Petition to Boycott the Boston LGBT Film Festival: Our Response.
It has recently come to our attention that a petition has been circulated requesting a boycott of the Boston LGBT Film Festival’s presentation of Assi Azar’s film Mom & Dad: I Have Something to Tell You.
The petition alleges that the Boston LGBT Film Festival is working in “partnership” with the Israeli government on this event. The Boston LGBT Film Festival works with virtually every major consulate and international cultural organization in the city of Boston in order to present artists and their work to our community.
The mission of the Boston LGBT Film Festival is to highlight LGBT issues as shown through the medium of film. We do not, by inclusion or exclusion of films from our programming, seek to endorse anyone’s political policies or views. We do not make decisions on whether to show or present an artist based upon the nature of their country’s political policies, as that would inevitably lead to the continued silencing of LGBT voices, possibly those that need to be heard the most. It is not our role as an arts organization to discriminate against an artist for the practices of their government.
The Boston LGBT Film Festival, over the course of its 27 years, has screened films that depict the LGBT experiences of both Israeli and Palestinian citizens. We will continue to show films from diverse perspectives that speak to the varied LGBT experience. If you are interested in learning about how LGBT issues are portrayed in film, and in particular how LGBT issues are dealt with in Israel, then please join us. You are certainly free to organize and protest but we hope you won’t try and silence our voices.
James A. Nadeau
Executive Director
Boston LGBT Film Festival.
May 3rd to May 13th, 2012
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