FFRF TV show guest raps about science and atheism – Freedom From Religion Foundation

Watch the preview here.

The lively guest on Freedom From Religion Foundation’s “Freethought Matters” TV show this Sunday has made an art of educating about science in the rap form.

Baba Brinkman is an atheist and New York-based rap artist. He’s best known for his series on evolution, human nature, medicine, religion, climate change and consciousness. An award-winning playwright, Brinkman has toured the world. He has performed live on “The Rachel Maddow Show” and has shared the stage with Stephen Hawking and Neil deGrasse Tyson. Brinkman has won the National Center for Science Education’s Friend of Darwin Award for popularizing evolutionary biology. With a master’s in English literature, he has also pioneered in lit-hop with rap adaptations of Beowulf, Gilgamesh and Canterbury Tales. The program previews some of his very clever rap videos.

“I call it peer-reviewed rap,” Brinkman explains his science compositions to “Freethought Matters” co-hosts Dan Barker and Annie Laurie Gaylor. “I pretty much don’t do a hip-hop project or a video or a show unless I have consulted with primary researchers and checked my lyrics by them because I don’t want to be out there just expressing my opinion as an artist. I can editorialize, but my goal as an artist is to really get some version of the scientific consensus and the big questions and the facts across. I think rap is a powerful vehicle for that.”

If you don’t live in the quarter-plus viewership of the nation where the show broadcasts on Sunday (see below), you can already catch the interview on FFRF’s YouTube channel. New shows go up every Thursday.

“Freethought Matters” airs in:

• Chicago, WPWR-CW (Ch. 50), Sundays at 9 a.m.
• Denver, KWGN-CW (Ch. 2), Sundays at 7 a.m.
• Houston, KIAH-CW (Ch. 39), Sundays at 11 a.m.
• Los Angeles, KCOP-MY (Ch. 13), Sundays at 8:30 a.m.
• Madison, Wis., WISC-TV (Ch. 3), Sundays at 11 p.m.
• Minneapolis, WFTC-29, Sundays at 7:30 a.m.
• New York City, WPIX-IND (Ch. 11), Sundays at 10 a.m.
• Phoenix, KASW-CW (Ch. 61, or 6 or 1006 for HD), Sundays at 8:30 a.m.
• Portland, Ore., KRCW-CW (Ch. 32), Sundays at 9 a.m. Comcast channel 703 for high def, or Channel 3.
• Sacramento, KQCA-MY (Ch. 58), Sundays at 8:30 a.m.
• San Francisco, KICU-IND (Ch. 36), Sundays at 10 a.m.
• Seattle, KONG-IND (Ch. 16 or Ch. 106 on Comcast). Sundays at 8 a.m.
• Washington, D.C., WDCW-CW (Ch. 50 or Ch. 23 or Ch. 3), Sundays at 8 a.m.

Upcoming guests include Professor Lerone Martin, author of a recent book on J. Edgar Hoover’s bigotry, and writer Christine Kenneally, who has a new book out on the horrors of Catholic orphanages. You can catch interviews from past seasons here, including recent ones with Gloria Steinem, Ron Reagan, “Daily Show” co-creator Lizz Winstead, author John Irving, actor John “Q” de Lancie and award-winning columnist Katha Pollitt. Past interviews include Julia Sweeney and Reps. Jared Huffman, Jamie Raskin, Hank Johnson and Eleanor Holmes Norton, among many other notable authors, activists, musicians, actors and freethinkers.

Please tune in to “Freethought Matters” . . . because freethought matters.

P.S. Please tune in or record according to the times given above regardless of what is listed in your TV guide (it may be listed simply as “paid programming” or even be misidentified). To set up an automatic weekly recording, try taping manually by time or channel. And spread the word to freethinking friends, family or colleagues about a TV show, finally, that is dedicated to providing programming for freethinkers — your antidote to religion on Sunday morning!