#343: Attention Podcast Super Fans. We’re So Back!

It can sometimes be difficult to remember the exact order of events when nearly a quarter of a century has passed. If there’s one thing that should be seared into our collective memories, it's that the Department of Homeland Security and everything it has done (yes, even their most recent collab with Diddy) comes as a direct response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security was founded in the years following America’s realization that its borders and intelligence operations were far more vulnerable than previously thought.

From then on, terrorists – both foreign and domestic – were enemy number one, and America needed a place to put the people deemed the enemy.

It’s not hard to view the start of the 21st century as the tipping point that ultimately shaped the world we live in today, and one aspect of this tilted world is the Guantánamo Bay detention camp.

That’s right – we get to try and make sense of what went down at Gitmo in the latest season of Serial.

There’s a good chance your perception of Guantánamo Bay, and everything that happened there, brings up images of casually recurring human rights violations and those egregious instances of torture that eventually found the headlines.

But Sarah Koenig and Dana Chivvis revisit it all with the people who were stationed and detained at Gitmo so we can actually round out our understanding of life at the world's most expensive and least transparent prison.

Like we’ve all come to expect, Serial reveals that there’s more to the story than what we’ve read in the headlines. Through interviews and accounts that can be difficult to take in at times, we’re asked to shake up our preconceptions about something that’s about as American as apple pie – a prison engulfed in questionable practices and the inhumane treatment of its detainees.

The familiar criminal justice feeling will take over as soon as you hear the soundtrack kick in.

Have a listen and share what you think 👇 below.

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