Decoder Ring - Podcast Rankings and reviews

I’ve been a long time listener to this wonderfully researched, well crafted, beautifully written/ intriguing podcast. However, I’m usually a rater not a reviewer. The hovercraft episode pulled at every string of my heart. A (hilarious/adorable) father trying to please/make his son’s dreams come true sent me over the edge to review. LOVED IT, thank you to Willa for including, and PLEASE Evan, make more content with your kind, sweet father…without the take over if his leaf blower!

I’ve been listening to Decoder Ring for well over a year now and I always learn something new, even becoming interested in topics I never paid attention to in the past. However, the Stuffed Animal episode was the first one that actually made me cry. The connections drawn between stuffed animals and actual creatures moving toward extinction was simultaneously inspiring and heartbreaking. Beautiful work, Willa and team! Keep it going as you always do.

New listener here - and I won’t be back. 2 commercial breaks in less than 9 minutes. I get that this is a business but come on. That’s so aggressive, and obnoxious even broadcast TV is less aggressive with advertising than that. You don’t give your listeners a chance to even get on board with your story the way you have your show structured around excessive ads in the first 10 minutes.

Interesting show, but seems to directly avoid engaging with the heart of topics at times, probably to avoid accusations of being “political.” It comes off as a little milquetoast and centrist, when I really wish it was more like “You’re Wrong About”.

Case in point… how do you write an episode about HYSTERIA (literally comes from the word for uterus) without the episode being a serious discussion of misogyny, even in the episode description it does not mention that this term is gendered. Come on

Way too many jarring ads per episode. Ruins the flow of the podcast, which is a shame because the content is really interesting. I’d totally pay for ad-free, but holy cow TEN DOLLARS A MONTH (?!) is simply unaffordable for most folks. Imagine if we paid that much for each podcast we listened to, we’d only afford one show. And that’s just about the price of a whole streaming service!

The episode on “The Rules” is way conservative. I was shocked! The episode examines the real appeal of a book like this, which I appreciated—that is not wrong—but then did no thinking at *all* about the long-term cultural consequences of women radically changing their behavior to suit men’s whims—not to mention the implications of this way of thinking for (or even the *existence* of) non-binary or trans people! It also just seemed to assume the self-evident value of “getting married” (to someone, anyone). To top it off, it concludes with the idea that, yeah, following rigid patriarchal gender roles might disempower women and feed the oppressive institutions that harm all other groups besides cis men—but they just make things easy, you know? And that’s essentially okay. Like, what?! Do whatever you want in your own life, but to platform this viewpoint at this particular cultural moment, and to disseminate ideas with such reductive, short-sighted, and poorly outlined gender politics on the basis of “convenience”... it was just so disappointing. I really would suggest a major revision to this episode.