The Response

In this documentary episode, we take a deep dive into how communities are responding to the growing abortion access crisis in the United States, sharing the stories of those impacted and highlighting a number of radical grassroots, mutual aid, and solidaristic efforts aimed at helping people access abortion in the places where it's currently outlawed or restricted.

Abortion access has always been limited here in the United States, but since Roe v. Wade was overturned in June of 2022 and the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision held that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion, things have gotten dramatically worse.

In the face of trigger laws banning and criminalizing abortion in many states — as well as state-sanctioned harassment and targeted campaigns against people seeking abortions — the centuries-old movement for reproductive rights and justice has only grown and strengthened.

This is a special re-release of this episode for International Women's Day. The episode was originally published as two separate parts but we have combined those two parts into one continuous episode.

Episode credits:

• Series producer and writer: Robert Raymond
• Host and executive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats
• Additional music: Chris Zabriskie, Do Make Say Think, and Pele
• Original artwork was created by Bethan Mure

This series features:

• Julie Amaon: Family medicine physician and the medical director for Just the Pill
• Jenice Fountain: Executive Director of Yellowhammer Fund
• Gulf South Plan B: Mutual Aid organization that distributes free emergency contraception in Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas and Mississippi
• Angel Jones: Recipient of medical abortion pills
• Laurie Roberts: Executive Director of Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund

Today on the show — a special presentation of a live conversation between Saket Soni and Rebecca Solnit on Saket Soni's new book, The Great Escape: A True Story of Forced Labor and Immigrant Dreams in America.

The Great Escape is the harrowing story of how 500 disaster relief workers from India were trafficked to the United States under false pretenses and exposed to inhumane conditions while rebuilding New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Rebecca Solnit has described the book as being "paced like a thriller, written like a poem, and full of vivid characters who'd enliven any novel, but it's the true story of one of the largest modern-day trafficking incidents in recent history and how Saket Soni and his crew went after the powerful perpetrators. A story as important as it is riveting to read."

Saket Soni is the co-founder and executive director of Resilience Force, the national voice of the resilience workforce — whose labor helps us prepare for, and repair after, climate disaster. He will be in conversation with renowned author Rebecca Solnit, who wrote, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster — a book that inspired the creation of this show and which we've talked about many times in past episodes.

This conversation is a recording of a live event co-organized with The Green Arcade in San Francisco on March 3rd. The Green Arcade is a bookshop featuring socially conscious nonfiction, plus select literature & kids' titles, located on Market St.

Episode credits:

• Live recording and editing by Robert Raymond
• Executive production and hosting by Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The Response is a podcast series from Shareable.net.

Today on the show, we've brought on Prem Thakker, a journalist with The New Republic who has been reporting on East Palestine, Ohio. Prem's recent piece is titled: "Life After the Ohio Train Derailment: Trouble Breathing, Dying Animals, and Saying Goodbye."

In this episode, we'll bring you up to date on everything happening in the aftermath of the February 3rd train derailment — from the health concerns and experiences of the residents of East Palestine, to Norfolk Southern's bungled and oftentimes horrifying response, to what coverage of the event has looked like and why so many politicians have remained silent on the issue for so long, and to the small glimmers of hope that disasters like this can present in terms of building community strength and solidarity.

Resources:

• "Life After the Ohio Train Derailment: Trouble Breathing, Dying Animals, and Saying Goodbye," The New Republic
• "The Conspiracy of the Ohio Train Derailment Is Right in Front of Us," The New Republic
• "Trump, Who Deregulated the Railroad Industry, Lies to the People of Ohio in His Visit," The New Republic
• "Death Plume" Tweet by Robert Raymond and the response to the "fact-check" by USA Today.

Episode credits:

• Host, producer, and editor: Robert Raymond
• Executive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The Response is a podcast series from Shareable.net.

Today on the show we've brought on Rebecca Burns, co-author of the recent piece in The Lever, Rail Companies Blocked Safety Rules Before Ohio Derailment.

On February 3rd, 150-car train derailed in East Palestine, Ohio. The train was carrying several cars of vinyl chloride, an extremely hazardous and toxic chemical used in plastics manufacturing. The derailment triggered a gigantic fireball, which, if you've seen pictures of it, looks like a giant, billowing mushroom cloud, which sent a plume of black smoke miles and miles across multiple counties.

After the initial explosion the town was evacuated, but residents have since been allowed to return. However, the situation is far from resolved. The extent of impacts on people living in the area, as well as on the local ecology, are difficult to imagine — and this story is not getting the attention that it deserves.

Norfolk Southern, the company responsible for the disaster, has been on the cutting edge of lobbying for industry deregulation, killing federal safety rules and slashing its workforce to dangerous levels. Incidentally, the company has also been seeing record profits.

In this Disaster Dispatch episode of The Response, journalist Rebecca Burns will explain what's going on in East Palestine, Ohio, what the technical and political causes of this disaster are, and how disasters like this are just part of a broader ecosystem of industry deregulation and corporate cost-cutting which could serve as a death sentence for the rest of us.

Episode credits:

• Host, producer, and editor: Robert Raymond
• Presenter and executive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The Response is a podcast series from Shareable.net.

Today on the show we've brought on Andy C. from Poor Prole's Almanac to talk about a wide range of fascinating topics — from agroecology and sound ecological practices regarding the growing of food and the stewardship of land, to native seed bombing and other forms of mutual aid and disaster preparation, to the difference between right-wing prepperism and left-wing prepperism, to why building collective power and resilience is the best way to ensure that we not only survive the slow but inevitable societal collapses that have already begun — but to thrive through them and build a better world out of the ashes of the old.

Resources:

• Poor Prole's Almanac on Instagram and Twitter

Episode credits:

• Host, producer, and editor: Robert Raymond
• Presenter and executive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The Response is a podcast series from Shareable.net.

For the past couple of years, the City of Atlanta, George, has been pushing forward a project nicknamed "Cop City" — a tactical training compound featuring a mock city which has been referred to as a kind of war base where police will learn military-style maneuvers. The 90 million dollar compound would be built on somewhere between 60 and 300 acres of forest in Atlanta — a space known as the Weelaunee Forest, one of the largest urban forests in the country.

As a result of this controversial and extremely unpopular development, a grassroots response has taken shape to stop "Cop City." One of the responses has been by those known as forest protectors, forest defenders, or tree dwellers — activists who have camped out in the forest hoping to stop the clearcutting, bulldozing, and destruction of the forest from happening. On January 18th, one of these forest protectors, known by their forest name "Tortuguita," or "Little Turtle" was killed by police during a raid in the forest.

This killing has launched the story of "Cop City" — and the grassroots movement fighting against it — into national and even international headlines. In this episode of The Response we've brought on two individuals who are part of that movement to break things down for us.

Jesse Pratt López is a photographer, documentarian, and organizer involved in the stop cop city movement based in Atlanta. Nolan Huber-Rhoades is a community journalist and filmmaker currently working on a documentary on "Cop City" who has also been covering the events since April of 2021.

What are the forces behind "Copy City"? What has the community response looked like — not just to the development itself but also to the brutal police response which has terrorized those protecting the forest? And how does the Stop Cop City movement bring together police abolition, climate change, land back, surveillance capitalism, and the right to protest all in one place? We explore all of these questions and more in this episode with Jesse and Nolan.

Resources:

• The Atlanta Solidarity Fund
• GoFundMe for Family of Manuel "Tortuguita" Páez Terán
• Food not bombs Atlanta
• Community Movement Builders
• Defend the Atlanta Forest
• Little Turtle's War published by Bitter Southerner

You can find Jesse Pratt López on Twitter and Instgram & Nolan Huber-Rhoades on Twitter and Instagram.

Episode credits:

• Host, producer, and editor: Robert Raymond
• Presenter and executive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

The Response is a podcast series from Shareable.net.

From a chicken coop providing omelet breakfasts to underserved communities, to a network of farms stretching from Oakland to East Palo Alto, to a night watch program aimed at keeping the police accountable and protecting marginalized communities from police violence, to providing grassroots disaster relief during the most recent storms in the Bay Area — The Hood Squad seems to do it all.

In this episode, we've brought on JT, Savage, and Nay from The Hood Squad, a mutual aid and police accountability organization based out of the Bay Area. Through their six principles of peace, love, harmony, balance, unity, and justice, the Hood Squad aims to shift the systematic oppression which has targeted the disenfranchised communities of the world.

We discuss their origins as a grassroots art and media collective, their expansion into a very broad array of mutual aid work including police patrols or "night shifts" and disaster relief work, and how the Hood Squad reinvests into their community with farming and training for self-sufficiency, self-awareness, and communal responsibility.

Follow Tha Hood Squad on Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube. And support their work at thahoodsquad.com

Episode credits:

• Host, producer, and editor: Robert Raymond
• Presenter and exectuvie producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Today on the show, we've brought on Douglas Rushkoff to talk about his new book, Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires.

Douglas is Professor of Media Theory and Digital Economics at Queens/CUNY and a research fellow at the Institute for the Future. Named one of the world's ten most influential intellectuals by MIT, he hosts the Team Human podcast and has written many award-winning books including: Team Human, based on his podcast, as well as the bestsellers Present Shock, Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus, Program or Be Programmed, Life Inc, and Media Virus.

He coined such concepts as "viral media," "screenagers," and "social currency," and has been a leading voice for applying digital media toward social and economic justice.

In this interview we explore the strange, dark expressions of AI futurism and tech utopianism growing within the billionaire class. Island bunkers, missions to mars, the Metaverse and the impulse to escape in the face of looming climate and social collapse. These are the fantasies of the rich and powerful, but there is an alternative path for humanity, one anchored in mutual aid, disaster collectivism, and human interdependence. We'll explore all of this and more in this episode.

Episode credits:

• Host and exectutive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Presenter and editor: Robert Raymond
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

How do we respond to natural disasters? What comes to mind? Large relief organizations like the American Red Cross? Or perhaps the Federal Emergency and Management Agency? Well, those images are certainly part of the story — but they're not the whole story. In our new podcast series, The Response, we aim to share a perspective that isn't extensively covered in the mainstream media. Specifically, we ask the question: how do communities come together in the aftermath of disasters — often in the face of inadequate official response — to take care of each other?

In the first-ever episode of The Response, we began to answer that question by taking a deep dive into the Rockaways Peninsula in New York City, to explore how, in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, a grassroots network of activists and volunteers emerged to coordinate one of the most effective relief efforts in the city. The group became known as Occupy Sandy, and in this episode, we tell their story, focusing on the personal narratives of three New Yorkers who were thrown into this spontaneous relief effort. We'll explore how, in the midst of the unfolding catastrophe, unlikely friendships were formed, deep bonds were cultivated, and a perhaps dormant side of New York City was awakened — one based on collectivity, mutual aid, and solidarity.

Episode Credits:

• Producer, writer, audio engineer: Robert Raymond
• Executive producer and host: Tom Llewellyn
• Field producers: Paige Ruane and Jack McDonald

Music by:

• Chris Zabriskie
• Pele
• Lanterns

Today on the show, we've brought on Genean from Common Humanity Collective — a mutual aid organization based out of California's Bay Area.

When the pandemic began in 2020, it felt like there was a huge spike in mutual aid efforts — in fact we did an entire series of episodes on many of the community-led responses to COVID that year including an audio documentary that highlighted the work done by a local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, or DSA, in Chico, California.

But where are things now? What have mutual aid organizations, and the left more broadly, learned from the last couple of years? How do we continue to make sure that the mutual in mutual aid remains a central pillar of our efforts? And how can we politicize our work within the communities we're engaging with?

We explore these pressing questions in this week's interview — along with a lot other stuff on mutual aid and ways to plug in.

Episode credits:

• Host and editor: Robert Raymond
• Presenter and executive producer: Tom Llewellyn
• Theme Music: "Meet you on the other side" by Cultivate Beats

Additional Resources:

Check out Common Humanity Collective and get more information on their air purifier build coming up on December 17th and their mask build on January 22nd on their website. And make sure to follow them on Twitter, Instagram, and on Mastadon.

Make sure to follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.