The Big Story

This is the story of a Jeopardy! contestant who made a white supremacist gesture on the program. Only he didn’t. But that didn’t stop thousands of people, including several dozen former Jeopardy! contestants from insisting that he had, and hunting ceaselessly for evidence to back up their assumptions. This is a story about what the internet is doing to all our minds. Every day. And what we can learn from watching it happen in real time. GUEST: Ben Smith, media columnist, New York Times We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

After nearly a century of moving Canadians between rural towns and big cities, Greyhound Canada announced last week it would end all Canadian routes. This is a move that could be devastating for hundreds of thousands of Canadians who lack access to a car and might be stranded without access to medical appointments, connection to family or dozens of other intercity transportation needs. But that’s only if nobody acts to replace what Greyhound offered with a better version. There are a number of possibilities that could remake the bus landscape in Canada. The question is if any level of government has the will to implement them. GUEST: Alexis Zhou, freelance journalist, transportation advocate We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

When people started presenting with symptoms, local doctors and scientists wondered if the mysterious neurological disorder might be Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease. But it wasn’t. It wasn’t anything else that we recognize, either. And the symptoms are a long list that run from inconvenient to painful to life-altering and deadly. We don’t know what’s causing it, haven’t been able to treat it and—because of the pandemic—haven’t been able to fully research the places where it may have come from. What we do know is that it’s awful. And in New Brunswick it’s becoming more common. GUEST: Amanda Coletta, The Washington Post We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Hope and optimism are the reasons we sign up for dating apps — even if we know we'll end up in the muck when we get there. We expect some bad dates and ghosting and all the rest, but the reality is that a small percentage of these dates do end in alleged sexual assaults. That's horrific, and often the police are involved. But when the user reports their assailant to the app they met on, what happens? Who handles that complaint and escalates it? Are they trained to help victims? What actions do they take? Is there an official process or are victims fending for themselves? And if the accused user isn't removed and it happens again—is the company that makes that app to blame? GUEST: Brian Edwards, Columbia Journalism Investigations We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

When Uber first arrived in Montreal, it wasn't legal—but that didn't stop it. And cabbies were angry, but little was being done at the government level, and police were rarely if ever enforcing the law. So one man decided to take the matter into his own hands, waging a war that, while ultimately unsuccessful, left his mark on a city and an industry as an outlaw hero. This is the story of the Taxi Sheriff. GUEST: Marcello Di Cintio, author, Driven: The Secret Lives of Taxi Drivers We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

A comprehensive, Canada-wide study found that Canada has some of the highest levels of radon in homes in the world. Roughly half the homes tested failed to meet WHO standards, and even by Canada's more lenient standards, one in five were above the threshold of what's considered safe. The prairie provinces scored worst in the country—but no region was immune. Long-term impacts of radon exposure can lead to lung cancer—in fact it's the second biggest cause of lung cancer behind smoking. So why don't more Canadians know of this danger? Which homes are most vulnerable to high levels of radon? How can you easily test for it, and what can you do if your home is unsafe? As one researcher says, "This is an avoidable public health crisis." To learn more about radon exposure visit evictradon.org. GUEST: Declan Keogh, Investigative Journalism Bureau (You can read the project by the IJB and the Toronto Star right here) We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

About 40 percent of the Amazon packages delivered to Canada come through Ontario's Peel Region. It manufactures almost everything. It's where trucks get loaded up and head out across the country, full of everything. And for months now, it's been on fire with Covid-19. Vulnerable workers in multigenerational homes, without sick days, bringing home the virus and infecting their families. Yet even when the vaccination push began in earnest, Peel was left behind. It wasn't until a massive piece of reporting a month ago connected the dots, that Canadians started to realize the tragedy that was unfolding. And that feature was in an independent publication, not a major Toronto paper. Why did so many, from politicians to journalists to the public forget about Peel? And now that help has arrived—what will it take to put out the fire for good? GUEST: Fatima Syed, reporter (You can read Fatima's feature in The Local) We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Thousands of small businesses used the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy to keep afloat and avoid laying off their staff. But they weren't the only type of business to qualify for and receive the CEWS. Among some of the companies that took government money are companies that bounced back after a bad month, companies who fared well during the pandemic and publicly-traded companies who were even able to payout dividends to shareholders in the same year they accessed this emergency funding. All these companies qualified, so they can't be blamed for taking the funds. Should the policy have been clearer? Should the amounts and recipients be public? What could have been done to make this program more targeted and efficient? GUEST: Patrick Brethour, Tax and Fiscal Policy Reporter, The Globe and Mail We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

It began with allegations of sexual misconduct, but it went beyond that into a bureaucratic tangle that left the alleged victim's parents without justice, the RCMP spending hundreds of thousands to keep a constable on leave and an embarrassing look into an organization that badly needs to fix its policies. What went wrong in the case of Const. Justin Harris? And how systemic are the problems in the RCMP discipline process? GUEST: Jane Gerster, investigative journalist We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Shopping! Parties! Beer! Reunions! As the United Kingdom moves into phase three of its reopening on Monday, even phase two seems far beyond what Canada can expect. But it's not. As our country struggles through what will hopefully be our last lockdown, it's worth hearing about what happens next from the places in the world that most closely resemble where we've been. This isn't a fever dream, it's just hard to believe right now. But it's happening. GUEST: Ebony-Renee Baker, Canadian journalist reporting from London, UK We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:Through email at hello@thebigstorypodcast.ca Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter