Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good:Learn what works from leading social innovators, with host Spencer Critchley.
Spencer Critchley is the host of Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good. He is an award-winning writer, producer, and communications consultant with experience in broadcasting, film, digital media, public relations, advertising, and music. He is the managing partner of Boots Road Group, an advertising, public relations and digital media firm that serves purpose-driven organizations.
As a communication consultant, Spencer has worked for both of Barack Obama's presidential campaigns, former Congressman Sam Farr, the U.S. Department of Labor, the University of California at Berkeley, the Monterey Jazz Festival, and many others.
As a digital media producer, his clients have included David Bowie, Moby, Santana, Britney Spears, and others while he was with Thomas Dolby’s Beatnik Inc; the Silicon Graphics-Time Warner-ATT interactive TV system; Silicon Gaming; and the multiple award-winning Choosing Success multimedia program for CCC/Viacom, described by Wired magazine as "the most inspired piece of educational software ever created." He produced Boots Road Group's Davey, W3, and Videographer Award-winning video “Rancho Cielo: Transforming Lives” for Rancho Cielo Youth Campus.
As a journalist, Spencer reported stories for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, National Public Radio, the Associated Press, and others, winning awards for investigative reporting from Public Radio News Directors Inc. and the Associated Press. For CBC Radio, he was a correspondent and guest host for the national entertainment and popular culture show “Prime Time,” the host of the syndicated “Canada Rocks” record review, and a contributor to “The Entertainers” and other programs. He has written for the Huffington Post, O’Reilly Radar, Business Insider, the Stanford Social Innovation Review, and other publications, and is the host of the Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good podcast (dastardlycleverness.com).
As a composer and music producer, Spencer was signed to a songwriting and artist development contract with Warner-Chappell Music Publishing. He created music for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation including for the Peabody Award-winning CBC Radio drama “Paris from Wilde to Morrison” and the series shows "Prime Time," "Radio Banned," and "Metro Morning." He composed the score (with collaborator Marco D’Ambrosio) and produced the music, dialog, and sound design for the Emmy-winning PBS documentary "Blink.”
Spencer is an adjunct lecturer in Journalism for the Middlebury Institute of International Studies. He has been a guest speaker for Stanford University’s documentary film program; New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts; Art Center College of Design; California State University Monterey Bay; the American Constitution Society; MacWorld; Intel Developer World; the Game Developer's Conference (GDC); Interpret America; the New Teacher Center; the California Association of Public Information Officials; and the SXSW, Hot Springs, and Bermuda Film Festivals.
He has been interviewed or quoted by the Associated Press, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, CNN, Fox News, i24 (Israel/US), ITV (UK), Mix Magazine, MSNBC.com, National Public Radio, Reader’s Digest, Sky News (UK), and others.
Web: spencercritchley.com | Twitter: @scritchley | Facebook: spencer.critchley.page
Dastardly Cleverness In The Service Of Good is produced by:
Oct 11, 2022
In many ways, addiction has become a defining feature of life in America. More and more of us have become addicted to drugs like alcohol, heroin, cocaine, and opioids, and to other things increasingly recognized as addictive, like sugar, junk food, and social media.
The problem has been growing for decades, but in recent years it has exploded. A record for deaths by overdose was set in 2020, at a level six and a half times higher than just 10 years before. The 2020 record was smashed last year, with the overdose death rate still rising. Overdose is now the leading cause of death for Americans between the ages of 18 and 45.
Some of the toll is probably related to the COVID pandemic. But much of it is also caused by a seemingly infinite supply of incredibly addictive and dangerous synthetic drugs, especially meth and fentanyl. They can be obtained or made cheaply by almost anyone, and sold at an enormous profit. Often they’re mixed in with other illegal drugs, or with counterfeit versions of legal drugs. Now there are reports of fentanyl pills made to look like candy.
Spencer's guest this time is one of the leading experts on the addiction crisis, and one of its most powerful storytellers. Journalist Sam Quinones sounded the alarm on opiate addiction in 2015 in his multiple-award-winning book Dreamland. That book focused on the devastation visited on a small Ohio town from two sources: the aggressive marketing of a supposedly safe universal painkiller called Oxycontin and a flood of cheap, black tar heroin. Dreamland played a major role in exposing the scale and the origins of the opioid epidemic, and that helped produce consequences for many of those who promoted and profited from that epidemic.
Sam Quinones was well ahead of the crowd when he wrote Dreamland, and he still is. His latest book is called The Least of Us. In it, he describes how the addiction crisis has gotten even worse — and yet he also gives reasons for hope. Those reasons are found in the stories of ordinary people who reject the despair that addiction feeds on and amplifies. They’re replacing it with small acts of rebuilding and love, the mutual care that may be the only lasting cure for addiction.