes, more than any other leader in America or Russia, he spoke to world peace. Gorbachev declared an innocence and a common responsibility to negate nuclear war. The Americans, as a TV show, revealed common elements that allowed universal humanness and collective responsibility to be seen. The key is not to see each side as equal, but to be able to see the fragility and the massive contradictions on both sides. We need to teach our kids that we too have made our mistakes and that it is important for us to be humble as a country to try and create as much unity as possible when our country and world are so threatened.

Read the transcription and listen to this episode on The Global Bridge Foundation website.