Jessica Smucker is today's SOS guest, and she believes the best way to change the world is to channel our pain into connection. Jessica is one very captivating person, both musically and otherwise. She worked on movies, is a published poet & a social justice warrior, came into music through a rock band called The Sleeping World, and she knows all the two-letter words in Scrabble, so don't even think of challenging her.
Ep 25 Race, Pollution, and Justice w/ Brentin Mock, Dr. Natasha DeJarnett, Tyree Daye
First Air Date
After 10 years of reporting on race, culture, and civil rights, Brentin Mock embraced environmental issues as his new beat. That was in 2008.
My Rap Name is Alex
First Air Date
Alex Mead is My Rap Name Is Alex, and he makes world-healing rap/hip-hop music in Buffalo, NY. A year-round bicyclist in a snowy land, a member of Bloodthirsty Vegans, and a reformed computer programmer, Alex combines tech savy with peace-justice-environmental passions to create absorbing music & videos. Subscribe to his YouTube channel here.
Social Justice Schools
First Air Date
Joel Westheimer asks the deep questions and provides the important facts in What Kind of Citizen?: Educating Our Children for the Common Good. How should education in a democracy differ from that in other systems? What are the wider effects of standardized education? What kind of citizen do we want our schools to promote?
Uncovering Black Independence History (& More)
First Air Date
In Mumbet's Declaration of Independence, Gretchen Woelfle, brings to life the true story of Elizabeth Freeman (Mumbet), whose efforts & determination led slavery to be declared unconstitutional in Massachusetts in 1783. Gretchen writes books for youth on a variety of social justice & environmental topics.
Tom Goss' Song of the Soul
First Air Date
Tom Goss is a big-hearted singer/songwriter from Washington D.C. Motivated by his passion for social justice issues, Tom spent 6 months in seminary to become a Catholic priest before deciding it wasn't right for him. Tom writes and sings frequently of love and its rightness, regardless of laws. Tom and his partner will be married in October in D.C., one of the areas that provides for gay marriage.
Organizing Rockford - Stanley Campbell & Rockford Urban Ministries
First Air Date
Stanley Campbell has served Rockford Urban Ministries for almost 25 years, a voice for peace, justice and care for the disadvantaged of Illinois' second city. Stanley knows the ropes, having started as a John Birch conservative who volunteered to fight in Vietnam and having learned to question and reexamine what he's been told.
David Rovics' Song of the Soul
First Air Date
David Rovics is a singer/songwriter with a cause - actually many of them. His music takes him wherever there are listeners for his activist selection, with concern for peace, social justice and much, much more.