Radio Reversal is a show that subjects aspects of everyday life to historico-political, theoretical, cheeky, irreverent, high brow, low brow, eye brow, warm-hearted analysis. Our aim is to see the world more clearly, think about what we'd like it to become, and how we can make that happen. We think that discussing these sorts of ideas is one way to lessen the alienation that affects many of us trying to make sense of a world that so often makes no sense of us. We also play loads of awesome music (sometimes thematic!) with great enthusiasm for requests and an emphasis on supporting local artists. It's fun!
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This morning on Radio Reversal, Anna and Nat discuss the Brisbane 2032 Olympic Games, and why being a host city is, overwhelmingly, a bad thing for the city and a worse thing for a city's poorer and more marginalised inhabitants. We draw on John Rennie Short's idea of "event capture" to look at the ways hosting a mega-event redirects urban processes (further!) away from more just modes of planning and transformation, the ways mega-events drive further dispossession of First Nations Peoples and displace poorer residents, and the ways even fairly limited checks and balances around social and environmental protections, and transparency and accountability in the planning and governance system get dodged, or overriden. All in service of an event that will cost billions and that will not even break even. We want to dig into the extensive evidence-base for why hosting the Olympics is a bad idea for cities, and why our refusals of specific venues should be coupled with refusing the Olympics anywhere.