BillHobbs.com is a frequently updated blog of original reporting and commentary by Bill Hobbs, a longtime Nashville journalist and media relations adviser. I am currently serving as communications director for the Tennessee Republican Party, a job I began on Oct. 29, 2007.
A documentary that Greenpeace doesn't want anyone to see will be shown in the nation's capital tonight, despite the efforts of the environmentalist group to demonize and squelch it. The documentary, Mine Your Own Business, shows how international environmentalists are trying to force the people of poverty-stricken villages in Romania and Madagascar to remain mired in wrenching poverty when they could have good jobs and a better way of life. It screens tonight in Washington D.C. at the National Geographic Society's Grosvenor Auditorium, and also is available online on DVD.
The films directors, Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney, fellows of the Moving Picture Institute, called the protests, condemnations, and a call for
> censorship from environmental activists "totalitarian" and "intolerant" in a press release from the Moving Picture Institute, which reveals that Greenpeace Executive Director John Passacantando has declined an invitiation to be a special guest at the screening and to engage in dialogue with the audience and filmmakers after the screening. Instead of accepting that invitation, Passacantando instead sent a letter to the National Geographic Society pressuring them to cancel the screening.
"I'm appalled by their demand to shut down the film," said MPI President Frayda Levy. "We invited them, but instead of joining us for a discussion, they display breathtaking narrow-mindedness. Regardless of whether you love or hate Mine Your Own Business, it deserves to be seen. What makes them so afraid of this film?"
The film reveals how the campaigns of global environmental activists are often exaggerated, misleading and motivated by a desire to preserve poverty stricken villages they view as "quaint."
The filmmakers' complete statement reacting to Greenpeace's attempt to squelch the film is - where else - on the film's blog.
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