By Brooke Shelby Biggs Whether you think of her as a visionary or a kook, Marion Stokes was far ahead of her time in addressing a problem in American media that continues to this day: a lack of diversity among the gatekeepers of traditional media. When she confronted white male panelists on the Philadelphia local …
How Much Do You Know About Recycling? ♻️A Biodegradable Quiz
How much do you know about where our waste goes? From cigarette butts to banana peels to plastics, test your expertise on recycling and learn some possibly shocking stats. This quiz is in tandem with the PBS documentary Eating Up Easter, which explores how the island of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) is handling tourist waste …
Can You Tell the Difference Between a Space Object and a Documentary Still Image?
Take a time-out to space out with our visual quiz. See if you can guess if each image is from an Independent Lens documentary film, or from the far reaches of outer space.
Which “Tales of the City” Character Are You?
It’s been 41 years since Armistead Maupin’s first Tales of the City book was published, 26 years since the initial PBS series based on that book aired, and now with a new incarnation premiering on Netflix, we thought it would be fun to return to the core of the books and find out: what Tales character are you?
Delete or Ignore? Pretend You’re a Facebook Content Moderator
In 2018, after much debate and controversy, Facebook finally published its censorship policies. All 27 pages of them. The move, wrote the LA Times, “adds a new degree of transparency to a process that users, the public and advocates have criticized as arbitrary and opaque.” But as explored in the Independent Lens film The Cleaners, …
Take the Armistead Maupin and Tales of the City Pop Quiz!
How much do you know about Armistead Maupin and about his beloved Tales of the City series? Are you a Maupin superfan? Take this quiz we created for both for longtime fans and those who are newer to Maupin and Tales to enjoy. However you grade out, we think you’ll both enjoy it and learn something. Direct …
Meet the Patels on PBS Presents a Love Quiz!
Keeping with the “looking for love” theme of Meet the Patels, which makes its television debut on Independent Lens Monday, December 26, 2017 at 9 pm, we present you with a fun quiz that will tell you where you will most likely find true love! Even if you’re already “taken” we think you’ll still enjoy taking …
Quiz: Are You Buckley or Vidal?
In 1968, opposing intellectual forces William F. Buckley and Gore Vidal squared off in a series of nationally televised debates during one of our nation’s most turbulent election cycles. With a month to go before another historic and tumultuous election, find out which Best of Enemies pundit you’re most like. The result may surprise you. Either way, you’ll …
Gun Quiz: How Much Do You Know About Guns in America?
No matter what your stance is on gun ownership, you may be surprised to learn the real trends fueling the debate. We created this gun quiz to test your knowledge about America’s firearm history, laws, and use, as well as the increasing militarization of police. Just as some of these topics have no easy answers, this quiz, …
Take this Quiz on the War on Terror
Everything changed in the United States on September 11, 2001. While in the aftermath of those attacks much of the focus in what President George W. Bush called the “War on Terror” was on the Middle East, the efforts to thwart terrorism on American soil were obviously stepped up to a great degree. From the controversial USA PATRIOT …
Black Panthers and Black Lives Matter Quiz
It was 50 years ago that the Black Panther Party, originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, was formed in Oakland, California by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton. The Black Panther Party organized armed citizens’ patrols to monitor the behavior of local police and to challenge police brutality in Oakland. As detailed in Stanley Nelson’s film The Black …
1971 Pop Quiz
Test your knowledge about all the things that were happening in America in the year 1971, from politics to music, movies to sports. The more far out your score the more groovy you are, man.