Recently, the annoying folks at Radiolab intended to investigate a phenomenon called "Yellow Rain", an apparently dangerous, mysterious precipitation observed in Vietnam and Laos circa 1981. At the time, the deadly rain attracted some media coverage while cold war tensions escalated between Russia and the US.
The producers and hosts apparently intended to limit the scope of the episode to the question, What was yellow rain? But during the show, the interview between a yellow rain witness, his translator/niece, and the Radiolab host and producer falls apart when the host pursues the witness about ambiguity in the testimony. After being pressed, the witness losses heart and, aided by his niece, implores the interviewers to focus on the death of their people in the proxy wars, and not the yellow rain.From the get go, Radiolab was oblivious to fact that the story they were investigating was situated in an ongoing struggle with deep political implications. It was only when the witnesses were crying and pleading for recognition of the tragedy within the story that the "story changed" for Radiolab. Host Jad Abumrad explains:
We were all really troubled by that interview. We talked about it for weeks, and we had arguments about it for weeks. What does it mean for the story? What does it mean for us personally?For the story, and for Radiolab: this is what concerns them. The vision of the show's hosts and producer got even more myopic in the end, somehow. Then the "conversation" ends with Radiolab essentially throwing up its hands at the controversy.
