Free film screenings will occur on September 19th, 21st,
and 22nd sponsored by the Sierra Club Borderlands Team and the Marin
Task Force on the Americas. Afterwards
there will be a Q&A with people who live along the U.S.-Mexico border, and
who know the situation first-hand.
Our immigration system is broken.
Thousands languish in immigrant detention centers, including private
prisons that warehouse detainees to cut costs and increase profits. Border enforcement inflicts tremendous harm
upon border communities and the environment, as border walls tear through
cities and wildlife refuges alike.
It is important to understand the problem if we want to find
solutions.
“Right now Congress is hammering out immigration legislation. If they do it right, it could benefit
millions of people. But if Congress
sticks to the “enforcement first” model, with more border walls and for-profit detention
centers, they will squander the promise of immigration reform,” says Dan Millis
of Sierra Club Borderlands. “There should
be a pathway to citizenship without hundreds of miles of new border walls or
the waiving of environmental laws.”
Everyone is invited to come see these films on the impacts of current
U.S. border policy on immigrants, border communities, human rights, and the
environment:
Immigrants
For Sale (2013, 33 min.) is a ground-breaking on-line documentary series
that goes inside the private immigrant-detention industry through the lens of
those most impacted and the players behind the trade, examining the
multi-billion dollar profits that fuel it all.
Wild
Versus Wall (2010, 20 min.) covers the ecological effects of the 651
miles of border wall already constructed along the U.S. boundary with Mexico.
The Department of Homeland Security waived 37 federal environmental-protection and
other laws along our borderlands, resulting in a brutalized landscape and a compromised
legal system.
The
Fence (2010, 30 min.) award-winning filmmaker Rory Kennedy’s HBO
documentary includes candid interviews with Border Patrol agents, ranchers,
environmentalists, and voices from both sides of the border-security debate.
Kennedy uses humor to highlight contradictions and politically driven
misinformation, as well as the ineffectiveness and costliness of the
controversial border barrier.
“It is critical that people in the Bay
area see for themselves the impacts of our current immigration policies, so
that they can push members of Congress to correct the situation instead of
making it worse,” says Millis.
Times and locations:
Thursday, September 19, 6:30 pm, Eric Quezada Center
for Culture and Politics, 518 Valencia Street, San Francisco. Co-sponsored by the Eric Quezada Center and
the Bay Area Latin America Solidarity Coalition.
Saturday, September 21, 6:30 pm, First United Methodist
Church, 9 Ross Valley Drive at Fourth Street, San Rafael. Co-sponsored by the Marin Peace and Justice
Coalition.
Sunday, September 22, 4:30 pm, Berkeley Fellowship of
Unitarian Universalists, 1924 Cedar Street (at Bonita), Connie Barber Room,
second floor (sorry, no wheelchair access).
Co-sponsored by the Social Justice Committee of the Berkeley Fellowship.
