VICE
Season 2
TV-MA
89%
Documentary series featuring startling, groundbreaking stories from around the world.
12 Episodes
- The Afghan Money Pit & the Pacification of Rio
E1The Afghan Money Pit & the Pacification of RioThe U.S. has spent nearly $100 billion on reconstruction projects in Afghanistan, the most spent on any country in history. But John Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, has found that much of that money has been wasted and misused, and has even fallen into the hands of the Taliban. Shane Smith heads to Afghanistan for a tour of American taxpayer dollars gone down the drain. Rio de Janeiro is working hard to remedy its reputation as a drug and murder capital in time for the upcoming World Cup and Olympics. The Special Police Operations Battalion (BOPE) has been charged with pacifying the slums (favelas), but BOPE's military occupation of increasing numbers of favelas has been criticized as heavy-handed. Some corrupt members of the BOPE, together with ex-police, have formed militia gangs of their own and are controlling many favelas by sinister means, openly extorting, torturing, killing and making criminals disappear. Still, there are hundreds of favelas, untouched by pacification, that remain under the control of drug gangs who act with complete impunity. Ben Anderson looks behind the picturesque façade of Rio's marketing campaign to reveal the dark underbelly of the city. - Greenland Is Melting & Bonded Labor
E2Greenland Is Melting & Bonded LaborShane Smith embarks on an expedition to investigate why Greenland is melting, and the fact that the resulting sea level rise will mean devastation sooner than expected. Fazeelat Aslam visits the bonded laborers of Pakistan's brick kilns, and learns how certain organizations are fighting back by rescuing the workers from their modern slavery. - A Syria of Their Own & White Gold
E4A Syria of Their Own & White Gold'A Syria of Their Own' - Thomas Morton goes to the frontline of the battle for a Kurdish state to follow the story of Syria's forgotten ethnic group, the Kurds. 'White Gold' - Rhino horn has been coveted in Eastern medicine for centuries. Vikram Gandhi traces the trade from Southern Africa to Vietnam to understand this illicit phenomenon which has been on the rise. - Terrorist University & Armageddon Now
E5Terrorist University & Armageddon Now'Terrorist University' - Dagestan is Russia's hotbed for Muslim extremism; Shane Smith heads there to follow in the footsteps of Boston Marathon Bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev who spent six months there. 'Armageddon Now' - Thomas Morton looks at the Israel-Palestinian conflict and the surprising Evangelical support for the Jewish State. - The Pink Gang Rebellion & Genetic Passport
E7The Pink Gang Rebellion & Genetic Passport“The Pink Gang Rebellion” - The brutal details of a 2012 gang rape on a Delhi bus focused international attention on India’s rampant rape issue. Inept law enforcement, the social stigma associated with rape, and a patriarchal social structure have allowed sexual assaults to plague Indian women. Delhi’s police department has vowed to hire more female officers and set up a help desk, but these measures are hardly a solution. Rapes in Delhi doubled in 2013, and as bad as it is in Delhi, the Indian countryside is even worse. Instead of investigating rape cases, rural police officers often ignore victims and their families. But one woman, Sampat Pal, has galvanized a group of rural women into the Gulabi Gang, or Pink Gang, to combat the injustice of sexual assault. Gelareh Kiazand heads to rural Indian to investigate the issue and embed with this revolutionary gang. “Genetic Passport” - From 1949 to 1989, the Soviet Union, determined to prepare for nuclear warfare, detonated more than 450 nuclear bombs in an area of Kazakhstan known as the Semipalatinsk Test Site. For hundreds of thousands of Kazakhs, radiation not only surrounded them, but became part of their DNA. In an effort to curtail the birth of a new generation of deformed children, a Kazakh doctor recently tried to implement a mandatory “genetic passport” allowing people to know if their genes were damaged by radiation. Thomas Morton goes to Kazakhstan to learn more about this controversial initiative. - The Resource Curse & Deliver Us from Drought
E8The Resource Curse & Deliver Us from DroughtAs humanity’s appetite for energy grows exponentially, the extraction industry scrambles to the most remote regions on Earth to satisfy demand. In the undeveloped Melanesian country of Papua New Guinea, America’s Exxon Mobil has staked its claim to a $19 billion dollar liquid natural-gas project expected to start production in late 2014. Vikram Gandhi heads to Papua New Guinea to investigate. Over in Texas, Thomas Morton investigates the climate catastrophe, and discovers firsthand the local responses, which often involve reaching out for divine intervention. - Crude Awakening & The Enemy of My Enemy
E9Crude Awakening & The Enemy of My EnemyShane Smith heads to Louisiana to report on the lasting effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Then, Ben Anderson goes deep into Houthi-controlled territory to learn about the group that’s fighting, and beating, Al Qaeda in the east, Saudi Arabia in the north, and Yemen’s central government in the south. - Heroin Warfare & The Coldest War
E11Heroin Warfare & The Coldest War‘Heroin Warfare’ - Since the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan, heroin production in the region has skyrocketed, making the country the number-one producer in the world by a large margin. Suroosh Alvi got a rare look inside Iran to meet the suffering heroin addicts, and to see how the country is coping with the illegal drug trade. ‘The Coldest War’ - With the polar ice caps shrinking due to global warming, new trade routes are being exposed, along with billions of dollars' worth of natural-resource reserves. This is prime real estate and the five nations bordering the Arctic are readying themselves to fight for it. David Choe headed north to witness NATO forces participating in the largest polar military exercise in history. - Surveillance City & The Forgotten War
E12Surveillance City & The Forgotten War‘Surveillance City’ – Vikram Gandhi heads to Camden, New Jersey where a police surveillance system is transforming law enforcement in the city. ‘The Forgotten War’ – Ben Anderson heads to refugee camps in Chad and Sudan to meet victims of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir’s brutal genocide. Little has been done about the problem in the past decade and now rebel groups are poised for a civil war.
