Contextualizing Charlottesville with PRX and Radiotopia Podcasts

Contextualizing chaos and tragedy is key to understanding why it happened and avoiding it in the future. We’ve gathered a few episodes of PRX and Radiotopia podcasts to help listeners put into context the demonstration, counter-protests and violence in Charlottesville Aug. 11–12 that left one counter-protester, Heather Heyer, dead.
Reveal, “Hate on the March: White Nationalism in the Trump Era”
In the wake of the protests by neo-Nazis and white supremacists that turned deadly in Charlottesville, Virginia, President Donald Trump has come under fire for not immediately and clearly condemning American racists. It’s not the first time. Trump and those close to him have often played down the threat of violence committed by white supremacists across the country.
Through interviews with key Trump supporters and advisers, Reveal explores if we should have seen Charlottesville coming, and if we should expect more race-based clashes on the way.
Reveal, “A Frank Conversation with a White Nationalist”
Reveal host Al Letson spoke with Richard Spencer the day after the election. Like many people, Spencer was both thrilled and surprised that Donald Trump won — and he has a specific agenda. Spencer’s a white nationalist. He sees Trump’s election as the first solid steps toward a new, post-America, whites-only nation.
Love + Radio, “The Silver Dollar”
Music is Daryl Davis’ profession, but extreme racism is his obsession. As a black man in the United States, Davis has experienced more than a few incidences of racism, from boyhood in Greater Boston during the ’60s to present day. “How do you hate me if you don’t even know me?” he asks.
Davis joined a country band in the early ’80s and, while playing at a club called The Silver Dollar, he met a member of the Ku Klux Klan who was impressed with Davis’ piano playing. “I’ve never met a black man who can play piano like Jerry Lee Lewis,” the KKK member told Davis. Years later, Davis decided to write a book about the KKK, called Klan-Destine Relationships: A Black Man’s Odyssey in the Ku Klux Klan.
99% Invisible, “The Falling of the Lenins”
Ukraine’s current government, led by Petro Poroshenko, decided to make the removal of statues of Vladimir Lenin — the former communist leader who helped create the Soviet Union — into state policy. Ukraine’s parliament passed a package of bills called “decommunization laws.” Local authorities had a year to get rid of their Lenin statues. If their town or streets had communist names, those had to be changed, too. But it hasn’t been easy, logistically or politically, because removing these things erases history that is still important to some Ukrainians. Furthermore, communist symbols are very pervasive in the built environment — they can be found on buildings, bridges and other infrastructure.
Radio Diaries, “Strange Fruit”
British singer Rebecca Ferguson wanted to sing the song “Strange Fruit” at Donald Trump’s inauguration. This is the story behind the song: An eerie photograph, a famous song and the man who lived to tell the story. It’s about three murders and the community that allowed them to happen — and that helped to carry them out.
Reveal, “Richard Spencer’s Cotton Farms”
On this episode of Reveal, three stories of men are at the center of controversy. He’s been punched on the streets of Washington, D.C., and kicked out of a major conservative political gathering, and yet white nationalist Richard Spencer has left Montana to set up shop in the nation’s capital. What does he have to show for it?
Criminal, “39 Shots”
In 1979, a group of labor organizers protested outside a Ku Klux Klan screening of the 1915 white supremacist film, The Birth of a Nation. Nelson Johnson and Signe Waller-Foxworth remember shouting at armed Klansmen and burning a confederate flag, until eventually police forced the KKK inside and the standoff ended without violence. The labor organizers felt they’d won a small victory, and planned a much bigger anti-Klan demonstration in Greensboro, North Carolina. They advertised with the slogan: “Death to the Klan” and set the date for Nov. 3, 1979.
As protesters assembled, a caravan of nine cars appeared, and a man in a pickup truck yelled: “You asked for the Klan! Now you’ve got ’em!” Thirty-nine shots were fired in 88 seconds, and five protesters were killed. The city of Greensboro is still grappling with the complicated legacy of that day.
We Live Here, “Removing Confederate Monuments: Why Now and What’s Next?”
Earlier this spring, the nation was transfixed with the fight in New Orleans over the removal of its Confederate monuments. That spread to other cities — including in St. Louis, which just removed a Confederate memorial from its lauded and most famous public park. So what now? We Live Here swoops in, and with help from BackStory’s Nathan Connolly, tries to unearth some conclusions and next steps.
HowSound, “On Interviewing a Racist”
“Live like the truth is true, and go where love has not yet arrived.” Words Al Letson, of Reveal, lives by, especially when interviewing a racist. In this episode of HowSound, Letson, a black man, breaks down how he interviewed Richard Spencer, a self-identified white nationalist. “I didn’t feel like I needed to necessarily prep for him,” Letson says, “because life experience had already had me prepped.”
Love + Radio, “How to Argue”
Love + Radio revisits Daryl Davis and asks him: “How should we argue?” To people engaging with others on the opposite side of the ideological spectrum, Davis gives this piece of advice: “You don’t have to respect what they’re saying, but you need to respect their right to say it.” He recommends researching opposing viewpoints so you know what to expect and how to react, inviting conversation, not debate, and looking for commonalities, among many other nuggets of wisdom he gathered during his time researching his book on the KKK.
Reveal, “The Secret Trump Voter”
How did everyone miss the Donald Trump supporters who were hiding in plain sight? On this episode of Reveal, you’ll learn why they kept a low profile — until Election Day, that is — and hear what they have to say now that their candidate is headed for the White House. You’ll also meet an emerging leader of the alt-right movement who is packing his bags and leaving rural Montana for Washington, D.C., where he’ll advocate for a white supremacist agenda.
Us & Them, “A Confederate Reckoning”
Can we reconcile different versions of history? Two American foreign correspondents of color fly from Kenya to Louisiana to report on an unfinished civil war back home — to understand the legacy of the Confederacy, slavery and racism in the United States.
The Memory Palace, “Notes on a Plaque, Still Imagined”
This episode was originally released in August of 2015. It was re-released upon hearing that the city of New Orleans has begun the process of removing four monuments to the Confederacy and post-Civil War era, starting with an obelisk erected in 1891 honoring members of the Crescent City White League who suppressed the African American vote through violence and intimidation and who launched a failed military overthrow of the city’s elected government and integrated police force in 1874.
Radio Diaries, “Willie McGee and the Traveling Electric Chair”
In 1945, Willie McGee was accused of raping a white woman. The all-white jury took less than three minutes to find him guilty and McGee was sentenced to death. Over the next six years, the case went through three trials and sparked international protests and appeals. But in 1951, McGee was put to death in Mississippi’s traveling electric chair. His execution was broadcast live by a local radio station. Narrated by Bridgette McGee, this documentary follows a granddaughter’s search for the truth.
Reveal, from the Center for Investigative Reporting, also releases a weekly newsletter you can subscribe to that looks at hate crimes and racial violence in the United States, called “The Hate Report.”

