KEEP FIGHTING, KEEP DANCING
Saja Kilani! Shabnam Mogharabi! Noam Shuster-Eliassi! Dan Savage!
Hello Beloved,
I wish, for once, I could begin one of these emails with “Things are looking up!” or something like that. Sadly, it seems things are getting worse and worse. ICE continues to terrorize immigrants. We’ve learned more horrors from the Epstein files and our rapist President wants to us to move on and forget about it. The ceasefire in Gaza is a fucking joke. Hundreds of Palestinians are being killed and thousands are being displaced. A “Board of Peace” is being put together to determine Gaza’s future. The board’s members include rapists, war criminals, and real estate moguls. Venezuela. Iran. Sudan. Congo. Minneapolis. I could go on and on.
“What the hell, Nick! Who begins an email this way?”
Please, my friends, do not give up. Do not lose hope. We cannot.
“We can be fucking angry, though, right?”
Yes, be fucking angry.
But don’t lose hope. The powers that be are beating the shit out of humanity right now. Don’t ever forget, though, that we outnumber them! We have heart. We have soul. We have art. we have morality. We have power. We have countless forefathers and foremothers watching over us and guiding us. Most of all, we have each other. We have community.
Speaking of, keep an eye out for more ways to build community with us here at Let’s Give A Damn — including Good Trouble Supper Club. Coming soon!
Now, our latest podcast episodes and a few things you should definitely click on.
🎧 LATEST PODCAST EPISODE(S):
Three episodes ago, I interviewed Noam Shuster-Eliassi and Amber Fares.
👉🏽 Noam is an Israeli activist and comedian who writes and performs in Arabic, English, and Hebrew, frequently touching upon her experience growing up in “Oasis of Peace” (Neve Shalom / Wahat al-Salam), a mixed community where Palestinians and Jews live together by choice.
👉🏽 Amber is an award-winning documentary filmmaker best known for her directorial debut Speed Sisters, which aired internationally on Netflix, Al Jazeera and RAI. She has many other directorial credits including her most recent film, Coexistence, My Ass!
🎥 Coexistence, My Ass! follows Noam as she creates a comedy show by the same name. Shot over five tumultuous years, the film traces Noam’s personal, professional, and political journey in tandem with the region’s steady deterioration. This is a film that began as something completely different. Because of Covid and escalated settler violence in the West Bank and ultimately because of the genocide which began several years into making this film. It’s stunning and I can’t wait for you to hear more about it in this conversation.
📱 Take a look at one of the clips we posted on Instagram
Two episodes ago, I interviewed Saja Kilani.
👉🏽 Saja Kilani is a Jordanian/Palestinian/Canadian actress and spoken word poet. Her first film performance, Simsim, earned her the Best First Time Lead Actress Award at the Amman International Film Festival. She starred in her debut international Oscar and Golden Globe-nominated film, The Voice of Hind Rajab, where she received the Best Actress Award at the 36th edition of the Carthage Film Festival. When she’s not acting, Saja shares her original spoken word poetry in live performances as part of her storytelling practice.
🎥 The Voice of Hind Rajab is a must see film! On January 29, 2024, Red Crescent volunteers receive an emergency call. A 5-year-old girl is trapped in a car under fire in Gaza, pleading for rescue. While trying to keep her on the line, they do everything they can to get an ambulance to her. Her name was Hind Rajab. Find this film in a theatre close to you and go see it as soon as you possibly can.
📱 Take a look at one of the clips we posted on Instagram
In the latest episode, I interviewed Shabnam Mogharabi.
👉🏽 Shabnam Mogharabi is an entertainment executive, producer, and New York Times bestselling author with 20 years of experience in mission-driven media. She currently runs The Joy Brigade, a boutique film and media production company. Prior to that, Shabnam was an EVP at film company Participant and also co-founded the uplifting content studio SoulPancake with actor Rainn Wilson, which she ran as CEO for nearly a decade, amassing 1B video views and dozens of awards. She and Rainn are still collaborating today on Rainn’s Soul Boom platform, which seeks to unlock a modern spiritual revolution through playful, practical, and profound media.
We spend a good chunk of our conversation talking abut the book she and Rainn recently wrote called the Soul Book Workbook.
📱 Take a look at one of the clips we posted on Instagram
🔗 THREE THINGS YOU SHOULD CLICK ON:
ONE. Remember when the Rapist-In-Chief, Donald Trump, shared a video on Truth Social depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes? Yeah, that was fucking crazy. My friend Propaganda had a thing or two to say (or rap) about it.
TWO. Drew Jackson is a brilliant poet and speaker. He recently shared one that was born out of grief related to the fake ceasefire in Gaza right now. Israel and the US are claiming there is a ceasefire but the truth is, hundreds of Palestinians have been slaughtered by Israel as they continue to engage in war crimes. Read Stars Over Gaza.
THREE. My friend and priest, Fr. Danny Bryant, wrote a Substack piece that is worthy of your time. It’s about Epstein, Liam Ramos, sexual abuse, and more.
“I’m willing to work together with anyone to stop it. Not to be courageous and not because there’s a single, goddamn, redemptive reason why that horror happened to any of us. But because the thought of it happening to one more person won’t let me close my eyes.”
Read it here. And while you’re there, subscribe!
🧠 PONDER
“During the darkest days of the AIDS crisis, we buried our friends in the morning, we protested in the afternoon, and we danced all night. The dance kept us in the fight because it was the dance we were fighting for. It didn’t look like we were going to win then and we did. It doesn’t feel like we’re going to win now but we could. Keep fighting, keep dancing.” — Dan Savage on how the gay community dealt with the AIDS crisis in the 80s
👋🏽 GOODBYE!
That’s it for this week…and year! Thank you for reading. I'm truly grateful. Consider forward this email to a friend? Or send them this link so they can sign up. And you can always email me about anything.
We have a lot of work to do, y’all. Hang in there. I love you.
Keep giving a damn,
NICK LAPARRA
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“the thought of it happening to one more person won’t let me close my eyes.” Right through the heart.
It seems we are all dying for a little hope.
Why goodbye!?