OUR PRESIDENT
BALTASAR GARZON
Garzón, the second of five children in a middle-class family, grew up in Andalusia in southern Spain. Raised a Roman Catholic, he attended a seminary for several years before abandoning religious studies and turning his focus toward law. After earning a law degree from the University of Sevilla in 1979, he began his judicial career at a local court in Huelva provincia (province) in 1981. In 1983 he became a magistrate. He served on a court in Almería provincia until 1988, when he joined the Fifth Central Court of Investigation, a branch of the National Court (Audiencia Nacional) in Madrid.
As a judge-magistrate for the National Court, Garzón was responsible for investigating cases involving drug trafficking and terrorism. By the early 1990s he had successfully prosecuted members of the Antiterrorist Liberation Groups (Grupos Antiteroristas de Liberación; GAL)—an illegal paramilitary organization that opposed the Basque separatist group ETA—for the murders of a number of suspected ETA members. In 1993 Garzón won a seat in Spain’s Congress of Deputies, where he represented the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party. He resigned the following year, however, after falling out with Prime Minister Felipe González Márquez. Garzón’s continued investigation into the government’s alleged support of GAL in the 1980s contributed to the downfall of the González government in 1996.
Garzón entered the international spotlight when in 1998 he sought the extradition to Spain of Augusto Pinochet in order to try the former Chilean dictator for human rights abuses. Garzón was acting under the controversial legal principle of universal jurisdiction, whereby courts in one country may judge grave human rights crimes committed outside that country, regardless of the nationality of the accused. He later invoked universal jurisdiction in several other high-profile cases, including the indictments of several former Argentine officials, for human rights violations during Argentina’s Dirty War (1976–83); Osama bin Laden, for his role in the September 11 attacks of 2001; and a number of former members of the George W. Bush administration (2001–09), for allegedly allowing torture at the United States’ Guantánamo Bay detention camp. Garzón’s limited success in some of these cases garnered the plaudits of human rights activists, but many critics felt that he had overreached his authority. In 2009 Spain restricted the application of universal jurisdiction to cases involving Spanish interests. Nevertheless, Garzón remained unapologetic about his activism. Citing as an inspiration the Sicilian prosecutor Giovanni Falcone, a crusader against organized crime who was assassinated by the Mafia in 1992, Garzón described his work as an effort to uphold the rule of law, both within Spain and internationally.
Meanwhile, Garzón continued to work on various domestic cases. He played an important role in Spain’s crackdown on ETA, and in 2008 he opened an investigation into the disappearance of more than 100,000 people during the Spanish Civil War (1936–39) and the subsequent Francisco Franco regime. However, he was soon charged with breaching a 1977 amnesty law that had pardoned all perpetrators of politically motivated crimes during the Franco era. Although Garzón stepped down from the case, he was suspended from his position with the National Court in 2010, and plans were made to try him for abuse of power.
Source, Heather Campbell ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA
SUBMISSIONS & RULES
1º The works in competition must denounce the Holocaust and other Crimes against Humanity, its denial, Nazi and neo-Nazi propaganda, and hatred and discrimination of human beings due to their ethnic origin, religious confession, sexual diversity or any other factor for which that may constitute a hate crime.
2º Short films must not exceed 15 minutes in length, animation, fiction, or documentary works that also defend this premise are admitted, the submission deadline is May 30, 2023.
3º All the works that meet the following requirements can participate in the contest: denounce the Holocaust and other Crimes against Humanity, its denial, Nazi and neo-Nazi propaganda, hate crimes and discrimination against refugees, ethnic minorities, sex and LGBT diversity , religious, ideological and other forms of intolerance; expose the consequences of racism, antisemitism, xenophobia, social exclusion and other forms of intolerance, its final production date cannot be later than October 30, 2022.
4º Any work that respects its bases and principles, regardless of its duration, is accepted within the bases of this festival, being registered if they wish, for universal viewing through our YouTube channel, since the objective is to add the cinematographic creativity to change the consciousness of the human being.
5º The festival will take place simultaneously worldwide between July 2º 2023, by any group that downloads the festival.
6º The organization is not responsible for the use given to images and/or soundtrack, given by the creators and/or editors, if they violate intellectual property laws by not having permission for their inclusion, and a complaint removes it from the online channel. line of the same as a work in competition, we will abide by the resolutions and legal verdicts for its elimination or not, in the case of wanting to also participate in our online modality open to all creators.
7º The short films and video clips can be of any genre within fiction, animation, video-creation, or documentary, and may be these years old, that is, edited as of July 2012, the quality of some pieces may include them even though They are older, but out of competition, only for viewing in physical rooms, or on our YouTube channel.
8º The works included will deal with complaints about the denial of the Holocaust, neo-Nazi propaganda, exclusion, xenophobia, racism, incitement to hate crimes, or others about their victims, the violation of their dignity and rights, the persecution of migrants, the effects of armed conflicts, torture, and persecution of ethnic, sexual, or religious minorities, by groups, totalitarian governments, or measures instituted in sovereign democracies that violate human rights, and international agreements for the protection of asylees or political refugees, in contradiction with the laws signed by these nations.
9º The works must assume the message of social denunciation of abuses against human beings, all those who do not provide documentary evidence of the facts narrated in fiction will be excluded, if they point to real governments, or their security forces, or do apology of extremist ideologies as a remedy for these facts.
10º The entrance to the festival must be free, since the purpose is to defend human rights, non-profit, any complaint about the attempt to charge entrance and access to the festival will have legal consequences for the local organizers.
11º Any NGO, collective, union, or association, will be able to download through the link that we will provide from June 30, 2023, to participate in the world premiere on the date of July 2º, 2023.
12º The sending of the works will be done by email through WETRANSFER, to the e-mail director@hopefirst.net
13º Any incidence not contemplated in the bases, will be resolved through its technical commission.
MANIFESTO.
On April 9th, 1865, marked the end of a tragedy, such as the American Civil War, with the success of achieving the abolition of slavery in the USA, the fact that a human being was owned by another, "his master", however , suffering, exploitation, and racism did not end then. The Jim Crow laws that were enacted in the rebel states after the defeat represented racial segregation, a scandal that lasted a century, and inspired both the genocidal Nuremberg laws that allowed the Nazi Holocaust, and South African Apartheid, and therefore, the division of human beings no longer into "races", but between WHITE MEN, and second class citizens.
After a century of struggle, thousands of murders and lynchings promoted by the KKK, or spontaneously by the residents of any place, the Jim Crow laws were repealed on July 2, 1964, which meant that the first democracy in modern history , the land where men and women rebelled against the tyranny of a King and his armies, finally lived up to its name, THE INALIENABLE HUMAN RIGHTS were finally recognized for all citizens, many of them, who fought in Europe against Hitler, or the Italian Fascists, but who could not drink coffee in the same place as another person, just because of the color of their skin, they were good to give their blood for freedom against the greatest criminals in history, but legally they were not good to use the same toilet as other people with lighter skin, even though both had landed in Normandy, or Sicily behind the stars and stripes flag.
The 20th century ended with the triumph of democracy, Nelson Mandela ruling South Africa, and the fall of the Berlin wall that separated two worlds on the brink of nuclear war, and the destruction of our planet.
But democracy does not defend itself, we are the citizens who must support it, the same citizens who failed in Germany in 1933, before the fanatics who opened Pandora's box, and released their demons on earth. The same ones, who then shouted Heil Hitler, with many of their grandchildren who now defend the extreme right throughout the world, with all their nationalist and tribal hatred, "us and them", not only in the USA, in India, and for all of Europe the ghost of those demons is no longer hidden or ashamed, the neo-fascists rule again in Rome, in the USA, there was a coup to take over the Capitol, the same movement that General Smedley Butler prevented in the 30s , marching with the war veterans towards him, just like they did in Rome following Mussolini, and this same year, 2023, it has been repeated in Brazil, a divided country, like most of the Europeans, or in South America .
No, democracy does not defend itself, but those of us who believe in it, those of us who believe in freedom, peace, and the brotherly love of HUMANITY, will fight for it, well, if those who want to open that box again, and free the demons of "the superior race", they shout their hatred on the street, we will defend that same democracy and human rights, not because we hate those who hate, but because we love the weak, the suffering, the those who no longer have hope, we will give it back to them, that same hope in a new, dignified, just, and noble world, we will all shout together against the nationalists, the racists, and the neo-Nazis, HOPE FIRST.
WHO WE ARE
We are a group of diverse activists, from organizations that fight hate and discrimination, to public figures who during their time created the foundations for the pacification process in the Basque Country, and several artists, (mainly related to cinematography), who have launched the "Hope-First" project, during a time of radical and exclusive nationalism, "us versus them", fear of refugees as a terrorist "fifth column", and processes like the drift of the hopeful and, “Arab Springs”, that have led to terrible and bloody civil wars, and that can be a prelude to a scenario of division between different communities, religions, and cultures, whose point of inflection and no return could provoke a catastrophic war of "everyone against everyone", parting from the fallacy of "us versus them", events already proven in Libya, Syria, Sudan, and Ukraine, or in identity ruptures against common projects such as "Brexit" within the European Union, or the "Process" within Spain, which, amongst other conflicts, reflect a number of nations at war, or nations divided by internal fractures, only surpassed during World War II, (1939-45), and a total number of refugees on the planet, that summed up, is superior to the displacement that took place during that universal conflagration, that resulted in the loss of one hundred million human lives.
This project starts with the first universal short-film festival against hate, racism, and homophobia, "Hope-First", referring to both Greek mythology, when all the demons who wanted to destroy humanity were locked in Pandora's box, to HOPE, with the purpose of defeating these demons if the box were ever to be broken, and were there still to be a sense of conscience amongst humans, so as to counteract arguments of exclusion and hatred, similar to the "we first"?, which has culminated with "America First".
"HOPE-FIRST" is an online festival, whose common thread is the defense of human rights as a principle, and as universal law, above sovereignties recognized by the rest of the community of nations, but where in too many cases women are treated like cattle, children are soldiers or slave laborers, or the death penalty is an indiscriminate punishment against hundreds, or thousands, of people every year.
This festival is located on a YouTube page, and is open to all filmmakers who want to collaborate with this idea of universality, brotherhood, and human fraternity. Any work that defends human rights, in any format, and of any length will be admitted. Films must have been produced after June 2012, and must not exceed 15 minutes of viewing.
The most viewed short films will be unified into a single piece, and will premiere simultaneously on July 2, 2023, coinciding with the end of Jim Crow laws, and racial segregation.
Any collective, association, or organization around the world that would like to collaborate that day on this project, (english & spanish versions), will be able to broadcast this feature film online, or download it from the internet to process it in DCP, and project it in cinemas that day, the 2th of July.
FEMALE DIRECTORS AND SCREENWRITERS
The professional gender gap has led to the resurgence of the feminist movement for a actual equality. It is also a fact in the cinema, thanks to the work of actress Geena Davis, and her "Institute on gender in media", have proven that discrimination, both wage and labor of women in the cinema, (their salary is lower, and the opportunities to direct or write scripts too), is a reality; in effect, it is the professional agents who present proposals to the production companies, and they know that their commission will be higher if they select the most recognized male directors or screenwriters.
Therefore, when studying both the situation and the figures, we ask ourselves: check them by this organization, if there are awards for the best actor, and the best actress?, why not include prizes at our festival for the best female directors or screenwriters?. So we would start a trend that would break the "glass ceiling" that prevents a true equality in the seventh art, and it is scandalous in the 21st century.
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