lisa: tonight on pbs news weekend, how surveillance cameras, meant to fight crime, are being used to punish the residents inside public housing projects. >> public housing authorities are referencing this footage, and the footage is helping to persuade the courts and the judges in order to remove these people from their homes. lisa: then, it's not just magic, how a popular video game challenges gender roles in the real world. and, the story of a playwright and civil rights activist who gave voice to black, female, and queer artists. >> major funding s

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lisa: good evening. i'm lisa desjardin, john yang is away. we begin tonight in ukraine as its forces ppare to launch a counteroffensive, russia is striking across the country. in the eastern city of dnipro, strikes late saturday killed a 2-year-old child and wounded almost two dozen others. five more children were among the injured. top ukrainian officials, including president volodymyr zelenskyy, now say that more than 500 children have been killed since russia's invasion began. in northern afghanistan, nearly 80 young schoolgirls, grades 1 to 6, were poisoned at two separate schools, in a first of its kind attack since the taliban takeover. the girls have been hospitalized with unspecified injuries. the person accused of planning the mass poisoning had a "personal grudge," an afghan education offici said. an investigation is ongoing. since the taliban took power nearly two years ago, girls have been banned from education

beyond the sixth grade. in eastern india, the investigation into friday night's train disaster found that an error in the signaling system is what led to the crash. india's railway minister surveyed the scene today, and said further investigation will determine whether the error was human, technical, or sabotage. over 275 people were killed in the crash. israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu is calling yesterday's rare shootout along its southern border with egypt a "tragic terrorist attack." three israeli soldiers were killed in the incident, and their attacker, an egyptian border guard, was also killed in the return fire. netanyahu demanded accountability from its neighbor and ally. >> the incident on the egyptian border was serious and unusual and it will be thoroughly examined. israel passed a clear message to the egyptian government.

we expect that the joint investigation will be exhaustive and thorough. lisa: egypt has said its officer was chasing drug smugglers, and that they will work with israel to investigate. back here at home, though a financial crisis has been averted with the debt deal signed into law this weekend, there are signs republicans who voted "no" could move against house speaker kevin mccarthy. on cnn's "state of the union" today, congressman ken buck of the house freedom caucus criticized mccarthy for agreeing to what buck called a "democrat bill." buck wouldn't rule out action to vacate his speakership. >> i do knowhat speaker mccarthy has credibility issues. we continue to see the swamp, the folks in washington, d.c., who want to spend more money, winning, and we continue to see the folks who want to spend less money and really act responsibly losing. and so i think that kevin mccarthy has an issue in a broader sense. lisa: speaker mccarthy, appearing today on fox news, defended the deal that a two-thirds majority of

republicans voted in favor of. and, in iowa, the search continues for two missing men after recovery teams found the body of another today beneath the rubblef a collapsed apartment building. a structural engineer's report dated just four days before the collapse last week warned that a wall of the century-old building was at imminent risk of crumbling. other documents show city officials and the building's owner were warned for months. still to come on "pbs news weekend," how a popular video game explores gender identity. and, the story of playwright and civil rights activist, lorraine hansberry. >> this is pbs news weekend, home of the pbs newshour come up weeknights on pbs. lisa: american cities are facing

two aggravating crises. affordable public housing is in short supply, and violent crime is on the rise. a growing dynamic overlaps both, legions of cameras are being deployed in public housing areas. officials argue they are a 24/7 crime deterrent, but what happens when the camera focus shifts from fighting crime to monitoring the people they were put in place to protect? an investigation by the washington post found those eyes on the poor are being used to punish and evict residents, at times for minuscule missteps and others based on wrong assumptions. douglas macmillan is the reporter who led this investigation for the washington post and he joins us now. let's start off the top. these cameras are often purchased using government grants meant for fighting crime. but take us through what you found out about punishment for those who live in those areas. doug: yeah, so crime and drugs are still a very ever present problem in many of the public housing communities aroundhe

country. not all of them, but many of them. and one of the ways that they are increasingly trying to fight this problem is with cameras, and they're arguing that they can cover more ground is often very budget conscious, resource strapped local government agencies are trying to cover more ground and watch more of their territory with these cameras. what my reporting has showed is when they put these cameras up, a lot of times they will begin turning them on residents and using them to catch violations of their lease agreements that you and me and many of our viewers here would probably not classify as crimes. lisa: what are some specifics? doug: monitoring people for smoking in the wrong place. catching one woman was in her eviction proceedings in court, contained a picture of her removing a laundry basket from the communal laundry room. lisa: and she was evicted for that. doug: she was not evicted for that but that was part of the , record that was brought before her in court. and the lawyers that i'm talking to who help people who are dealing with these evictions say that more, more and more often,

evictions that they are seen from public housing authorities are referencing this footage, and the footage is helping to persuade the courts and the judges in order to remove these people from their homes. lisa: what do the residents tell you about this? are they aware of these cameras and what do they see as the trade-offs here in their lives? doug: yeah, many residents actually want more cameras. many residents in public housing do fear for their lives and fear for the kind of crime and drug problems that are around them. but a lot of times when the cameras go up, many of them kind of have a different experience and a different story about what the cameras are. a lot of times ty do not say that the cameras are being used to capture the problems that are most severe to them. r example, the daily occurrences of packages being stolen from their doorstep or a car being hit in front of their door. a lot of times when these kinds of things happen, what they tell me is that they will go to the housing authority, ask for the footage to help them kind of solve those problems. and many times they say they're

being told that the footage not available or that they can't be used for that purpose. so, you know, the question that you have to ask is, are these cameras being used to help the community that they're being put in to help, or are they being used to watch that community? lisa: how widespread is this, and how widespread is the use also of facial recognition here? doug: the cameras themselves are increasingly widespread. i mean, mo public housing authorities have some kind of surveillance system, but what's happened in the past few years is they've gotten increasingly sophisticated. and with these federal grants, the department of housing and urban development makes about $10 million annually available to public housing agencies, and increasingly, that money is going further. so in the past two or three years now, that money that you will use to get your basic camera setup can now get you things like facial recognition or cameras that have software baked into them that can recognize what's going on on the screen in some cases, make determinations about what's going on in the screen and determinations about what it thinks is suspicious. lisa: wow. so that's really sort of a big brother factor of what everyone's doing and when in that community. doug: well, it's this question

about automating policing and automating, you know, letting a camera and an algorithm decide what is suspicious. and researchers have shown that facial recognition, for example, has been bsed towards people of color and women in many cases have been misidentified by facial recognition cameras. so in my reporting to show that and some, not many yet, i think it's still very early, but in some public housing, authorities are beginning to use facial recognition to do things like enforce ban lists, to identify people who have been banned from the property and to alert authorities when the cameras see them enter those prope rtlisa:ie what are some of the ultimate consequences you've found? can folks who face eviction from this appeal these decisions? and is there any dialog either from your reporting with officials or for residents who say we don't like this? how does that work? doug: well, in many cases i have found the residents are not aware of the cameras or any kind of policies around them and most

of the cases i found, the housing authorities haven't really kind of laid out policies around how they are going to use the cameras. so i think what you will see going forward is more of a dialogue about what should we what should we allow these cameras be used for? what should they not allowed to be used for? the consequences can be very severe. when people lose their home and public housing, oftentimes they end up homeless because public housing, they're often at the end of the rope and they don't have any other options that's . why they are living in government-subsidized housing. and when they're evicted from their home, they often not only are homeless, but their future opportunities for employment and housing are severely diminished. lisa: you featured a woman who was on her sister's couch, i think, rig now. doug: yeaha woman who was kicked out of her housing for smoking outside of the property, among other reasons. she has lived on her sister's couch. and she told me when she's

applying for housing now and she goes to kind of apply for the next stop, she's you know, she keeps get running into this barrier where they are running her reference check and there and they're rejecting her based on her eviction from public housing. so you know one instance like that of the cameras catching you doing something wrong could end up having lifetime consequences for you. lisa: i could hear some people saying these folks are breaking rules that are in public housing. is there any context on whether other kinds of landlords outside of public housing could evict people for these sorts of things? doug: definitely. my reporting didn't really focus on this, but cameras and surveillance equipnt is a growing focus for private developers all around the country. and i think they're actually, you know, more opportunities for them to use sophisticated surveillance methods because they're not beholden to any federal agency or any local government agency, and the kind of policies and scrutiny that might result from that. lisa: doug macmillan, a fascinating, important area that we might not have known about except for your reporting. thank you for the washington post joining us. doug: thanks, lisa. ♪ lisa: the latest video game in nintendo's critically acclaimed “legend of zelda” series has

smashed sales records since its release several weeks ago. it even boasts a guinness world record for the fastest-selling nintendo video game of all time. but the game's influence goes beyond its commercial success. ali rogin has more. >> the legend of zelda video game has been around since 1987. over the decades, the game has evolved. it has become more imaginative. it also has gender fluidity. our digital video producer has immersed herself in the latest installment and joins me now. thank you so much for being here. for those not familiar with the game, what is legend of zelda? >> an action-adventure game. you play as the main protagonist

who goes through a series of adventures to save the princess zelda from people. so you beat bad guys and go through quests and solve puzzles. these games have had different iterations over the years. this latest is particularly notable. it has been a large commercial and critical success in the way you play. reporter: what makes the game unique compared to others? it has been around since 1987. what is unique about it? >> the way legend of zelda has been built over the years is to make it a really immersive game. the way the game is created, there are three worlds essentially stacked on top of each other. worlds to discover and learn about with mountains and

whether. it is a game you can constantly play and discover new things but this game has a physics set up that is also hard to explain. you can use boards to make giant machines that defeat your enemies and do an innite amount of play. reporter: the main protagonist is a character called lin and game creators have said link presents a peter pan character but can also be perceived as gender-neutral. tell me about the impact link has had among t lgbtq+ community. >> the creator said they did not want to have a link be perceived as a boy or girl. even the name is meant to represent a link between the player in the gam

so the idea is thatink is a silent character. never speaks in any of the games. you are meant to be the character. so you are projecting how you see yourself with the character. the way the avatar has evolved over the years has become more customized. you can get all sorts of headdresses and tunics and really create the character you want to see. th is really important for the lgbtq+ gaming community and for someone who may be does not know what gender they want to present themselves as, it can be a journey for them. i think that is why it is such an important part of the lgbtq+ gaming community. reporter: tell me about some of the other representation notable about the game. >> and a lot of the games you

basically play through as just link but the characters you meet along the way, in one of the zelda games you meet a male represented character who was like a ninja who helps you with a quest and later it turns out it is princess zelda the whole time. and there is a game where link has two dress up as a member of an all-female old -- all-female tribe that does not let men in. so by pushing these sorts of traditional generals and not boxing the men it is a really interesting aspect of the game. reporter: there is really no limits. are there crossover impacts in how gamers approach real life?

>> one of the gaming developers who also created super mario brothers was inspired by his childhood in japan, exploring forests to create this game and if you played zelda or any game i think you would realize discovering new things is the main part of the game. you are discovering secret passageways and riding a horse. the sense of discovery is really important and going back to the gender discussion, i think that discovery within the game can mirror the discovery you are seeing in yourself, the progression of the character, for a lot of the transgender people i have read about, seeing links progression throughout the game mirrors how they feel in their transition. that is not to say that link is a trance character but i think

it is an important avatar for people to see themselves in. reporter: the game is so popular somepl pe t p alayg akre. oin you got to play it for work. >> it was a last to learn more about the game. i have played it my whole life. i played the original zelda. when i was reporting on the story and talking with my friends about it, i heard a lot of people who play the new game with their kids but also played the original game so they are continuing this tradition of playing video games together and i think that is one great example of t games continuing popularity. reporter: the fruits of your extensive reseah can be watched online on the pbs newshour website. casey, thank you so much for joining us.

lisa: for this pride month, as part of our series, “hidd histories,” ali rogin is back with a look at a playwright and civil rights activist who gave new voice to countless marginalized artists who were women, black, and queer. reporter: her plays told stories of black life dden in plain sight, and her life continues to inspire lgbtq writers all across the theater world. lorraine hansberry's magnum opus, “a raisin in the sun,” debuted on broadway in 1959 when she was just 28 years old, making her the first black woman playwright ever to reach broadway. the seminal work was also made into a 1961 film starring sidney poitier. the author james baldwin once wrote of the production, “never before, in the entire history of the american theater, had so much of the truth of black

people's lives been seen on the stage." and, the play was based on hansberry's own experiences. like her characters, the youngers, she grew up in a middle class black family in chicago. they moved into an all-white neighborhood, and were persecuted for it. hansberry was born in 1930 on the city's south side into a family deeply involved in the fight for civil rights. her father was a successful realtor who fought for better black housing. he won a case before the supreme court that helped end some discriminatory real estate practices like the ones they endured. in 1950, hansberry dropped out of college and moved to harlem, where she continued her family's legacy of activism. she called herself a revolutionary. she spoke at protest gatherings, marched on picket lines, and wrote for a progressive publication called “freedom.” but, while hansberry was outspoken on racial justice in america, she reckoned with her sexuality in private. for nine years, she was married to a man, robert nemiroff.

and, though she was never “out” publicly, hansberry privately identified as a lesbian - at a time when homosexuality was illegal in new york city, and gays and lesbians were demonized. she also wrote anonymously to a lesbian magazine, “the ladder.” in january 1965, at just 34 years old, lorraine hansberry died of cancer. months before her death, she spoke to six teenage winners of a national creative writing contest. she told them, “you are young, gifted, and black. i, for one, can think of nmore dynamic combination that a person might b” words that hansberry's friend, musician nina simone, would immortalize into song. ♪ >> ♪ young, gifted, and bck. what a lovely, precious thing ♪ ♪ lisa: that is our program for

night. i'm lisa desjardins. for all of my colleagues, thks for joining us. see you tomorrow. >> for 25 years consumer cellular has been offering no contract wireless plans designed to help people do more of what they like. our team can help find the plan that fits you. to learn more go to consumer cellular.tv. >> and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. [captioning performed by the

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[narrator] this program was made possible inart by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. (birdsong)