KQED's Forum
Forum tells remarkable and true stories about who we are and where we live. In the first hour, Alexis Madrigal convenes the diverse voices of the Bay Area, before turning to Mina Kim for the second hour to chronicle and center Californians’ experience. In an increasingly divided world, Mina and Alexis host conversations that inform, challenge and unify listeners with big ideas and different viewpoints. Want to call/submit your comments during our live Forum program Mon-Fri, 9am-11am? We'd love to hear from you! Please dial 866.SF.FORUM or (866) 733-6786 or email forum@kqed.org, tweet, or post on Facebook.
Episodes
December 18, 2025 • 54 mins
Data centers are the server farms that power the internet. California has the third-most data centers of any state: over 320 sites, with more construction slated for next year. But energy experts are sounding alarms about their impacts on electric grids, water and climate; impacts that are worsening with the explosion of AI. We’ll talk about what data center growth means for the environment — and for ratepayers — and how lawmakers ...
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December 18, 2025 • 54 mins
The president calling female reporters “piggy”, “stupid” and “ugly.” Claims that liberal feminism has ruined the workplace. The manosphere. Despite the #MeToo movement, protests featuring pussy hats, and political and cultural efforts to call the patriarchy to account, misogyny feels like it’s going strong in 2025. But why? We gather a panel of thinkers and leaders to talk about how misogyny has become mainstream and what can be do...
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December 17, 2025 • 54 mins
From hotels to fast food restaurants, more companies are luring consumers to sign up for loyalty programs in exchange for points, discounts and other deals. But according to two former FTC officials, loyalty programs have devolved into “data-harvesting machines” that track what we buy and even how much we’re willing to pay. And the financial benefits tend to fall far short of the initial promise. We talk to Sam A.A. Levine and Step...
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December 17, 2025 • 54 mins
In recent contract negotiations, Kaiser Permanente therapists asked for language to specify that artificial intelligence would not “replace” humans in mental health care, but the employer has so far refused. Kaiser already uses AI technology in mental health care to take notes and create summaries, but Kaiser therapists worry further use of the technology could usurp their jobs. We talk about the ways AI may be entering our mental ...
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December 16, 2025 • 54 mins
From Hollywood to Rockefeller Plaza, news of a potential sale of Warner Bros Discovery has sent shockwaves through the film industry. And the current bidding war between streaming giant Netflix and film studio Paramount has all the hallmarks of an HBO prestige drama – from antitrust lawsuits to a hostile takeover bid – with implications for all of American media. We unpack it all with NPR’s critic-at-large and a legal expert. What ...
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December 16, 2025 • 54 mins
2025 was supposed to be crypto’s year. President Trump began his term by announcing a strategic Bitcoin reserve and promised to back the market for the currencies. But Bitcoin is down nearly 30% from its all time high and crypto companies and investors have been hammered in the market. All this while Trump’s crypto czar, David Sacks, operates under accusations of conflicts of interest, and the Trump family continues to enrich itsel...
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December 15, 2025 • 54 mins
Suicide is a leading cause of death in the U.S. for kids aged 10 to 18. And autistic youth are more likely to think about and die from suicide, and at earlier ages, than their neurotypical peers. Conventional mental health interventions are not designed to address the needs of autistic people — and can even worsen their distress, especially among those with elevated cognitive language and daily living abilities. But promising new m...
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December 15, 2025 • 52 mins
There have been more than 150 small earthquakes in San Ramon in the past month. In one rattling day alone there were at least 19 of magnitude 2.0 or higher. Do all these little earthquakes mean the big one is coming soon? Or maybe that the big one is not coming soon? Seismologists say it means neither. But we’re bringing together earthquake scientists to answer all your questions and tell us the latest in the science of quakes.
...
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December 12, 2025 • 54 mins
Diane Keaton. Jane Goodall. Belva Davis. Ozzy Osbourne. Brian Wilson. Sly Stone. David Lynch. We lost cultural luminaries, larger-than-life personalities and loved ones in 2025. We’ll celebrate their legacies and hear how they changed lives and communities for the better. And we want to hear from you: Who did you mourn this year — and what did they give you?
Guests:
Chloe Veltman, correspondent, NPR's Culture Desk
Meaghan Mitche...
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December 12, 2025 • 54 mins
We’ll look back at KQED’s Best Bay Area Albums of 2025 with our music writers. This year’s list of favorites includes local musicians putting out original hip-hop, punk, salsa, spiritual jazz and rock. We’ll hear live in studio performances from musicians that made the list – Oakland hip-hop artist Jamel Griot and instrumental band Arts and Crafts – and we’ll talk about the local musicians topping your playlists.
Guests:
Nastia ...
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December 11, 2025 • 54 mins
The White House says it’s submitting plans this month for its 90,000 square-foot gold-studded ballroom which will be bigger than the White House while Democrats call for inquiries into the funding of the project. Meanwhile, the Oval Office gleams with gold adornments, and an executive order decrees classical architecture for all federal buildings. Design historians say Trump is reshaping America’s visual identity in his own image, ...
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December 11, 2025 • 54 mins
The killing of Alberto Rangel, a 51-year-old social worker at San Francisco General Hospital, has left colleagues grieving and questioning whether his death could have been prevented. Rangel was stabbed by a patient who authorities say had made multiple threats for weeks. Incidents of workplace violence in healthcare facilities have been on the rise for more than a decade nationwide, prompting hospitals and medical offices to adopt...
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December 10, 2025 • 54 mins
Lawmakers are demanding that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth release video of the September strike that killed two survivors of a U.S. attack on their boat in the Caribbean. That strike, which the Pentagon says targeted drug traffickers, has prompted war crime accusations. But since then, the U.S. has launched more than 20 strikes in the region, killing more than 80 people. We talk about the impact and legality of the attacks along ...
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December 10, 2025 • 54 mins
The National Institutes of Health have historically funded scientists to find cures for diseases and protect public health. NIH funding has led to the discovery of immune therapies for cancer, antiviral treatments and prevention of HIV, and ground-breaking research into memory loss and Alzheimer’s disease. After a year of funding cuts and freezes that have rocked the medical research field to its core, we catch up with leading rese...
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December 9, 2025 • 54 mins
Children as young as 12 can legally work on California’s farms, picking strawberries and pruning blueberry bushes along with a host of other physically demanding jobs. Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Robert J. Lopez spoke with 61 children who work in the fields of the Salinas, Santa Maria, San Joaquin and Pajaro valleys. They described unsafe and unsanitary conditions, extreme heat — and a fear of speaking up, because they can’t ...
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December 9, 2025 • 54 mins
In California, mobile homes make up to 6% of the state’s housing stock. With as many as 300,000 homes in 5,000 mobile home parks in the state, they play a critical role in providing affordable housing. But state laws and efforts by for-profit developers to buy up mobile home communities are putting this kind of housing at risk. We talk to experts about the challenges mobile home owners face.
Guests:
Bruce Stanton, general couns...
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December 8, 2025 • 54 mins
In groundbreaking experiments with mice, Boston University neuroscientist Steve Ramirez has succeeded in turning memories on and off, even implanting new ones. He says that someday we’ll be able to do the same in humans. But should we? We talk to Ramirez about the ethical dilemma and the personal experience that caused him to consider erasing his own memory. His new book is “How to Change a Memory: One Neuroscientist’s Quest to Alt...
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December 8, 2025 • 54 mins
On the bus and in the grocery store line, more and more people are keeping their AirPods in. While we work, while we walk, while we shower, even while we fall asleep — we listen. But what does constant listening do to our attention, our relationships, and the social fabric we all share? We talk about constant audio consumption and its cognitive and cultural costs.
Guests:
Jenny Odell, artist and critic, author of "How to Do Not...
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December 5, 2025 • 54 mins
When writer Patricia Lockwood fell ill with Covid in March 2020, she says she felt insane for months, experiencing “Brian fog” (not brain fog) and what she called “The Refrains,” where a single song lyric would play over and over in her mind. So she decided to make sense of it all by writing “a masterpiece about being confused.” We talk to Lockwood about what it was like to write while “insane” and edit while in full health, and h...
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December 5, 2025 • 54 mins
Giftflation is here. Prices for go-to gifts such as boxes of chocolates or the latest iPhone will be higher this year than last thanks to rising tariffs and inflation. And while consumers are anxious about the economy, they are still expected to break spending records by shelling out more than $1 trillion on holiday shopping. We’ll talk about your gift plans and hear tips from scouring craft fairs, to searching out meaningful finds...
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