Think from KERA

Red flag laws, or “extreme risk protection orders,” make it easy for the government to confiscate guns from citizens if they pose a grave risk to society. It sounds logical, but do they actually work? Jacob Sullum of Reason magazine joins host Krys Boyd to talk about his view that a “great idea on paper” is simply a license to prevent gun ownership. His Reason article is headlined “States are Depriving Innocent People of Their Second Amendment Rights.”

Hip-hop is a genre primarily ruled by men. But just try turning on the radio for a few minutes without hearing a song by Cardi B or Nicki Minaj. Music journalist Kathy Iandoli joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the contributions of Queen Latifah, Salt-N-Pepa and other woman artists – and why the contributions of women in rap are so often overlooked. Her new book is called “God Save the Queens: The Essential History of Women in Hip-Hop.”

There are great gifts and there are great burdens – and in the new Amazon series “Undone,”the lead character must decide which one she has. Kate Purdy, co-creator, producer and writer of “Undone,” joins host Krys Boyd to talk about her drama, which uses Rotoscope animation to bridge the worlds of the living and the dead while working through themes of love, mental illness, family and ethnicity.

It’s been three years since British voters chose to leave the European Union, though negotiations on how that will work drag on. But you have to look much further back than the 2016 vote to understand how Brexit came to be. Fintan O’Toole, a writer for The Irish Times, The Guardian and The New York Review of Books, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the English worldview after the empire collapsed and why that’s key to the fractured policies of today. His new book is called “The Politics of Pain: Postwar England and the Rise of Nationalism.”

When we shell out hard-earned cash for something nice, it’s upsetting to discover it’s a fake. Sometimes, though, collectors who wind up with knockoffs come to prize them. Lydia Pyne, visiting researcher at the Institute for Historical Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the value of the right kind of fakes and which ones still take us for a ride. Her new book is called“Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff.”

Throughout the American West, you’ll often find main city thoroughfares named “Indian School Road.” But city maps don’t tell the story behind the name: trauma inflicted by the U.S. government on Native American children. Nick Estes, assistant professor in the Department of American Studies at the University of New Mexico and a member of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about how generations of tribes still grapple with this brutal legacy. His story “The U.S. Stole Generations of Indigenous Children to Open the West,” appeared recently in High Country News.

The Federal Reserve recently announced it is cutting interest rates by a quarter point*– *the third cut this year. Robert S. Kaplan, President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about how these decisions are made, how they affect everyday people and what the outlook is for the economy going forward.

Silicon Valley has tried to rethink the way we drive, where we work and how we accomplish life’s everyday tasks. Derek Thompson, contributing writer at The Atlantic, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about how long these companies can survive when profits seem to be elusive. His recent article is, “The Millennial Urban Lifestyle Is About to Get More Expensive.”

Teenagers are known for being moody, hormonal and awkward – characteristics that extends beyond humans. Dr. Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, visiting professor in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard and president of the International Society for Evolution, Medicine and Public Health, talks to host Krys Boyd about how all animals — humans included — transition into adulthood. Her new book, written with Kathryn Bowers, is called, “Wildhood: The Epic Journey from Adolescence to Adulthood in Humans and Other Animals.”

It wasn’t that long ago that being on television was the surest route to celebrity. Today, YouTube is king, and personalities are raking in fame, riches and followers. Richard Lawson of Vanity Fair joins host Krys Boyd to profile these internet celebs, who are devoted to digital clicks and the fickle tastes of their audiences. His article is headlined “The Often Perilous, Sometimes Lucrative, and Ever-Evolving Business of Being a YouTube Star in 2019.”