What is Hollywood Workers for Peace? The entertainment laborers fed up with being tools for war propaganda

In the days after October 7th, 2023, a fault line ruptured inside the Writers Guild of America (WGA). On one side were those who demanded the Guild make an official statement of unilateral support for Israel. On the other were those of us who objected to such a statement, fearing it would provide political cover for a campaign of indiscriminate brutality already underway in Palestine. After days of fraught debate, the Guild ultimately announced they would not be making an official statement.

By then, the Directors Guild of America (DGA) and Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) had released statements condemning the Hamas offensive on October 7th without any mention of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land, or the decades of brutal Israeli repression and displacement that led to the attack. A group of powerful showrunners were publicly browbeating the WGA to follow suit in interviews with the trades and in their own open letter.

But there were many screenwriters who recognized these statements as fueling a one-sided narrative that would not only lead to the escalating genocide that we’re witnessing today, but also fuel an islamophobic narrative that would put our Palestinian, Muslim and Arab union members at risk. Individually, these writers began speaking out and connecting with one another.

As mostly lower to mid-level workers, we knew that if we were going to be successful, we would have to show collective force publicly. This led to us forming a collective we called WGA for Peace and publishing our anonymous open letter.

Soon, members of other guilds who shared our concerns joined our efforts and signed onto our open letter. The WGA ultimately heeded our call not to release a statement. That said, some of our signatories have reported being fired, doxxed, and threatened with blacklisting by powerful industry figures for speaking out on behalf of Palestinians. Others have reported being harassed by superiors for not signing the pro-Israel open letter, and we’ve received threatening emails from some powerful players ourselves.

None of this will stop us.

It’s undeniable that there is now a target on our backs, so we remain anonymous for now, even as many of us continue to organize around this issue publicly in our personal lives. Recognizing that many within our industry share our concerns but fear what might happen to their careers if they speak out, we are seeking to unite like-minded individuals to create a collective force that cannot be easily silenced.

We have evolved into Hollywood Workers for Peace, a collective of Hollywood laborers from every sector of our industry who stand united against war, imperialism, and state violence, and against the suppression of voices calling for an end to state violence in its various forms — from police brutality, to state surveillance and genocide.

We also recognize that, although justice for the Palestinian people is what united us, our solidarity extends to every person and community struggling for liberation, from Sudan to Congo, from Tigray to Haiti, from Hawaii to Turtle Island. We see the role our industry plays in the dehumanization of oppressed people around the world and to that we say: no more.

We call on our unions to:

• Use our historic leverage gained during this year’s strikes to publicly call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Palestine;
• Forcefully condemn and take action against censorship and repression, and establish reporting processes for members who have experienced repression and censorship from within our industry;
• Investigate and put pressure on partnerships with entities and corporations complicit in human rights violations.
• Form a committee that will recognize when harmful content is platformed in a biased manner, and what is de-platformed. Though we would never ask for censorship, freedom of speech doesn’t absolve one from the consequences of what they are saying. Therefore, we must assess our complicity in the dehumanization of oppressed groups.

We know how important it is for our unions to speak on behalf of all workers, not just the powerful ones. This was something leadership had been preaching throughout both the writers strike and ongoing actors strike, after all.

If you are a Hollywood worker who is just as disturbed by this industry’s silence in the face of genocide as we are, and recognize its longstanding complicity in imperialism, please join us. We’ve got a lot of work to do to realize our dreams in a town that is safe for all artists, and we are just getting started!

WHERE TO FIND US:

Twitter: @Hollywood4Peace

Instagram @Hollywood4Peace