[antiwar-van] Coalition Releases Open Letter To Cancel Border Security TV Show

Tue Apr 30 07:18:57 PDT 2013

COALITION OF ORGANIZATIONS RELEASE LETTER
TO GET BORDER SECURITY OFF THE AIR

A coalition of approximately 70 organizations has released an open letter
calling on producers, broadcasters and partners to "to cancel, stop
participating in, and end the broadcast of Border Security". The group
includes a range of community groups, legal organizations, labour unions,
national and international human rights organizations and student groups.

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* The letter can be found here. Please read and share:
http://www.cancelbordersecurity.ca/#!letter-from-organizations/c39y

* Please also share this Facebook image (you don't need a FB account to
view or link to this):
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=366808410102875&set=a.271182039665513.63321.153945524722499&type=1&theater

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Please let us know if your organization is willing to be added as a 
signatory to this letter by emailing info at cancelbordersecurity.ca

We hope you will join us in sending a strong and necessary message to the
show’s producers and broadcasters that deportation is not entertainment. 

==> TEXT OF OPEN LETTER <==

Minister Vic Toews, Ministry of Public Safety, Government of Canada Luc
Portelance, President, Canadian Border Services Agency
Rob Bromley, President, Force Four Entertainment
John Ritchie, Partner and Executive Producer, Force Four Entertainment
Gillian Lowrey, Partner and Director of Business Affairs, Force Four
Entertainment
Paul Robertson, President, Shaw Media
Peter Bissonnette, President, Shaw Media
Zoran Stakic, Privacy Officer, Shaw Media
Andrew Eddy Vice President, Shaw Media Content Distribution
Michael French Vice President, Shaw Media Finance
Barb Williams Senior Vice President, Shaw Media Content
Deb Avis, Senior Vice President, Shaw Media Social Responsibility
JR Shaw, Executive Chair, Shaw Media
Jim Shaw, Vice Chair, Shaw Media
Bradley Shaw, Chief Executive Officer, Shaw Media

We are a group of community-based and national organizations who would
like to voice our collective concern about Border Security: Canada’s Front
Line.

We are deeply concerned about the traumatic and potentially dangerous
consequences upon all those who find themselves being filmed for Border
Security. In Border Security a highly one-sided narrative is told about
those crossing the border under varying circumstances or those people in
the process of migration, which has the particular long-term impact of
spreading fear about and among immigrant and migrant communities. At best,
this TV show is an invasion of privacy with questionable ethics on
informed consent; at worst, it can put the lives of vulnerable migrants at
risk by commercially exploiting their stories for broadcast. No one
deserves to face the trauma of being forcibly separated from their
families and then having this suffering turned into entertainment. We also
find it extremely troubling that the federal government has approved and
is involved in this production.

Deportation is not entertainment. We urge you to cancel, stop
participating in, and end the broadcast of Border Security. More than
23,000 people have signed a petition calling for an end to this TV show.
They are joined by prominent cultural producers, human rights groups, and
legal organizations. We hope you will take this opportunity to demonstrate
your commitment to upholding human rights, legal obligations, and ethical
media production by cancelling Border Security.

Sincerely,

Agriculture Workers Alliance Support Centre-Surrey
Alberta Public Interest Research Group
Alliance for People’s Health
Amnesty International
Antidote: Multiracial and Indigenous Girls and Women's Network
Association of Chinese Canadians for Equality and Solidarity Society 
Babae Montreal
Battered Women’s Support Services
BC Civil Liberties Association
Café Rebelde
Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers
Canadian Council for Refugees
Canadian Labour Congress
Chinese Canadian National Council
Coalition of South Asian Women Against Violence
Connective Project for Colombia
Council of Canadians
Defenders of the Land
Dignidad Migrante
Downtown Eastside Women’s Center
Fraser Valley Peace Council
Global Queer Research Group-University of British Columbia
Health for All
Idle No More
Immigrant Workers Center
Indigenous Tar Sands Campaign
International Iranian Federation of Refugees
Justice for Migrant Workers
Latinos in Action
Law Union of Ontario
Lead Now
Migrante BC
Mining Justice Alliance
Native Youth Movement
No One Is Illegal-Toronto
No One Is Illegal-Vancouver Unceded Coast Salish Territories
Out On Campus-Simon Fraser University
People's Commission Network
People Against Settler Colonialism-University of British Columbia
Pivot Legal Society
Progressive Nepali Forum in Americas
Purple Thistle Center
QTIPOCALYPSE
Quebec Public Interest Research Group-McGill University
Queer Migration Collective
Raices Latin American Cultural Society
Rising Tide-Vancouver Coast Salish Territories
Regina Public Interest Research Group
Salaam Canada
Sanctuary Health
Shit Harper Did
Simon Fraser Public Interest Research Group
Siraat
Social Housing Coalition BC
South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy
Streams of Justice
Tadamon
Teaching Support Staff Union
Toronto Action for Social Change
Trikone Vancouver
Truthfool Communications
University of British Columbia Colour Connected Against Racism
University of British Columbia Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and
Social Justice
University of British Columbia Race Autobiography Gender and Age Graduate
Student Network
Unis’to’ten Camp
Vancouver Status of Women
West Coast Legal Education and Action Fund

-- 
Harsha Walia

https://twitter.com/HarshaWalia
https://www.facebook.com/NoOneIsIllegalNetwork

-- 
Harsha Walia

https://twitter.com/HarshaWalia
https://www.facebook.com/NoOneIsIllegalNetwork

-- 
Harsha Walia

https://twitter.com/HarshaWalia
https://www.facebook.com/NoOneIsIllegalNetwork