Radio Reversal - 4zzz

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Radio Reversal - 4zzz

Social Critique and Crass Language. Thursday mornings 9am - 10am, on 4zzz 102.1 fm. (www.4zzzfm.org.au/program/radio-reversal) It's fun!

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 ease the 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. Tune in on 102.1 fm, stream online from 4zzzfm.org.au, or listen to our podcasts:
http://radioreversal.podbean.com/

You can also listen to our more recent shows via 4zzz's on demand page:
http://ondemand.4zzzfm.org.au/radio-reversal

Email us! radio.reversal(at)gmail.com

18/06/2025

Good morning Zedheads! Tune into 102.1fm this morning from 9am - 10am as Anna is joined in the studio by super special guests - Caspian & Jayden from the Anti-Poverty Network of South East Queensland to talk about ***POVERTY***

We’re going to talk a bit about what poverty is, and why it exists (spoiler alert: the answer is colonial racial capitalism), as well as hearing from Caspian and Jayden about the upcoming People Against Poverty Summit, happening this weekend here in Magan-djin, so-called brisbane. They'll reflect a bit on why it’s so important for people across this continent (and indeed, globally) to build movements that can challenge both the CRIMINALISATION of poverty, and the social and political systems that allow so many people to struggle for the necessity while others are allowed to hoard wealth, resources, and power.

Towards the end of the show, we'll be catching up with long-time Aboriginal rights activist Adrian Burragubba to talk about a particularly urgent example of the state working to criminalise poverty - and the devastating consequences that come from it. Adrian is one of the organisers of a community meeting that's been called for Friday 20th June at 11am at Jagera Hall in West End in response to the state government's announcement that they are considering RE-CRIMINALISING public drunkenness. We'll talk to Adrian about why these announcements are so concerning, given the evidence that laws like these do nothing but punish and criminalise already-over-policed people, particularly Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and people sleeping rough.

As always - a huge show! We'd love to hear from you if you've got thoughts, questions, or song requests...bonus points if they're in some way thematically linked to today's topic!

Listen in live or catch up on demand at https://4zzz.org.au/program/radio-reversal

11/06/2025

Morning Zedthians, hope you are looking after yourselves during these intense times!

On today's show we play excerpts from Saturday's Magan-djin gathering in response to the tragic news that a young Walpiri man from the community of Yuendumu had been killed in an interaction with off-duty police officers in a supermarket in Mparntwe, Alice Springs. Kumanjayi White was a vulnerable young man who is mourned by his family and community. He died after being restrained by off-duty police officers in an interaction that is eerily similar to the murder of George Floyd five years ago. The police officers who restrained him have yet to be stood down by the NT Police, and no announcements have been made regarding an inquiry into his death.

All across the continent, communities have mobilised to demand that the institutions and individuals who are responsible for his death face accountability. Kumanjayi White’s family, include his Grandfather, the venerable Elder and activist Uncle Ned Hardgraves, have renewed their calls to disarm police across the Northern Territory. Almost four years ago, the Yuendumu community began the karrinjarla muwajarri campaign to demand a police ceasefire across the Northern Territory in response to the fatal shooting of Kumanjayi Walker by Constable Zachary Rolfe in 2019. They wrote:

"We do not want any more reports or inquiries that are not acted on. We already hold the answers and strategies we need. We do not want any more consultations with governments who do not listen to us.

"We demand our self determination, our rightful decision making authority, and our resources to be restored to us. This is a list of our demands. What we are calling for is karrinjarla muwajarri, a police ceasefire. Indefinitely."

Since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody in 1991, there have been nearly 600 deaths. This year alone, 11 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have died in custody. Not a single person has ever been held accountable. Right now, police are investigating themselves over Kumanjayi White’s death. The officers involved remain on duty — carrying on like it’s business as usual.

Families are reeling from trauma after trauma. Yuendumu is grieving the recent death of Kumanjayi White while still awaiting the findings from the coronial inquest into the death of Kumanjayi Walker. In today's episode we hear from Wanjiriburra and Birri Gubba activist and film-maker Sam Watson, Gungarri woman and academic Dr. Raylene Nixon — mother of Stevie-Lee Nixon McKellar who died in police custody in Toowoomba, and Wakka Wakka and South Sea Islander man Kevin Yow Yeh.

Tune in 9–10am on 102.1FM 4ZZZ, catch up on-demand at https://4zzz.org.au, and listen to our podcast episodes at https://radioreversal.substack.com

Photo by Studio 9001.

04/06/2025

Good morning Zed Universe! Tune in this morning from 9am - 10am for a HUGE show here on Radio Reversal, looking at some of the ways that people in our community are working against the forces that aim to normalise colonial and racial violence.

It's a heavy time for this conversation, and a crucial time. It's day 607 of the most recent wave of genocidal violence in occupied Palestine, and over 76 years since the Zionist occupation began with mass atrocities and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. It's also just a week after Kumanjayi White, a young Walpiri man who lived with complex disabilities, was killed after being restrained by off-duty cops in Mparrtwe, Alice Springs. Kumanjayi White’s death in police custody is the 597th Aboriginal death in custody since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody handed down its findings in the 1990s - many of which, as senator Lidia Thorpe has consistently pointed out in Parliament, are yet to be implemented.

In response to these horrors, communities around the world are gathering together, refusing to stay silent, and refusing to allow this violence to be normalised or legitimised by the state.

We’ll kick off this week by reflecting on a really interesting autonomous action organised in solidarity with Palestine over the weekend by workers and performers at the Wickham Hotel, who downed tools and refused to take shifts or perform their sets because the venue had been provided to the State Zionist Council of Queensland for a social event. We’re going to have a chat to Oriela & Bizzi two of the organisers and performers who supported their comrades to withdraw their labour on the night, as well as Lulu LeMan, one of the performers who stopped mid-performance on Friday evening as workers began crisis talks to plan the picket for Saturday night. Later in the show, we’ll also have a chat to Ari Russell from Unionists for Palestine, to put this action in the broader context of workers organising against the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Finally, towards the end of the show, we'll turn to the devastating news out of Mpartwe this week, as the community of Yuendumu is once again left grieving the death in police custody of a young Walpiri man, Kumanjayi White. Kumanjayi White was a vulnerable young man who is mourned by his family and community. He was killed in an interaction with NT police that is eerily similar to the one which led to the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis almost exactly five years earlier. To get across the community response to this devastating news, we catch up with Wanjiriburra and Birri Gubba activist and film-maker Sam Watson to talk about some of the demands made by Kumanjayi White’s family, and how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities around the country are mobilising in response to his death.

As always - we welcome your thoughts and reflections. You can text us on 0420 626 733 or call us in the studio on 3252 1555, or get in touch here!

28/05/2025

Good Thursday Zedalytes! Han in the studio this morning, with an especially wonderful discussion to share with you between Anna and the incredible Joyrah Sebasio. Joyrah is a Bamaga woman and one of six artists shortlisted for this year's black&write Writing Fellowship for her poetry collection "Letters to Live By." There has been significant controversy around this fellowship, as just hours before the $15K award was due to be presented to 2025 recipient Martu writer Ren Wyld the ceremony was cancelled and Wyld's win rescinded, after Qld's government intervened citing a deleted tweet by Wyld in support of Palestinian resistance. Anna and Joyrah speak about this, and the ongoing importance of First Nations-Palestinian solidarity.

Joyrah Sebasio is a Bamaga woman who loves writing in Kala Lagaw Ya with her cultural parents Ama Matilda Bani, Awa Brian Whap and Nanu Kuthayg Sani Tamwoy. Joyrah’s existence and Creation stories are woven into Kala Lagaw Ya from Panay & Maydh on Mabuyag and Badu in Zenadth Kes. Joyrah is a young poet led by the footsteps of other renowned poets, authors, songwriters and knowledge holders from from Injinoo in Cape York and Tamwoy Town on Waibene.

Tune in from 9–10am on 4ZZZ 102.1FM or catch us live or on-demand at https://4zzz.org.au

21/05/2025

Good morning Zedheads! Today on the show we are talking about the artificial crisis that is the Brisbane Olympics, and specifically the Planning (social impact and community benefit) and other legislation amendment bill (POLA) 2025 (qld) -
....but WAIT. I know that sounds incredibly dry, a convo about a piece of planning legislation, but that's just what they want you to think!

The POLA Bill is actually an outrageous in how it allows Olympics venues and infrastructure to proceed despite what 15 other pieces of planning and environmental legislation say, in how it "streamlines" the development assessment process into practical non-existence, how it creates jobs for buddies, how it runs roughshod over Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural heritage management processes, and removes pathways for appeals and injunctions.

To help us understand the POLA Bill, the implications of it, and the politics underlying it, we have a studio full of planning nerds - Nat, Edward, and Jonathan Sriranganathan. Tune in 9-10am on 4ZZZ for our legislative lament and administrative anger, and lots of new, local music!

Image is of the Save Victoria Park crew - make sure you're following them on socials and keeping up with their campaign!

07/05/2025

Tune in from 9am where we’ll be sharing some initial reflections after the federal election result.

Last Saturday, roughly 1 in 3 people voted Labor, 1 in 3 voted Liberal/National, and 1 in 3 voted for someone else.

Has anything changed?

With the centre-right-wing Labor party now dominant nationally, what lessons should we take from this election? Is running for elections still worth the time for those of seeking deeper radical change? Where should we all be putting our energy?

Listen live on 4ZZZ 102.1FM or online via the links in the comments.

30/04/2025

Happy May Day Zedrades! This morning, the people's historian Dr Jeff Rickertt joins Han in the studio to talk about the history of labour struggle in so-called queensland -- how the first unions were established, and some of the tensions and contradictions that these movements revealed in terms of race, gender, and colonialism. We'll talk a bit about the history of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander labour organising, and particularly the incredible history of Aboriginal labour strikes as a strategy for demanding the return of Aboriginal lands.

Later in the show, we’re going to focus a bit more on some of the recent histories of labour solidarity during periods of crisis: from the “green bans” and unions standing against gentrification and displacement; to the unions who took collective strike action to protest the tour of the all-white Springbox rugby team during apartheid in South Africa. We’ll wrap up by hearing a bit about the most recent examples of labour organising during the genocide in Gaza, and some of the ways that workers have attempted to leverage their collective power to refuse to be complicit in genocide.

There’s lots to dig into in this week’s show, and lots of questions about the power and possibility of workers movements in the present conjuncture - in a time where union membership is at all time lows, wages have stagnated further than many thought possible, and housing security is out of reach for all but the wealthiest of workers.

As we face down emboldened fascist movements, growing political repression and overt genocidal violence in Palestine and beyond, we’re looking back to think about the long history of workers organising on this continent, its tensions and contradictions, and what we ought to be doing collectively as workers in this moment.

Tune in now on 102.1FM 4ZZZ for the tail end of the show (9–10am), or else catch up on-demand at https://4zzz.org.au

Artworks by Sam Wallman ✊

23/04/2025

Morning Zedverse ! This morning Han's chatting with Prof Sandy O'Sullivan from the Centre for Global Indigenous Futures about the high court ruling in the UK as the latest attack on trans rights in the wave affecting trans folks in the US, UK, and here in the settler-colonial nation state of australia. Prof Sandy is a Wiradjuri trans/non-binary person and helps us unpack the colonial and white supremacist logics at play in anti-trans movements and the enforcement of the gender binary. Tune in now (9–10am) on 102.1FM 4ZZZ, or catch up on-demand at https://4zzz.org.au/

Image from AP: https://apnews.com/article/britain-trans-rights-protest-court-ruling-london-63efca6104673e6b8647a20a0705683f

16/04/2025

Zedheads! Tune in this morning from 9am and 10am as Anna is joined in the studio by super special guest, Katrina Graham! We're settling in for a huge Thursday chat about the longstanding relationship between pop culture, policing & state propaganda, continuing our series of shows looking at the politics of disaster. This week, we're turning our gaze to film, and thinking about how disasters and crises are represented in film, and how those representations serve to entrench normative ideas about policing, the military, the state, and capitalism! We're asking about what is missed in representations of disaster and crisis in mainstream film and tv, and what this means for our collective understanding of these moments!

Katrina Irawati Graham is a writer, director and dramaturg working in screen and theatre. She works in many genres including feminist horror, crime and drama. She is twice ADG nominated for her co-direction with Peter Andrikidis on STAN drama series Bali 2002. Her Indonesian ghost story, White Song, is part of Australia’s first all-female directed horror anthology, Dark Whispers (SBS) The feature film of that story, Raesita Grey, was recently selected into the Jogyakarta Asian Film Market. She has written two award winning crime web series and has been in writers’ rooms for ABC and SBS. She is currently in development with Mother Tongue, an antiracist midwifery TV drama series.

Katrina is also La Boite Theatre's current Resident Dramaturg. Katrina is in demand as a speaker and facilitator known for her strong work championing anti-racism, cultural safety, intersectional gender equity and justice in the screen industry. She co-founded a national gender equity organisation and served on the Women in Film and TV International board alongside women from 6 continents.

She is involved in local grassroots groups including Magandjin Solidarity Fund, Grassroots Action Network, Growing Forward, Magandjin Myanmar Solidarity and Balaangala. She celebrates her Indonesian – Australian heritage.

AND! If you didn't realise already, it's also April Atonement! A classic opportunity to re-subscribe to 4zzz, even if it's been years since you last subscribed. When you're looking back at your life from the nuclear wastelands, you won't regret the time you spent listening to 4zzz ;)

Tune in at 102.1fm live, listen back on demand, or head over to our substack to subscribe so you get access to the podcast edition of this week's show as soon as it drops! https://radioreversal.substack.com/

09/04/2025

Good morning Zedders! On today's show we are continuing our series on Disasters, Crisis, and Collective Futures - so far in the series we've looked at disaster capitalism (how capitalism both causes and profits from disasters), and crisis colonialism (how colonialism uses times of crisis to create or expand frontiers of exploitation, dispossession, and extraction, and how the colonial apparatus excels at managing crises in ways that can quash emerging solidarities and resistance). We've also talked about disaster communism, and how times of crisis and disasters can present ruptures through which we can glimpse, and experience, ways of living together otherwise - and what it might take to defend those ruptures from the colonial crisis managers who would like us to turn back towards the state, rather than towards each other.

To help us dig into these phenomena further, we are joined by the incredible Gudanji and Wakaja woman Rikki Dank, co-director of Gudanji for Country. In an interview recorded last week with Anna and Nat, Rikki spoke with us about the impact fracking has on lands and waters (in what you might know as the Beetaloo Basin, NT), and the way fracking contributes to and escalates the climate crisis alongside other environmental catastrophes. And she places this contemporary crisis in a much longer standing emergency of colonial extraction on Aboriginal land, and the systematic and violent dispossession of the Aboriginal People to enable that extraction.

Alongside this, Rikki also spoke about her family's long history of resistance to colonial dispossession and extraction, and the practices of care and solidarity and love and refusal and determination that have maintained this staunch resistance, and maintained people and kin.

This is a huge chat and we won't get to all of it on the live broadcast, but we'll be releasing the full interview on our podcast in the coming days. We're so grateful to Rikki for helping us better understand the nature of disasters, to position colonialism as a long-standing and ongoing disaster, a sometimes slow but constant violence, in which emergencies are common (just not evenly distributed). Emergencies are not exceptional. And crucially, Rikki demonstrates how Aboriginal People have steadfastly held open spaces of rupture and possibilities, maintaining and recreating ways to care for kin and Country and fight for futures on their land, that are vital and beautiful.

Tune in from 9-10am on 4ZZZ for this chat, along with lots of new and local music. And make sure you're following Gudanji for Country on socials, you can also sign up to their newsletter to stay in the loop on the brilliant work they do (link below).

02/04/2025

Good Thursday Zedicals ! This morning on the show (9–10am, 102.1FM 4ZZZ) we're talking to artist Katrine Mcleod and artist-social worker Salam Elmerebi, along with folk musicians Kath Mundy and Jay Turner, about this weekend's SEEING GAZA exhibition-fundraiser (Apr 4–6) at Vacant Assembly.

Seeing Gaza shares an artist’s journey bearing daily witness to the livestreamed Geno+side of the Palestinian people. Through paintings, sculptures and montage, Katrine’s work evokes deep humanity and challenges the viewer to question impunity and our own complicity.

The exhibition opens 5pm Friday 4 April, with a Welcome to Country from Aunty Dawn Daylight, followed by speeches from Salam Elmerebi, Remah Naji, and Rouba Rayan. It will be open 11am–4pm Sat 5 Apr, with a live music evening kicking off at 5pm, featuring Phil Monsour, Mundy-Turner, Sophie Nishizawa, and Pig City Sensored (entry by donation). The exhibition continues 11am–2pm Sun 6 Apr.

SEEING GAZA is a fundraiser for MATW Limbs Of Hope Project providing prosthetics to child amputees in Gaza. Find out more about the exhibition on the event pages: https://www.facebook.com/events/543335421596837/
https://www.vacantassembly.com/calendar/2025/3/seeinggaza

26/03/2025

What's up everyone!

From 9am today on 102.1FM we'll be talking about 'disaster capitalism,' 'disaster communism' and the relationship between these two dynamics in the specific conditions of settler colonialism. We’re thinking about this in a more functional sense - not so much in terms of a binary between the two, but rather, in trying to make sense of what is specific about the way that these dynamics operate in settler colonies.

Anna will be introducing a concept she's been working on over the past few years - the idea of 'crisis colonialism' and thinking through the ways that settler colonial states seemed to be well-equipped to use periods of crisis - economic depressions, world wars, ecological disasters - into fuel for settler nation-building projects.

Join us live on air on 102.1FM feom 9am to 10am, or listen online via the 4ZZZ website.

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