People with no name and numbers: “The Other Latif” from radiolab

 

"If you were born in a different place under different circumstances, would you be the one holding the microphone, or the one behind bars?" asks The Other Latif, a podcast hosted by Radiolab and its former director of research, Latif Nasser. 

A casual American journalist who never came across anybody by his name—and even found no one with the name in the citizen directory—Latif Nasser was surprised to coincidentally meet another Latif Nasser, a man with his same name, from a lawyer's case report. This is where the podcast and Latif Nasser's journey starts for "the other Latif," the one with no name and number. 

As the investigation journey goes on, it came to light that the other Latif was an alleged top-level explosives expert for Al-Qaeda and a close associate of Osama bin Laden, who has been spending nearly two decades behind bars without trial in Guantanamo Bay. 

Due to strenuous exertions, Latif Nasser meets the other. Being exposed to his innocence, he was not able to silence the hooking question of whether he was being diligently played or not, not whether he was guilty or not guilty. 

The narrative goes through the suburbs of Morocco, from where the other Latif is from, to the mountains of Tora Bora, where he was allegedly captured, simply asking the question, grappling the listener with a conundrum: how come a good man can be swept up for a bad reason without realizing it? 

The Other Latif, more than a true crime podcast, delves deeper into the post-9/11 framework where religious identities are often radicalized, and stereotypes are perpetuated with haunting repercussions. It can be seen as one of the masterpieces of podcasting, echoing a critique of Western hegemonies' structural violence, often curtailed by anti-terror tags and ethnic segregation strategies.