If we here at Story Screen understand anything, it’s that family is important. It is the cornerstone of just about every individual’s life and for some people, it is being threatened every day by organizations that seem blinded by their own selfish, disillusioned version of reality. We live in an age where people who work to protect us from harm, are also capturing families, imprisoning parents, and locking children in cages to await decisions from officials far away in an air conditioned room (one which screams over-compensation). It is crazy, disgusting, disheartening, and just down right terrible.
There’s also no way we are going to let this continue to happen.
Story Screen has never shied away from dipping its toes into the political pool when the time calls for it. In the past, we raised money for Amnesty International and the ACLU to continue to support and fight for the rights of immigrants coming into the United States, whether it is desperate and illegal, or otherwise. We then raised even more money for the Texas Civil Rights Project (TCRP), which seeks to dismantle the very idea of separating children from families when they are arrested at the border of Mexico and America, fighting to finally make that very thing illegal, giving all parents the right to be reunited with their children.
And now, we have to get them together.
While TCRP and other organizations have secured the right to reunite families, many of those families cannot afford the flight airfare and fees that are required to actually get to their children currently awaiting release. Inability for these families to get to their children in time will lead to very, very bad things, things that we cannot even believe are happening right now. Story Screen has teamed up with the ACLU, MOVE ON, The Leadership Conference, and the National Domestic Workers Alliance to support the Families Belong Together initiative, whose main goal is to do just that: pay for the required fees necessary to reunite families with their children. Very cool.
In classic Story Screen fashion, we’ve gathered support from over 20 local businesses here in the Hudson Valley, to help the efforts of Families Belong Together. And we want to invite YOU to join us for a big benefit party, celebrating hope, music, love, empathy, and of course, movies. We’ll be throwing down some tasty vinyl jams, all from selected movie soundtracks and scores, as well as projecting several films by some of the most talented Mexican directors out there. We’ll also be raffling off some pretty sweet prizes: from gift cards, bottles of booze, freshly roasted coffee beans, vinyl records and more! But wait, THERE’S MORE! We’ll be tossing together a collection of speakers to comment on a variety of super interesting subjects – ranging from what we can do every day to help things like this from never happening again, to where to get the very best burger. Big landscape of topics. Oh, and we’re also going to be holding our very first Movie/Music Trivia Night that we’ve been developing for some time now. We know. You wish you were there already! We need your help to make this night a success and help Families Belong Together.
So here’s all the details: This benefit event will take place on Thursday, August 2nd, starting at 8pm and going til close, at Quinn’s Rest-n-Rant at 330 Main Street, Beacon, NY. Bring some cash to donate (we will also have a Square available for digital donations) and bring your very best movie nerd buds to win some awesome trivia and raffle prizes. Feel free to swing by with any vinyl movie soundtracks you may own and want to hear as well, and our very lovely DJ will be happy to spin them for you.
We resisted, we protected, we’ve freed. Now, with your support, hope and the tenacity that is courage, we can continue making sure these human beings get treated as such. Thank you.
Love,
La Familia de Story Screen
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