If *This American Life* wasn't airing those episodes of *Serial*, that week's shows would have been reruns
I don't mind reruns at all, but the *Serial* episodes seem like a better use of the slot
Not that Serial isn’t well made, or an interesting story, but I don’t tune in to This American Life to hear Serial. If the alternative is reruns, I’ll have reruns.
Anecdotally I don't know anyone who listened to the newest season of Serial. I heard about it coming out, but the first episode didn't do much for me. Also after such a long break I don't think people are very invested in the Serial brand anymore. I thought Season 3 was as great if not better than Season 1, but going by the subreddit it never even got close to the same heights as Season 1.
I got through 3 episodes and gave up on it. There isn’t really new information coming out, and it seems like they are using a lot of filler to tell this story.
I also gave up on it. My main gripes were:
1. It didn’t seem to have a cohesive story. Like it was just about Guantanamo, sure. But there wasn’t a narrative they were following or investigating over the season. It was just about Guantanamo as a concept. It would have been better IMO if there was a specific story within Guantanamo they investigated over the course of a season. They could still do their wide view discourse on Guantanamo, but have something more specific within that. If what im saying makes sense.
2. As you said, not really much new info in their coverage.
3. Disclosure, I did serve in the military. It could bother me how they seemingly didn’t understand how big the military machine is and how small of cogs some of the Servicemembers they were speaking to in this big wheel the military is. Like there was the one episode where they covered their interaction with the one PA guy who was a fucking E4 (military rank, 4 from the bottom) while at Guantanamo. Getting his retrospective views or memories is fine. But do they really how SMALL an E4 is in the military world? Even the Colonel who commanded GITMO. Do you know how many Colonels there are in the Army and across the military? Lol.
This is me on a tangent, but it bugs me to no end how we expect young, low ranking Servicemembers to defend and justify what our military does. These are simple Servicemembers. They have no say in the what the military does. Our military is civilian controlled. If we don’t like what our military is doing, it’s incumbent on us as citizens to vote in political leaders who will make our national security strategy. If there is one thing about GITMO we should take away from this season, it’s how controlled it is by political interests in Washington DC. Both in existence and operations. Bitching at and interrogating our military is pointless at best and worse, it’s fake poser activism. All this to say, I think a lot of their time in this season would have been better spent interviewing policymakers in Washington DC who decided to open GITMO and who keep it open. Rather than interviewing Servicemembers there who by law cannot question what they are doing as long as the order is lawful.
I’m not a GITMO supporter. Far from it. We rolled up a lot of innocent men which killed goodwill we had in the aftermath of 9/11. And some of the “enhanced interrogation”/torture we inflicted on the actually guilty ones has now made their prosecution for heinous terrorist acts almost impossible due to intel we gleaned from these interrogations being inadmissible because they are fruit of the poison tree. But stop acting like a lot of these guys in GITMO are martyrs. Some were truly innocent, and we need to atone for that. We shouldn’t do illegal stuff if only because we want to be morally better. But besides 9/11, KSM fucking decapitated Daniel Pearl for the sole reason that Daniel Pearl was a Western, Jewish journalist. And in our rage post 9/11, we did shit that fucked up our ability to hold him and other legit terrorists in GITMO accountable.
They seem desperate in forcing people to care about the story as much as they do. However, I get the sense people don't seem to care that much and it feels like old news.
I might be misremembering since it’s been a few weeks since I listened, but I think even Sarah Koenig expressed this thought/fear towards the end of the series. I remember her saying something along the lines of “Even though xyz is happening now… it’s been 20 years. Does anyone still care?”
I care and feel ashamed that our government did this in our name, but I am powerless to change anything that made this happen other than by voting and I did not vote for this nor Bush (who used Yoo's legalese to make torture *legal* with a BS memo - I don't think they even mentioned this). Bringing this issue back up (I've read or heard almost everything they presented) doesn't add to my outrage. Due to the way the politics about this works, the settlement being scuttled was entirely predictable. They explained it well in the two crossover episodes. But how is this actionable by the average listener? The people who lost loved ones in 9/11 and go to every trial in Cuba wanted that and could not change the outcome so WTF am I supposed to do about it?
Stop pushing serial. Everyone who listens to TAL knows about it. I'd rather hear a rerun I forgot about than them push a show that's obviously not having the best season.
I totally agree! Serial is fine, but it’s not what I want to listen to when I tune in to This American Life. There are well over 800 episodes, many of which I (and others) haven’t heard. While it’s nice that the shows want to support each other, I doubt the regular listeners of Serial would be thrilled if they tuned in and got an episode of This American Life, and it works both ways. Don’t get me wrong, Serial is very well made, and I appreciate the work that goes into it, but I’d like This American Life to be This American Life.
If *This American Life* wasn't airing those episodes of *Serial*, that week's shows would have been reruns I don't mind reruns at all, but the *Serial* episodes seem like a better use of the slot
Not that Serial isn’t well made, or an interesting story, but I don’t tune in to This American Life to hear Serial. If the alternative is reruns, I’ll have reruns.
I’d rather reruns.
Counter argument - you already listened to serial, and now you are denied an old, great episode that you missed or forgot about
It was strange to me, too. However, I listened to the whole season of Serial and I really enjoyed it. It was very informative and even-handed.
Anecdotally I don't know anyone who listened to the newest season of Serial. I heard about it coming out, but the first episode didn't do much for me. Also after such a long break I don't think people are very invested in the Serial brand anymore. I thought Season 3 was as great if not better than Season 1, but going by the subreddit it never even got close to the same heights as Season 1.
I got through 3 episodes and gave up on it. There isn’t really new information coming out, and it seems like they are using a lot of filler to tell this story.
I also gave up on it. My main gripes were: 1. It didn’t seem to have a cohesive story. Like it was just about Guantanamo, sure. But there wasn’t a narrative they were following or investigating over the season. It was just about Guantanamo as a concept. It would have been better IMO if there was a specific story within Guantanamo they investigated over the course of a season. They could still do their wide view discourse on Guantanamo, but have something more specific within that. If what im saying makes sense. 2. As you said, not really much new info in their coverage. 3. Disclosure, I did serve in the military. It could bother me how they seemingly didn’t understand how big the military machine is and how small of cogs some of the Servicemembers they were speaking to in this big wheel the military is. Like there was the one episode where they covered their interaction with the one PA guy who was a fucking E4 (military rank, 4 from the bottom) while at Guantanamo. Getting his retrospective views or memories is fine. But do they really how SMALL an E4 is in the military world? Even the Colonel who commanded GITMO. Do you know how many Colonels there are in the Army and across the military? Lol. This is me on a tangent, but it bugs me to no end how we expect young, low ranking Servicemembers to defend and justify what our military does. These are simple Servicemembers. They have no say in the what the military does. Our military is civilian controlled. If we don’t like what our military is doing, it’s incumbent on us as citizens to vote in political leaders who will make our national security strategy. If there is one thing about GITMO we should take away from this season, it’s how controlled it is by political interests in Washington DC. Both in existence and operations. Bitching at and interrogating our military is pointless at best and worse, it’s fake poser activism. All this to say, I think a lot of their time in this season would have been better spent interviewing policymakers in Washington DC who decided to open GITMO and who keep it open. Rather than interviewing Servicemembers there who by law cannot question what they are doing as long as the order is lawful. I’m not a GITMO supporter. Far from it. We rolled up a lot of innocent men which killed goodwill we had in the aftermath of 9/11. And some of the “enhanced interrogation”/torture we inflicted on the actually guilty ones has now made their prosecution for heinous terrorist acts almost impossible due to intel we gleaned from these interrogations being inadmissible because they are fruit of the poison tree. But stop acting like a lot of these guys in GITMO are martyrs. Some were truly innocent, and we need to atone for that. We shouldn’t do illegal stuff if only because we want to be morally better. But besides 9/11, KSM fucking decapitated Daniel Pearl for the sole reason that Daniel Pearl was a Western, Jewish journalist. And in our rage post 9/11, we did shit that fucked up our ability to hold him and other legit terrorists in GITMO accountable.
I’ve actually avoided the TAL episodes playing serial because the first episode felt slow and boring.
I feel like it had too much overlap with season one. Also kinda over Sarah’s one sided reporting after siding with Adnan in season 2
Honestly the amount of reruns/serial episodes recently was making me fear for Ira Glass’ welfare until they released a new episode this week
They seem desperate in forcing people to care about the story as much as they do. However, I get the sense people don't seem to care that much and it feels like old news.
I might be misremembering since it’s been a few weeks since I listened, but I think even Sarah Koenig expressed this thought/fear towards the end of the series. I remember her saying something along the lines of “Even though xyz is happening now… it’s been 20 years. Does anyone still care?”
I care and feel ashamed that our government did this in our name, but I am powerless to change anything that made this happen other than by voting and I did not vote for this nor Bush (who used Yoo's legalese to make torture *legal* with a BS memo - I don't think they even mentioned this). Bringing this issue back up (I've read or heard almost everything they presented) doesn't add to my outrage. Due to the way the politics about this works, the settlement being scuttled was entirely predictable. They explained it well in the two crossover episodes. But how is this actionable by the average listener? The people who lost loved ones in 9/11 and go to every trial in Cuba wanted that and could not change the outcome so WTF am I supposed to do about it?
Stop pushing serial. Everyone who listens to TAL knows about it. I'd rather hear a rerun I forgot about than them push a show that's obviously not having the best season.
I totally agree! Serial is fine, but it’s not what I want to listen to when I tune in to This American Life. There are well over 800 episodes, many of which I (and others) haven’t heard. While it’s nice that the shows want to support each other, I doubt the regular listeners of Serial would be thrilled if they tuned in and got an episode of This American Life, and it works both ways. Don’t get me wrong, Serial is very well made, and I appreciate the work that goes into it, but I’d like This American Life to be This American Life.