The Gatekeepers (Radio 4) | BBC sounds
Plot: Million Dollar Lover | BBC sounds
Heart and soul: Radical empathy and the devil (BBC World Service) | BBC sounds
Archive on 4: Barry Humphries: Gloriously Uncut (Radio 4) | BBC sounds
The Gatekeepers is another prestige Radio 4 series about the state of the internet we’re in. Hmm. Having just reviewed Jon Ronson’s Things fell apart and Marianna Spring’s why do you hate me, I was reluctant to listen to another. After a while these programs start to depress me. They are always incredibly researched, carefully written, scrupulously fair and very interesting, but they are also at heart about the same thing. A modern world where online differences are fueled and encouraged. Why? Because “involvement” means money. And those who get the money squirm out of responsibility when the virtual hatred has real consequences.
Anyway, I gave myself a pep talk and started The Gatekeepers. And I’m pretty glad I did. Presented and researched by Jamie Bartlett, from The missing crypto queen fame, the series begins on the familiar ground of January 6, 2021, when the US Capitol was attacked. We stand with the Twitter employees who end up suspending President Trump’s account because they are concerned that he is spreading falsehoods and, worse, inciting violence. “Who actually pushed the button [to suspend the account]?” asked Bartlett. “I’m not going to answer that question,” said Yoel Roth, head of trust and security at Twitter at the time. “It was not me.”
But why was Trump allowed to spew his online misinformation? Was Twitter right to let him? Was it right to stop him? Bartlett goes back to the Internet’s beginnings, ye olde World Wide Web, for insight. The initial atmosphere was liberal hippie, and Bartlett argues this was due to the influence of a book called The Whole Earth Catalogue, a straight-up underground guide to everything you ever wanted to know. The new online hippies wanted the web to be a virtual version of the book, a “global consciousness”. A few years later, a genius hippie-type Mark Zuckerberg finally advises on his Facebook startup, but then Zuckerberg moves on, to be mentored by Peter Thiel. Thiel believes that “competition is for losers”, that if you create a business, you must eliminate competitors and make it a monopoly. And Zuckerberg’s attitude is changing.
We’re only a few episodes in, but there were some intriguing sliding door moments, where if a different decision had been made, we wouldn’t have ended up where we are now. Many of these moments have been covered before – such as the demise of section 230 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which states that platform providers are distributors, rather than publishers, of whatever their users decide to say. (So, platforms are not responsible for hate speech.) Still, Bartlett is an excellent presenter and The Gatekeepers rolling, barely treading new ground. And so far I’m not feeling too down.
If you’re looking for something worth a little less, a little more Dirty Johnthen rush to Sue Mitchell’s Million dollar loverpart of BBC Sounds’ Intrigue beach. I missed this 10-parter when it came out a few months ago, but I’ve since been piling it up in two enormous binges. Mitchell tells the true story of a love affair between two of her neighbors in California (Mitchell is British but has an American partner with a house there). Carolyn and Dave are the couple. Carolyn is 80 years old, youthful for her age, a wealthy widow. Dave is 57, a homeless ex-junkie and jailbird who moves in with Carolyn just two weeks after doing her yard work. Alarm bells start ringing, at least for Carolyn’s daughters, and a terrible tug of war between them and Dave begins.
The USP of this show is Mitchell’s access, as well as her amazing ability to engage everyone without judgement. So we hear about Carolyn and Dave throughout their entanglement, as well as Carolyn’s daughters, and Dave’s daughter as well. It’s such a small, poignant story, one where you find yourself screaming at your audio player as you listen. Highly recommended.
Over on the World Service, yesterday’s Heart and soul: Radical empathy and the devil Meet forensic psychiatrist Gwen Adshead, who has a sweet, soft-spoken manner as she explains that she has always been interested in “what happens when people do bad things”. Adshead works with the UK’s most violent offenders, and has a particular interest in “women who have assaulted or abused their children in some way”.
She talks to Erwin James, the murderer turned journalist who died last month, explaining how she likes working with people like him, in a “space where people can talk about what they’ve done and think about it in a human way”. “Radical empathy” is how she describes her work, and it is rooted in her Christian faith. What a wonderful program: quietly moving and interestingly testing for the listener. You think to yourself: Can I really be in the moment with a murderer without feeling like I’m passing moral judgment?
Much lighter and brighter but just as lovely Barry Humphries: Gloriously Uncut on Archive on 4 Saturday night. Presented by Humphries A fan turned friend, Rob Brydon had many friends and fellow creatives. It was fun to be reminded of Sir Les Patterson, that terrible spitting, drunken roué, as well as the fabulous Dame Edna Everage.
The critic John Lahr, insightful as ever, tells of spending a long time on tour with Humphries when he played Dame Edna. Lahr has just suffered the worst loss: two of his children are dead. Everyone scoffed at the idea that Dame Edna could heal people. “It’s just a funny idea that this buffalo is a healer because she’s so mean,” Lahr says, “but I can just tell you that she did.” Laughter, and Edna, can heal almost anything.
Finally, what a shock to hear about Steve Wright‘s death. An absolute radio giant, obsessed with the medium and with that old fashioned job, DJ’ing. Its very special assumption zoo radio – cheerful crew, smart callbacks, cheerful listener interaction, excellent star interviews – became a gold standard and easily traveled with him from Radio 1 to Radio 2 in the 1990s because no one else could do it like him. Truly loved by colleagues and his listeners, he will be truly missed.
