With episode titles like “Indigenous Food Justice (And Fuck Thanks-Taking),” “Sex Work: In Honor of Labor Day” and “Gentrification is Not Inevitable,” Ricardo Gamboa‘s latest venture is like nothing else out in the pop culture ether. The Hoodoisie (pronounced like “bourgeoisie,” but hood) is a bi-weekly radically politicized news show that Gamboa describes ” as if Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show was hijacked by radical POCs, queer, and women and they brought along a deejay and a bar.” Just like Gamboa’s Brujos, The Hoodoisie is a great example of how to bridge radical academic thinking and grassroots organizing. Started on the day of the current President’s inauguration, the show often draws hundreds of people in person and plenty more via their live-streams.
Knowing they’d tapped into a palatable way to discuss timely issues, Gamboa and his team have been releasing 30-minute video compilations of their standard 2-hour livestreams. “The show has proven to be a critical platform for this political moment,” Gamboa told Remezcla, “and to help people from our communities navigate what’s happening.” In the run-up to the midterms, for example, The Hoodoisie convened an event to champion and debate with “the most radical and trustworthy Chicago politicians running for office.”
Currently, the show has seven episodes up and you can watch them all online. Enjoy one of them in full below, which kicks off with Gamboa’s own version of an opening monologue (“The Call”) where he explains what finally motivated him to cast a vote in this last midterms, the first time he’d voted since the second Bush election. “That was back when I had a six-pack, and told people I was straight!” he jokes, before laying out how, as a radical, voting can oftentimes feel like “manufacturing a form of consent for these institutions that are trying to kill us.” It only gets better from there.
Find more of that humor and political commentary below and in every other episode of The Hoodoisie, “the ONLY live Chicago news show focused on block-optic and radical perspectives!”
The Hoodoisie runs bi-weekly in Chicago