What Would God Say? A Comedy Date with David Javerbaum and Michael Krasny

How would God spin 21st-century problems? Emmy award-winning comedy writer David  Javerbaum, former head writer and executive producer of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, has a few ideas! Javerbaum serves as “God’s ghost writer” in his new book, The Book of Pslams: 97 Divine Diatribes on Humanity’s Total Failure and is a veteran of other “God collaborations”—the Broadway show An Act of God and the popular twitter account @TheTweetofGod. He is in conversation with Michael Krasny, an award-winning journalist and retired public radio host of KQED Forum and the author of Let There Be Laughter: A Treasury of Great Jewish Humor and What It All Means. Come prepared to laugh your heart out!

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The Politics of Being Gay with Congressman Barney Frank, Eric Orner and Ann F. Lewis

Barney Frank was the first member of Congress to voluntarily acknowledge being gay in 1987. Frank will join his former congressional aide, Eric Orner, author of the new graphic novel Smahtguy: The Life and Times of Barney Frank, in conversation about his lifelong crusade for civil rights and his 30+ years in the U.S. House of Representatives. With Ann F. Lewis, a champion for women’s rights, a former White House Director of Communications, and the congressman’s sister.

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How Social Media has Spread and Normalized Conspiracy Theories with Ambassador Karen Kornbluh, Sarah Posner and Jessica Reaves

Who can forget the white supremacists who marched through the streets of Charlottesville, VA chanting “Jews will not replace us!”? Or the Buffalo supermarket shooting suspect, who cited the “great replacement” conspiracy theory in his manifesto, among other antisemitic and racist memes. Ambassador Karen Kornbluh, senior fellow and director of the Digital Innovation and Democracy Initiative at the German Marshall Fund and Jessica Reaves, director of Content and Editorial Strategy for the ADL Center on Extremism, will be in conversation with journalist Sarah Posner, author of UNHOLY: Why White Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Donald Trump, to discuss how social media has spread and normalized this dangerous theory. This program is part of a Moment series on antisemitism supported by the Joyce and Irving Goldman Family Foundation.

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Nadine Epstein, Clarence Page, and Eric K. Ward to discuss Black and Jewish issues

The Black Jewish Relationship: Triumphs and Tensions with Eric K. Ward, Nadine Epstein and Clarence Page

Pulitzer Prize-winning Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page is a longtime observer of the Black and Jewish relationship in America. Nadine Epstein, Moment editor-in-chief and Eric K. Ward, executive director of Western States Center, host him for a wide-ranging conversation covering pivotal moments of that relationship, exploring the shared history, and triumphs and tensions. Topics include the civil rights partnership, Black Panthers, Norman Podhoretz’s 1963 essay “My Negro Problem-And Ours” essay, the rise of Louis Farrakhan and much more. *Please note special day.

This program is part of The Wide River Project, a joint initiative of Western States Center and Moment that takes a deep dive—and fresh look—into the art, history and issues that both unite and divide the Black and Jewish communities.

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