Think from KERA

The downside of meritocracies is that they encourage individuals to succeed without worrying too much about how they achieved their success — or the people they leave behind. Harvard government professor Michael J. Sandel joins host Krys Boyd to talk about how many of America’s problems can be traced to a lack of concern over what’s best for society. His new book is called “The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good?”

The conspiracy theory of QAnon asserts that horrific acts of mass child abuse are currently taking place throughout the country — a new iteration of moral panic that’s been around for decades. Journalist Jen Gerson joins host Krys Boyd to discuss how and why the daycare “satanic panic” of the 1990s set the stage for the bizarre child abuse stories seen today. Her article, published in Victoria, British Columbia’s Capital Daily, is “The Destructive Conspiracy Theory that Victoria Unleashed Upon the World.”

Academics and activists can opine on the ways the criminal justice system is racist; it’s a different story to live that reality from childhood. Brittany K. Barnett is an attorney who helped win executive clemency from President Obama for seven of her clients and an entrepreneur focused on social impact investing. She joins host Krys Boyd to talk about being the daughter of an incarcerated mother, her pro bono legal work and her resolve to challenge the status quo. Her memoir is “A Knock at Midnight: A Story of Hope, Justice, and Freedom.”

Minute-by-minute chaos unfolded the night in 2016 when five police officers were killed in downtown Dallas. Jamie Thompson is a contributing editor for D Magazine, an associate professor of journalism at the University of Dallas and a journalist who covered the shooting that night for the Washington Post. She joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the viewpoints of bystanders and key players to offer a 360-degree view of events. Her book is “Standoff: Race, Policing, and a Deadly Assault That Gripped a Nation.”

India’s formal caste system is well-known – and an argument can be made that it’s time America came to terms with its own rigid hierarchy. Isabel Wilkerson is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize, a National Humanities Medal and a National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, and she joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the categories Americans are born into that rank us and grade us through no action of our own. Her new book is “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents.”

Keeping a secret can feel like the hard part – but as it turns out, it’s specifically the power of that secret to detach us from others that actually wears us out. Michael L. Slepian, Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Associate Professor of Leadership and Ethics at Columbia Business School, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the things we choose to hide and if we should trust others with the secrets we share.

In 1961, the Dallas Citizens Council, made up of all white men, commissioned a video promoting inclusion and opportunity in Dallas. The goal: race issues here would not interfere with business. Bob Ray Sanders, a former reporter and editor with both the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and KERA, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the documentary “At the Crossroads … Again,” which looks back at four decades of North Texas race relations and how these stories are covered in the media. The film airs tonight at 10:30 on KERA-TV and kicks off the new season of “Frame of Mind,” a partnership between Art&Seek and Dallas VideoFest.

Before he took his shot, Leslie Odom, Jr., almost quit acting altogether. That of course was before the Tony Award and the Grammy Award for playing Aaron Burr in “Hamilton” and becoming a bestselling author of “Failing Up: How to Take Risks, Aim Higher, and Never Stop Learning.” He joins host Krys Boyd to talk about his extraordinary career – and his philosophy that mistakes lead to breakthroughs.

Melanoma is a dangerous skin cancer with clear warning signs — that is, if you have white skin. Dr. Jenna Lester is an assistant professor of dermatology at the University of California, San Francisco, where she is the founding director of the Skin of Color Program. She joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the gap between skin cancer statistics — survival rates of melanoma are only 65 percent for Black people versus 91 percent for whites — and what needs to happen within the medical community to improve.

To date, 2020 has seen one of the most active wildfire and hurricane seasons on record. People in the path of these disasters are running out of options and many are considering simply moving. Abrahm Lustgarten, senior environmental reporter with ProPublica, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about projections of global migration patterns modeled just 50 years from now and how they will upend our planet. His article, “How Climate Migration Will Reshape America” appears on ProPublica’s website and in The New York Times magazine.