Thread by @AliaMalek

I've debated responding bc this isn't surprising, but it's still jarring to see how tone deaf, self-congratulatory& unable to learn from past mistakes #Hollywood can be -- despite what might be best intentions on all sides. A thread #Syria
variety.com/2018/film/news…

I appreciate @lenadunham @jjabrams Spielberg using their high profile to highlight #Syria stories.But why not enable Syrian storytellers? There are so many Syrian writers/directors who have lived a version of these stories or are at least way more intimately acquainted w/them

If no Syrians can be found, there are also Iraqi Lebanese Palestinian Egyptian and Arab American artists who are more intimately acquainted with these stories. Some of them are already in Hollywood...

We understand this in the context of black folks. By now, Hollywood (& publishing houses) see the value of having people from a specific community/race/gender/experience shape the narratives about them. The pay off is in depth, authenticity, and intimacy

There’s a reason @BarryJenkins Moonlight is so incredibly profound

I mean, @lenadunham gets this no? Her much lauded show resonated with so many people because, in fact, it derived specifically from her very own lived experiences

by 2018, to some extent, someone is in the room that gets this for black folks. Why is analogizing on this point to another community so difficult? (Still assuming all intentions are good)

But regardless of intentions, isn’t it clear now that sometimes the best articulation of good intentions is to step aside & hand the microphone over to the very people who've been excluded from telling their own stories?

Hold the mic, pay for the mic, make money from the mic -- OK. But get off the damn mic…

On the book that @lenadunham will be adapting: The book is full of good intentions. It is *also* written by a UNHCR spokesperson. Yes, that’s right. Not an independent journalist, historian, or writer

On the UNHCR: it’s an important organization. But it’s also an institution whose entire existence is based on the misery of refugees. & one that many refugees have to depend on. That power dynamic should make us all uncomfortable, no matter how many safeguards were taken

See this Guardian review, which gives insight into how the book was crafted
theguardian.com/books/2017/jan…

"Given the vital nature of this enterprise, I would love to be able to say that this is a book that demands to be read. But there is something missing. And that is Zamel’s own voice." & see below for the problem w/how the book was constructed

and while I appreciate the intentions, it's not the Syrian woman-- chosen to be at the center of the book by a UNHCR team-- who's giving Ted Talks about the experience.

keep in mind that plenty of Syrians are out there telling their own stories w/o the intermediary of UNHCR & who can do it in many languages themselves. Dear Hollywood (and other gatekeepers), let's hear from them

in case it's not clear - #Syria experiences can't be swapped out for another country's. but the same catastrophes have shaped our destinies across borders in the region; we share a language, religions, artistic traditions

i was remiss not to tag @Soudade_ a Syrian who just won big at Venice thenational.ae/arts-culture/f…