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Black dance creators on TikTok are sick of white influencers stealing their work without credit. Now, they have collectively refused to choreograph dance challenges for the app’s latest trendy hit, Megan Thee Stallion’s new song, “Thot Shit.” On today’s episode, Rachelle and Madison discuss the origins of this strike, the ineptitude of white dancers trying to create their own dances for the song, and how empty TikTok is without these Black creators. Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Derek John. Support ICYMI and listen to the show with zero ads. Sign up to become a Slate Plus member for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Part 2 of this episode of Hit Parade, Chris Molanphy continues his analysis of when singing became central to rap music. Rap has always been musical. But back in the day, rappers generally, well, rapped: talked in cadence over a beat. Fans judged MCs primarily by their rhymes and rhythms, not their melodies. Now? Rappers are mostly singers: MCs from Drake to DaBaby slip seamlessly in and out of melody. Some hits that appear on Billboard’s Rap charts feature literally no rapping. When did this change? Part 2 takes a close look at an integral pivot point in this progression: when Beyoncé changed the game by singing with triple-time flow like the baddest MC.   Podcast production by Asha Saluja. Hit Parade episodes are now split into two parts, released two weeks apart. For the full episode right now, sign up for Slate Plus and you'll also get The Bridge, our Trivia show and bonus deep dive. Click here for more info.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last week, the U.S. government released a new report that attempts to categorize 144 verified sightings of unidentified aerial phenomena, or UAP. They could only definitively explain one of them.  The new report signals a shift in the way we think about UAP. As technology has advanced and evidence of these encounters has increased, the question has become more urgent: What exactly is happening in our skies? Guest: Shane Harris, intelligence and national security reporter for the Washington Post Host Lizzie O’Leary   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Even as conservative critics call for her to be ousted from the Olympic squad, track and field athlete Gwen Berry won’t back down after protesting the American flag and national anthem during the Olympic trials. Amira Rose Davis joins the show to contextualize Berry in a long history of Black and female athlete activists. She also explains the personal risks these athletes take in peacefully protesting, even as institutions began paying lip service to the Black Lives Matter cause.  Guest: Dr. Amira Rose Davis, Assistant Professor of History and African American Studies at Penn State University and co-host of the feminist sports podcast, Burn it All Down Podcast production by Ahyiana Angel and Jasmine Ellis You can skip all the ads in A Word by joining Slate Plus. Sign up now at slate.com/awordplus for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dollar General is built on a business model that has its stores proliferating rapidly across the country. In response, a movement to control the growth has been picking up in the last few years. Can those who think the stores are causing more harm than help make their voices heard? Podcast production by Jess Miller and Cleo Levin. Listen to the Teamistry podcast. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week’s episode of The Waves, a conversation with Atlantic writer, Elizabeth Bruenig.  In the first half of the show, Elizabeth talks about her recent New York Times article, “I Became a Mother at 25, and I’m Not Sorry I Didn’t Wait” with Slate’s news director Susan Matthews. The two get into why pregnancy is both so personal and yet so public, how society and particularly the job market deals with that, and the randomness of deciding when the right time is. After the break, Susan and Elizabeth delve into the backlash the piece received from the left, and then the backlash that backlash received from the right, and what we can take from that cycle. Elizabeth talks about whether she was trying to be provocative, and only being “happy stupid” on Twitter. In Slate Plus, the women each share a piece of their past that made them feminists. For Susan, it was taking all the classes for a gender studies degree … without getting the degree. And Elizabeth talks about reading Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale

On today’s episode, Rachelle and Madison are joined by Buzzfeed’s Scaachi Koul to discuss her recent piece, “Why Bo Burnham, Jenna Marbles, and Shane Dawson All Logged Off.” They talk about the cesspool that is YouTube fandom, how precisely Bo Burnham articulates the problems of constant internet consumption, and the three ways logging off may be possible: deleting your content, apologizing a lot, and getting a Netflix special. Plus, a short explanation of the online phrase touch some grass. Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Derek John. Support ICYMI and listen to the show with zero ads. Sign up to become a Slate Plus member for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Slate Money Goes to the Movies, a miniseries in which Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and a different guest each week discuss popular business-themed movies.  Shane Ferro, former economics journalist and current public defender, stops by to talk about how Magic Mike is a film about the gig economy and the precarity of freelance work in a post Great Recession world.  Email: slatemoney@slate.com Podcast production by Jessamine Molli. Twitter: @felixsalmon, @EmilyRPeck  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you love the show and want to support us, consider joining Slate Plus. With Slate Plus you can binge the whole season of Decoder Ring right now, plus ad free podcasts, bonus episodes, and much more. On this episode, we explore the misunderstood history of Muzak, formerly the world’s foremost producers of elevator music. Out of the technological innovations of World War I, Muzak emerged as one of the most significant musical institutions of the 20th century, only to become a punching bag as the 1960’s began to turn public perceptions of popular music on its head. By the 80’s and 90’s, Muzak was still the butt of jokes, and was trying to figure out a new direction as they happened to employ many players in Seattles burgeoning grunge scene. This is the story of how different ideas about pop music butted heads throughout the 20th century, including inside Muzak’s offices.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On Wednesday, Britney Spears spoke in court against her current conservatorship, which began in 2008. In recent years, fans have speculated that Spears was being controlled against her will by her father through this conservatorship, and started the #FreeBritney movement in an attempt to break her out of it. On today’s episode, Madison and Rachelle break down the history of Spears’ conservatorship, the conspiracy theories that arose around #FreeBritney, and what the pop star’s statement changes. Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Derek John. Support ICYMI and listen to the show with zero ads. Sign up to become a Slate Plus member for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When you’re running a business, distinguishing yourself is crucial. With almost every industry evolving faster than ever, competition is largely driven and determined by technology. In this episode, Kristen Meinzer is joined by two guests who create and capitalize on disruptive innovations to better serve their customers. First, she talks to Chieh Huang, a serial entrepreneur who has built successful businesses in two of today’s most competitive markets: mobile gaming and e-commerce. Later in the show, you’ll hear from Tracy Hutton. As the CEO of CENTURY 21 Scheetz in Indianapolis, she fosters a culture of going above and beyond for clients.   Guests Chieh Huang: CEO and a Co-founder of Boxed Tracy Hutton: CEO of CENTURY 21 Scheetz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For nearly two years, an unprecedented experiment has been taking place in the town of El Zonte in El Salvador. Funded by a mysterious donor, the town’s residents built a Bitcoin economy, using the cryptocurrency to purchase just about anything.  Now, El Slavador has passed a new law making it the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. Can they replicate El Zonte’s success at a national scale? Guest: Ezra Fieser, reporter at Bloomberg Host Lizzie O’Leary   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Groceries was one of the last industries to come under Big Tech’s influence, but everything changed when Amazon bought Whole Foods. Podcast production by Jess Miller and Cleo Levin. Listen to the Teamistry podcast. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Police violence and protests were the sounds of summer 2020, and Black musicians from across the spectrum lent their voices to the moment. In honor of Black Music Appreciation Month, entertainment and music reporter Jewel Wicker talks with Jason Johnson about the tradition of popular music mixing with protests --from The Staple Singers, to Beyoncé, to DaBaby-- and which songs will have staying power. Guest: Jewel Wicker, entertainment and music journalist Podcast production by Ahyiana Angel and Jasmine Ellis You can skip all the ads in A Word by joining Slate Plus. Sign up now at slate.com/awordplus for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s episode of The Waves considers whether there is a uniquely feminist way to divorce your skeevy rich husband. Slate executive producer of podcasts, Alicia Montgomery, and business journalist and co-host of Slate Money, Emily Peck, delve into the stories of two billionaire women who have both recently ended their marriages—Melinda French Gates and MacKenzie Scott.  The two discuss whether French Gates and Scott bear any responsibility for the sins of their ex-husbands companies. They talk about the extent to which each woman worked to rehabilitate their partner’s image during their marriage, including unpacking French Gates’ obsession with telling the story of how she convinced her husband to drive their daughter to school (some of the time, at least).  Alicia and Emily also talk about whether there’s an expectation, just because they are women, that Scott and French Gates use the billions of dollars their husbands have amassed to better the world. And finally, they talk about how Gen Xers were taug

What do Chloe Bailey, Nina Simone, and Vice President Kamala Harris have to do with one another? We’re here to help you figure that out. On today’s episode, Rachelle and Madison talk about how a cover of Simone’s “Feeling Good” turned into a story that ultimately felt anything but. But first, they examine Rachel Lindsay’s recent comments about the Bachelor franchise.  Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder, Derek John, and Jasmine Ellis. Support ICYMI and listen to the show with zero ads. Sign up to become a Slate Plus member for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Slate Money Goes to the Movies, a miniseries in which Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and a different guest each week discuss popular business-themed movies.  Joanne Lipman, author and journalist, joins to talk about the 2005 film Thank You For Smoking. They discuss the terrible trope of female reporters sleeping with their sources, The Marlboro Man, and “moral flexibility.”  Email: slatemoney@slate.com Podcast production by Jessamine Molli. Twitter: @felixsalmon, @EmilyRPeck  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

To say that hydration is an invention is only a slight exaggeration. Back in the 1970’s and ‘80s, no one carried bottled water with them, but by the ‘90s it was a genuine status object. How did bottled water transform itself from a small, European luxury item to the single largest beverage category in America? It took both technological innovation, but even more importantly it took savvy marketing from brands like Gatorade and Perrier to turn the concept of hydration, and dehydration into problem they could solve via their wares. Today, hydration has branched out from athletics to wellness to skincare, but the actual science behind all of it is pretty sketchy. If you love the show and want to support us, consider joining Slate Plus. With Slate Plus you can binge the whole season of Decoder Ring right now, plus ad free podcasts, bonus episodes, and much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From “woke bae” to “woke-a-cola,” the word woke has taken the internet and mainstream media by storm. But how many people who use the word actually know what it means? On today’s episode, Rachelle and Madison (but, really, mostly Rachelle) explain the decades-old origins of the word, and how its meaning has evolved as it’s gone from being sung as a call to “stay woke” by the likes of Erykah Badu and Childish Gambino to being wielded as a slur by the likes of Mike Huckabee. Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder, Derek John, and Jasmine Ellis. Support ICYMI and listen to the show with zero ads. Sign up to become a Slate Plus member for just $1 for your first month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Let’s be clear: Rap has always been musical. But back in the day, rappers generally, well, rapped: talked in cadence over a beat. Fans judged MCs primarily by their rhymes and rhythms, not their melodies. Now? Rappers are mostly singers: MCs from Drake to DaBaby slip seamlessly in and out of melody. Some hits that appear on Billboard’s Rap charts feature literally no rapping. When did this change? In this episode of Hit Parade, Chris Molanphy walks through the history of hip-hop—from Gil Scott-Heron to Lil Nas X—to trace the evolving role of melody in rap’s conquest of the charts. The broadening of rap to include more female MCs, from Queen Latifah to Lauryn Hill, had a lot to do with it. But all roads lead through rap-and-B’s power couple, Jay-Z and Beyoncé. The pivot point may have been when Queen Bey realized she could sing with triple-time flow like the baddest MC.   Podcast production by Asha Saluja. Hit Parade episodes are now split into two parts, released two weeks apart. For the full episode right n