After October 7th, Israeli Minister of Security Itamar Ben-Gvir increased restrictions on Palestinian prisoners in Israeli security prisons. Prisoners started dying.

From the ages of 12 to 27, our producer Elna Baker was supposed to confess to male clergy anytime she did anything sexual. It was so routine for her that she barely thought to talk about it.

There can be consequences for reading other people's mail.

Host Ira Glass tells the stories of two professors, each making a calculation that no one had made before. One gets acclaim.

Measles cases are higher in the U.S. than they've been in a decade, mostly because more and more nervous parents are refusing to vaccinate their kids. Contributing Editor Susan Burton tells the story of what happened recently in San Diego, when an unvaccinated 7-year-old boy returned home from a trip to Switzerland, bringing with him the measles.

We hear about how Brandi Byrd and many other offenders end up in Judge Williams' drug court. One reason drug courts were created was to save money by incarcerating fewer people.

Dr. David Kalenberger is the head of a fertility clinic in Oklahoma City.

Chana Joffe-Walt continues her story about the phenomenal rise in disability payments over the last 30 years, since President Bill Clinton signed legislation pledging to "end welfare as we know it." Turns out, two private sector groups have really contributed to the growing disability roles. One is a group of people you'd probably expect, the other is a shock.

There are about seventy thousand Americans living in mainland China today, according to the Chinese and US governments. A lot of the Americans in China only stay for a few years, but then there are others — American ex-pats who’ve lived in China for a decade or more with no foreseeable plans to come home.

During her sophomore year in high school, Nevaeh was targeted in a secret text message chain by a handful of her peers. She’d come to learn the text chat was a mock slave trade where her photo and photos of other Black classmates were uploaded, talked about as property, and bid on.

About a year ago, a John Hopkins University study in the British medical journal The Lancet estimated the number of civilian casualties in Iraq. It came up with a number—100,000 dead—that was higher than any other estimate, and was mostly ignored.

There are certain jobs where thinking about someone else’s life is just built into it. Aviva DeKornfeld has a theory that petsitting is a job like that.

Host Ira Glass visits Claremont Middle School in Oakland, CA — a school with two principals. Principals Reggie and Ronnie Richardson are also twins.

How two next-door neighbors start treating each other badly, and how, once they start, they become obsessed with each other. Paul Tough reports.

Paul Tough visits Catherine Chalmers. She raises small animals and insects in her apartment, feeds them to each other, and photographs them eating each other.

This American Life contributor Paul Tough visits Catherine Chalmers. She raises small animals and insects in her apartment, feeds them to each other, and photographs them eating each other.

Producer Emanuele Berry has a day at the mall unlike any other. (7 minutes)

Ira tromps around the woods some more with Noah Strycker, who explains, among other things, his problem with the movie Spencer.

Sarah Vowell puts her foot down. She says that contrary to all the wide-eyed voyeurs we've heard up until this point in the program, reading other people's mail is wrong, simply wrong.

About fifteen miles from Pearlington, Bay St. Louis and Waveland are other communities struggling to bring themselves back to life.

Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. already had one other man in his life who shared his name—his world famous father, the Jesse Jackson. But then right before his most recent primary race, an aide told him that he now had another Jesse Jackson to contend with.

A man finds himself sucked into an intense head-to-head running competition against a perfect rival – all for free burritos from Chipotle. (18 minutes)

Pete found a bag of maybe a hundred letters in a dumpster and found himself completely wrapped up in the lives of the two people in the letters.

Ira meets two sisters who got into a fight, and then learned a lesson in turning the other cheek. (8 minutes)