Drilled

Latest Episodes:

How Think Tanks Paved the Way to Criminalize Climate Protest Sep 19, 2023

Show notes

Climate activists warn about the future—but for many communities, climate loss is already routine. Mo Isu from Inherited looks at the cycle of loss and rebuilding in the rural Niger Delta region of Nigeria as the country weathers extreme seasonal flooding. After meeting a flood survivor in his hometown of Lagos, Mo travels twelve hours to Lokoja—the town where Nigeria’s largest rivers converge—to explore how directly impacted flood survivors endure the region’s relentless cycle of damage and repair.

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Vietnam's Tax Evasion Charges Are Used to Jail Climate Activists Sep 11, 2023

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President Biden made his first trip to Vietnam as President this week, with the intention of "upgrading" diplomatic relations between the United States and Vietnam. Not on the agenda? Vietnam's move to use trumped-up tax evasion charges to suppress civil society groups, including five climate activists that have been imprisoned since 2021. Read The 88 Project's report on this practice.

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Australia’s State-by-State Crackdown on Climate Protest Sep 05, 2023

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Since Queensland passed the "Dangerous Attachment Devices" law in 2019 in response to anti-coal protests, Australian states have rapidly adopted similar measures targeting climate activism.

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The Corporate Push to Criminalize Speech Aug 29, 2023

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There's a lot of discourse happening about free speech in the context of "cancel culture", but precious little coverage of the global push to criminalize protest, particularly environmental and climate protest. We examine how extractive industries began agitating governments to crack down on protest, what tactics they use, and why they've been effective.

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Disha Ravi on Becoming the Face of "Radical" Protest in India Aug 29, 2023

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At just 22 years old, climate activist Disha Ravi—co-founder of Fridays for Future India—was arrested, flown across the country, and jailed for her activism. She joins us to explain the night the police showed up at her home, how it's still impacting her two years later, and why she refuses to let it stop her activism or force her out of India. An extended version of this interview will run in partnership with the Heated newsletter next week, as the G20 Summit gets underway in Delhi.

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How the Media Has Helped to Criminalize Climate Protest with Evlondo Cooper Aug 22, 2023

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Media Matters senior researcher Evlondo Cooper breaks down how the media has covered climate activism, shaping mainstream perception and helping the fossil fuel industry in its quest to criminalize climate protest.
Additional resources:
National news' scant coverage of climate protests largely overlooked the scientific urgency driving controversial climate actions

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Coming Soon: The Real Free Speech Threat Aug 15, 2023

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Around the world, environmental protesters are facing escalating repression—from harsh laws with life-altering prison sentences to fines to protesters arreseted near "critical infrastructure" to violent attacks. Corporations are suing protestors and NGOs, comparing protest to organized crime. Governments are growing increasingly comfortable branding environmental protestors as “domestic terrorists.”
The media is largely participating in the rhetorical “othering” of protestors, opting in most cases to focus on the disruption that protest causes rather than the change it seeks. In our new season, we take an an in-depth look at how climate protest has evolved in recent years, where this backlash is coming from, how it’s grown so quickly, and what it feels like to be someone who’s concerned enough about the future of humanity to join a protest, only to find themselves facing violence and legal ramifications.

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The Next Citizens United Will Be a Climate Case Aug 01, 2023

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In more than 30 climate cases making their way through United States courts today, oil companies are using an argument they've been laying the legal groundwork for since the 1970s: that since everything they've ever said about climate change was in the interest of shaping policy or blocking regulation, it's protected speech, even if it was misleading.
We explore how those cases are playing out and the likelihood that this new take on "corporate free speech" could make its way all the way to the Supreme Court.

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A Legal Strategy: How Mobil Oil Fought for Corporate Free Speech Jul 25, 2023

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Mobil Oil worried that its advertorial campaigns positioning Mobil as a personality in and of itself might be labeled "propaganda" by TV networks and deemed unfit to run. In response, Herb Schmertz, VP of Public Affairs for Mobil Oil, looked to the courts for protection. The "corporate free speech" movement moved through the courts, getting a big assist from tobacco lobbyist-turned-Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell and reshaped legal protections for corporations.

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The Panic: How Mobil Oil Changed Advertising Forever Jul 18, 2023

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In the 1970s, Mobil Oil invented the advertorial and was aggressively pursuing an entirely new type of marketing, branding the company as a person itself with a unique personality and opinions that demanded attention. When public backlash threatened to undermine their approach, they launched a campaign that would change the course of United States culture, policy, advertising, and history.

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