Public health officials have called the opiate epidemic the worst drug crisis in American history – with overdose deaths nearly tripling since 1999.  About 50 years ago, clinics starting treating opiate addiction with methadone, or controlled doses of an opiate to slowly wean patients off of their addiction. On today’s Unmute the Commute, we ride along with a methadone patient. Produced by Hans Anderson.

Unmute The Commute Methadone Ride

In today's episode, we talk to activists about missing and murdered indigenous women, girls and two spirit people and the reporters who are trying to shed light on this largely overlooked crisis. 

After years of failed law enforcement investigations and inconclusive data on indigenous women and girls, it was an unprecedented measure to label the systemic violence as a genocide in a country that has a reputation for being peaceful. The report states that up to 4,000 indigenous women and girls have been murdered in Canada in the last 50 years, but adds the caveat that the exact number may never be known.
 
Years of strained government and community relations, and mistreatment of Inuit, metis, aboriginal and indigenous Canadians on various fronts such as forced education, the foster care system, lack of essential resources, and now neglecting a genocide… equals frustration and tension. 

Yet, the US has just passed two bills that are meant to address violence against indigenous women and girls. So with federal governments in the US and Canada finally taking some initiative to address the genocide of indigenous women, what role do journalists play in reporting on this? This episode examines how coverage has been both positive and negative and what news organizations need to do in order to improve current depictions of indigenous people.

This is the last episode of The Knowhow Podcast's special five-part series: Reporting Injustice... A series where we look at some of the key stories in recent years that were turning points in how we saw some fundamental issues. We talk to the journalists who uncovered them about their struggle to bring these stories to public view. And we speak to experts who explain how these reports altered the way society perceived pressing matters of race, class and sexism. From Bill Cosby to Windrush, Grenfell to missing and murdered indigenous women, Reporting Injustice looks at the story behind the stories...

Reporting Injustice Episode 5: How journalists cover missing and murdered indigenous women and girls

91.3 KBCS is public radio providing Puget Sound with a diversity of music and information. Listeners tune in to hear an unparalleled mix of new and classic worldbeat, folk, and jazz, in addition to unique and vital news and analysis. Over 150 volunteer hosts, producers, and journalists deliver much of the music and news heard on the station. KBCS alumni can be heard on public radio stations throughout the region and reporting for National Public Radio. 

The roots of KBCS took hold in the early ‘70s. Perhaps inspired by the insurgent FM stations of the era, with their rebel disc jockeys spinning a wild mix of album sides and long prog rock tracks, a group of students set out to become broadcasters. Bellevue College was initially disinterested. While the events leading up to the student sit-in at the president’s office have been forgotten, the end result was that in February of ’73 KBCS went live, with a tiny 10 watt transmitter and equipment donated by KING-FM. 

Gradually, KBCS evolved from a student radio club into a professionally managed public media organization.  In 1990, transmitter power increased to 8,000 watts. In March of 2013 the station’s antenna moved from the Bellevue College campus to the top of Cougar Mountain, strengthening the station’s reach to the south and east. 

The Eastside’s only public radio station, 91.3 KBCS is heard throughout the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan region. The station continues to grow and adapt to the evolving needs of public radio listeners, and that ‘73 spirit of community and adventure is alive and well.

Unmute The Commute Methadone Ride

91.3 KBCS

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