Saturday, October 22, 2005

Holy War Against Wal-Mart

The United Church of Christ (UCC) is helping to promote Robert Greenwald's new documentary--Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price--with a week's worth of political action:

UCC's Justice and Witness Ministries is offering its support for an interfaith, grassroots "Wal-Mart Week of Action," set to begin on Sunday, Nov. 13. It's intended to be a time for congregations to stand in economic solidarity with Wal-Mart's workforce which — at 600,000 employees — is now the nation's largest.
[...]
The inaugural event of the "Wal-Mart Week of Action" (Nov. 13-20) will be the seven-day premiere push of "The Wal-Mart Movie," a new documentary by filmmaker Robert Greenwald.

Greenwald made headlines in 2004 with his making of "Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism," a critical look at the Fox News Network and the ever-expanding control by multi-national corporations over the public's access to news and information. Now, Greenwald has turned his attention to Wal-Mart, the largest corporation on the planet.

As part of a unique, grassroots viewing strategy, "The Wal-Mart Movie" is set to be shown at an estimated 7,000 community- based settings, including at least 1,000 churches. As of mid-September, more than 100 UCC churches had committed to offer screenings.
[...]
The UCC's involvement with the film already has been mentioned in articles by The New York Times and the Springdale (Ark.) Morning News. And given the high exposure of Greenwald's previous films, UCC members can expect "The Wal-Mart Movie" to cause quite the stir.

"The point of our sponsorship of this film is that it's time for this country to have a dialogue about if the Wal-Mart model is the best we can do in our local economic development," the Rev. Ron Stief was quoted as saying in the Arkansas paper that covers Wal-Mart's hometown of Bentonville.

I'll have to see if Mrs. F's UCC/DoC (Disciples of Christ) church is doing anything for this; if not, maybe they need a host...


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