The Upfront Podcast
Nina Geraldine Mueller
Welcome to The Upfront Podcast, where you can listen to compelling in-depth, honest, and thought-provoking conversations with international guests from all walks of life.
The aim is to raise awareness and amplify the voices of change-makers, thinkers, experts, leaders, and community influencers, to discuss current events, share personal stories, answer uncomfortable questions, and have upfront discussions important to our lives and society because knowledge truly is power.
This podcast covers topics people typically do not discuss, including societal fragmentation, politics, relationships, mental health, religion, community, civil rights, and lifestyle.
This is an independently produced podcast, without any media network affiliations. Please subscribe and leave a review so that The Upfront Podcast can reach more people!
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Top 10 The Upfront Podcast Episodes
Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best The Upfront Podcast episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to The Upfront Podcast for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite The Upfront Podcast episode by adding your comments to the episode page.
Eitan Chitayat | Narrative & Counterpropaganda
The Upfront Podcast
05/16/24 • 79 min
Eitan Chitayat is a creative director, copywriter and brand-builder, and founder of the Natie Branding Agency in Tel Aviv. Eitan has been delivering branding campaigns for B2C and B2B clients for over 25 years. He has lived in Hong Kong, London, Tel Aviv, New York, and Boston, working with clients such as Google, Volkswagen, American Express, and Toyota, as well as Israeli companies like Amdocs, NICE, The Jewish Agency for Israel, and Taglit. In 2015, he created the viral video "I'm That Jew" which has been viewed over 15 million times on various platforms. He also gave a TED talk about why he created the piece. He's consistently been an advocate for Israel and the Jewish People, gaining a following on social media, but since October 7th he has dedicated all of his time to fighting Jew hatred and anti-semitism, focusing on building Jewish pride.
We are speaking about his advocacy work, how we as a minority need to get better at advocating for ourselves to change the current narrative, and how we should be talking to our Jewish kids about how to deal with what’s going on and how to explain this spreading hatred. Eitan and I are also talking about the value and importance of integrity, as we attempt to find a reason behind so much misinformation being spread about Israel, the war, and the Jewish people, with age-old blood libels resurfacing, holocaust inversion and relativization and other forms of antisemitism, as well as who is leading, driving and funding the pro-Hamas/anti-Jewish, supposedly pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
Eitan on Instagram
Natie Branding Agency
Website "I'm That Jew"
Website "She's That Woman"
Eitan's Podcast "I'm That"
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
End of Year 2022
The Upfront Podcast
12/16/22 • 1 min
Juliet Taylor | Destigmatizing Mental Health Issues
The Upfront Podcast
07/28/22 • 48 min
My guest on this episode is Juliet Taylor, who grew up in a Jewish modern orthodox family in London, England. Juliet moved to Israel 9 years ago and worked as the educational director for a school. In the midst of her daily life, a mental health crisis slowly crept in and altered her life. Juliet was able to change her perspective on life and focus on what she values most, which eventually brought her to express her feelings through art in her spoken poetry. She has just finished her master’s degree in early childhood education.
We are speaking on working towards eliminating the stigma of mental health issues, going through countless lockdowns and war by yourself, and what ultimately matters most.
Find Juliet and her spoken poetry on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/julietmariataylor/
Find helpful resources for mental health support at https://www.helpguide.org/find-help.htm
Global Mental Health Resources https://checkpointorg.com/global/
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Sam "Disabledreamer" | Gender Identity, Disability & Mental Health - Part 1
The Upfront Podcast
01/27/22 • 33 min
In this episode, my guest is Sam (they/them). Sam and their family moved to Israel from California when they were 11 years old and became an advocate for intersectional disability and mental health. Sam is a writer and is currently also studying. We are talking about gender identity, disability, mental health, and how Sam handles living with cerebral palsy.
Find Sam on Instagram and on their website.
Subscribe and listen to The Upfront Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook and on our website.
For support, please visit https://en.eran.org.il or call *3201 (in Israel).
For support in other countries, please visit https://www.helpguide.org/find-help.htm or look up your local mental health helplines.
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Matan Peretz | Comedian - Soldier - Activist
The Upfront Podcast
02/08/24 • 51 min
My guest today is Matan Peretz, who makes a living as a comedian in Israel, and as an Israeli citizen he also serves in the IDF, the Israel Defense Forces, when called up for reserve duty. Matan has been using his platform to advocate for Israel, and against terrorism and will be sharing some important points of his activism and the social media information war. Based on his own experience, Matan will tell us about what life is like in Judea and Samaria, otherwise referred to as “settlements” in the West Bank, and how they have had to experience similar violence to what Hamas perpetrated on October 7th, 2023, long before any antisemites on social media caught wind of it that are now calling for the eradication of the entire Jewish people.
Matan graciously took time out of his busy schedule between serving in defense of our country and performing comedy to talk about various points in this war between Israel and Hamas. We are touching on the United Nations' countless antisemitic resolutions, history revisionism running rampant online on social media platforms, and how Israel is held to a different standard than any other sovereign country ever that has come under attack by terrorists. Matan and I are also discussing gun ownership in Israel in comparison to the United States, and why there are no school shootings in Israel. We are also talking about how far indoctrination of hate and brainwashing can go, or whether evil could be a basic human trait that just needs to be activated, whether there is a difference between the motivation of the Nazis and the Islamic terrorists of Hamas, and what the aftermath of this war could look like.
Find Matan Peretz online
For his comedy shows https://matanperetz.co.il/
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/matanperetz___/
TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@matanperetz
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@matanperetzstandup
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/matan.peretz.73
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Yirmiyahu "That_Semite" | Intersectional Jewish Advocacy
The Upfront Podcast
03/14/24 • 55 min
My guest today is the eloquent Yirmiyahu Danzig, known as @that_semite on social media. Yirmiyahu is an educator and activist for Jewish and indigenous rights. He holds a degree in Political Science, Homeland Security, and Public Diplomacy. Yirmiyahu will tell us how his own family background led to him inherently feeling and thinking more intersectional and realizing that there is a need for social justice and education overall.
Today, we are talking about Jewish identity, values and visibility, our own personal feelings about the hate we are being subjected to as a people, the danger of antisemitism and anti-jewish caricatures and stereotypes festering and remaining unchecked, as well as about why and how antisemitism differentiates from other forms of xenophobia.
Yirmiyahu and I are addressing the identity crisis and dichotomy of Jewish people in the diaspora trying to fit in while attempting to reconcile with the increasingly apparent becoming feeling of never truly belonging, what the current situation is like for Jewish students, specifically on university campuses in the United States, and we’re also addressing even the short-term dangers of aligning ourselves with politically right wing ideologies due to a supposed solidarity with the Jewish people and Israel as an extension,.. Yirmiyahu is also speaking on how terminology is a determining factor of how a narrative is formed, the Jews returning to their ancestral homeland being the most successful project of Decolonization, and how the diverse society of Israel, including, Muslims, Arabs and Druze are feeling. Yirmiyahu also speaks directly to our listeners who are parents of Jewish kids about how to talk to them about who and what they are, and why we as Jews owe it to our people and our ancestors to speak up.
Find Yirmiyahu @That_Semite
on instagram https://www.instagram.com/that_semite
Unpacked on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/@UNPACKED
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Alejandro Salas | Corruption Unpacked
The Upfront Podcast
02/23/23 • 59 min
My guest today is Alejandro Salas, the head of global movement at the global anti-corruption organization Transparency International. Alejandro is originally from Mexico and has studied political science. He now lives in Berlin, Germany.
Alejandro will tell us about the dangers of corrupt politicians, what makes for an ethical society, and how impunity plays a crucial role. We are also talking about why giving government officials too much power can directly lead to the downfall of a democratic system and where we stand globally on whistleblower protection.
Transparency International Website https://www.transparency.org
For contacting and submitting tips https://www.transparency.org/en/contact
For donations https://transparency.givingpage.org
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Katharina Höftmann Ciobotaru | Learning To Believe
The Upfront Podcast
08/04/22 • 63 min
Today’s guest Katharina Höftmann was born in Rostock in East Germany. She studied Psychology and German-Jewish History at Humboldt University in Berlin while working as a journalist for various newspapers. Due to receiving a scholarship for Ben Gurion University in Israel, she first stayed in the land that would later become her home base of choice. Katharina converted to Judaism and later wrote about her experiences in the Holy Land in several books and is an accomplished writer and author living in Tel Aviv.
We are talking about her conversion process into Judaism, whether one can learn to believe in God, and how Katharina lost and found her identity whilst attempting to reconcile the Holocaust’s perpetrator-victim relationship for herself.
Find Katharina on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/gutenmorgentelaviv/
Katharina's latest book can be found here (English excerpt available) https://www.new-books-in-german.com/recommendations/alef/
More books by Katharina: https://www.amazon.de/Katharina
Send us your comments, remarks, questions, and opinions in writing or as an audio recording through one of these channels:
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/theupfrontpodcast/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/theupfrontpodcast
E-Mail [email protected]
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Tomer Yair Zemel | The Importance of Pride Month
The Upfront Podcast
07/14/22 • 42 min
Tomer Yair Zemel was born and raised in Jerusalem, Israel. He is a social activist for causes that he is most passionate about. Tomer works in the high-tech industry and has been living close to Tel Aviv in Israel for the past several years.
We are speaking about his coming out, what he would recommend for other people to focus on when coming out themselves, what pride month and the pride parade are really all about and what still needs to change to give everyone equal legal rights. Please join in on the conversation in the comments on our Instagram or Facebook page.
Tomer’s Social Media accounts
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/Tyzworks/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/tomer.y.zemel
For support, please reach out to your local helpline or at:
https://www.lgbt-helpline.ch/en/
https://lgbtqia.ucdavis.edu/support/hotlines
https://lgbt.foundation/helpline
LGBT Olim (for Israel) https://lgbtolim.org/lgbt-organizations/
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
Jolanda Spiess-Hegglin | Victim Blaming Rhetoric
The Upfront Podcast
02/16/23 • 47 min
My guest today is Jolanda Spiess Hegglin, a journalist and former Swiss politician. One harrowing night, everything changed for her. In the aftermath, her name was extensively used in Swiss tabloid media in attempts to ruin her reputation and to victim blame, while Jolanda was trying to come to terms with what had happened to her and to seek legal accountability. Now, Jolanda is an activist against gender-based violence and has founded an NGO called netzcourage. Jolanda still, to this day, is receiving misogynist hatred, harassment, and threats, while she is working on vindicating her name and taking sole ownership of her story.
We are talking about the personal story of one incredibly courageous woman who has taken on what feels like an entire nation’s victim blaming rhetoric. We will also talk about how everything that has happened to Jolanda has uncovered a dysfunctional justice system, law enforcement victim blaming and revictimization, and how evidentiary material was being disregarded. Jolanda and I will also discuss the impact of the #Metoo movement on Switzerland, the discrimination of minorities, and the dangerous rise of incels in Switzerland.
Donations to #Netzcourage https://netzcourage.ch/spenden/
Find out more about Jolanda on https://www.jolandaspiess.ch/
Instagram instagram.com/jolandaspiess
Facebook facebook.com/jolandaspiess
Twitter twitter.com/jolandaspiess
Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/jolandaspiess/
Mastodon https://mastodon.social/@[email protected]
Helpful Links
Netzpigcock.ch https://www.netzpigcock.ch/en/
Netzcourage on the web www.netzcourage.ch
Victim Help Hotlines (US) https://victimconnect.org/resources/national-hotlines/
Hotline & resource directories (international) https://ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html and https://www.rcne.com/links/sources-of-help-for-survivors/
Join the conversation and leave us your comments, remarks, and opinions on our Instagram or Facebook. Please subscribe and leave a review, which helps the podcast reach even more people.
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FAQ
How many episodes does The Upfront Podcast have?
The Upfront Podcast currently has 37 episodes available.
What topics does The Upfront Podcast cover?
The podcast is about Culture, Society & Culture, Society, Psychology, Equity, Geopolitics, Feminism, Knowledge, Podcasts, Civil Rights, Education, Awareness, Sustainability and Politics.
What is the most popular episode on The Upfront Podcast?
The episode title 'Alejandro Salas | Corruption Unpacked' is the most popular.
What is the average episode length on The Upfront Podcast?
The average episode length on The Upfront Podcast is 45 minutes.
How often are episodes of The Upfront Podcast released?
Episodes of The Upfront Podcast are typically released every 7 days, 1 hour.
When was the first episode of The Upfront Podcast?
The first episode of The Upfront Podcast was released on Dec 5, 2021.
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