Saturday, January 5 at 10 a.m.- 4 p.m. Center for Nonviolence Board meeting and Retreat at Angela Price’s house. If anyone would like to join us at the retreat which starts at 1 p.m. (after a potluck meal at 12 noon), please call the Center for more information at 559-237-3223
Mon-Fri 11-3.
Wednesday, January 9 on KFCF 88.1 FM – 3 to 3:30 p.m. We begin the New Year with host Angela Price and her guest Iara Lee, director of this month’s video “The Suffering Grasses”. Call ins are welcome at 559-266-8888. For more information call 559-237-3223.
Wednesday, January 9 at 12 noon and at 7 p.m. (no potluck) The Center is proud to show this important film about Syria “The Suffering Grasses” directed by filmmaker Iara Lee in 2012. The 12 noon showing will be at 1584 N. Van Ness (SE corner McKinley and Van Ness).
The 7 p.m. showing will be at the College Community Congregational Church at 5550 N. Fresno (east side, between Bullard and Barstow). As a discussant and Q and A following the film we will be joined by Skype from Southampton, England by their Syrian collaborator Abdulwahab Tahhan. He is both an interviewee in The Suffering Grasses and production manager on the film. Below are some details about the film. It is free and open to the public. Wheelchair accessible.
Over a year later, with thousands dead and counting, the ongoing conflict in Syria has become a microcosm for the complicated politics of the region, and an unsavory reflection of the world at large. Against the backdrop of the Arab Spring, NATO’s toppling of Moammar Qaddafi in Libya, and the complicated politics of the region, this film seeks to explore the Syrian conflict through the humanity of the civilians who have been killed, abused, and displaced to the squalor of refugee camps. In all such conflicts, large and small, it is civilians—women and children, families and whole communities—who suffer at the leisure of those in power. While focusing on the plight of those caught in the crossfire of the hegemons, we seek to unravel the conflict by exploring the motivations of its actors—the Ba’athist regime of Bashar al-Assad, the Free Syrian Army and other geopolitical players like the United States, Israel, Russia, China, Iran, Lebanon, Turkey, the Gulf countries… When elephants go to war, it is the grass that suffers. This is a film about the elephants, but made for the grasses.
In May 2012, director Iara Lee participated in a press delegation to the Turkish refugee camps housing Syrian exiles, where she interviewed those who have been most affected by the bloody conflict. Some who fled to the camps identify as militants, others are committed to nonviolent tactics, and many more are just trying to live in peace without repression. Each may have his or her own opinion about the decision of some actors to take up arms, or about whether the international community should try to topple the regime. Ultimately, however, any understanding of the Syrian conflict and its costs should be rooted in recognizing the humanity and suffering of these refugees. This film is one effort to do just that.
