The second season of Katie Thornton’s podcast, “The Divided Dial” recently aired on WNYC’s “On the Media” and NPR stations nationwide, digging into the history of shortwave radio propaganda and how it became a recruiting tool for militias and laid the groundwork for right-wing use of the internet and podcasts. The Fund supported the first season of the podcast, which received a Peabody Award, and also supported the second season. At a time when extreme anti-government sentiment has entered the mainstream, Thornton’s podcast traces the long history of these beliefs, and how early right-wing and anti-government voices utilized the unusual medium of shortwave radio to build a movement that has – decades later – become more normalized. The series ends with an examination of the privatization of the electromagnetic spectrum, and a little-known battle wherein Wall Street is trying to get the FCC to turn over access to the public airwaves for the purpose of private gain.
Grantee podcast digs into history of right-wing shortwave radio use that feeds current media landscape
