March 24, 2020

217 Taz Ahmed - Pod-Activist

Show Notes

00:15 – Harry discusses the timely topic of coronavirus and wishes everyone the best of health

02:30 – Harry thanks today’s sponsor, Focusrite 2i2

04:07 – Harry takes a moment to recap his conversation with James Cridland

04:38 – Harry welcomes to the podcast, Taz Ahmed

05:26 – Harry thanks the second sponsor of today’s podcast, FullCast

05:51 – Taz’s podcasting origin story and the inspiration to start her show, #GoodMuslimBadMuslim

14:15 – The visibility and public response to #GoodMuslimBadMuslim

17:42 – Taz’s educational background and her decision to become an activist

23:25 – The work Taz has done to enhance political consciousness among Asian-Americans and what has changed over the years

33:57 – Trends Taz has observed about the political engagement among younger generations

39:33 – What continues to drive and motivate Taz

41:07 – The decision to wrap up the podcast after five successful years and Taz’s plans for the future

52:49 – What is something that Taz has changed her mind about recently

53:23 – What is the most misunderstood thing about Taz

54:10 – Harry thanks Taz for joining the show and lets listeners know where they can follow her

56:38 – Harry thanks his sponsors once more

57:44 – Harry announces the retention hashtag for today’s episode

TWEETABLES

“I’m not a riffer. Zahra is the comedian. I’m a political activist/organizer. I don’t do well with riffing so I was the one that was like, ‘we need an agenda.’”

“My understanding of civic empowerment and civic engagement is really like, you can’t just say, ‘Go vote.’ You need to tie it to culture. You need to tie it to what’s happening in pop news. You need to tie it to narratives. And that’s really why I got involved in storytelling.”

“What I was trying to do was to shift people’s political consciousness to see themselves as political beings, not just as brown people.”

“The Internet is mean.”

“At this stage of my podcast listening, I love narrative. I love highly produced podcasts. I love fiction podcasts.”