oh whoops, thanks for catching that. will fix ASAP!
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It took some work tracking down, but it looks like the Creative Director of the Santa Monica Film Festival took part in an Zoom webinar last year run by the anti-vax group Vaccine Safety Research Foundation.
It seems to have included Dr. Ryan Cole, who had his medical license restricted for spreading covid disinformation and whom it appears the Creative Director called a “hero” in the chat transcript.
So I imagine that’s why there are three films tied to antivax movement this year.
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Here’s hoping that they get measles, mumps and mpox at the same time.
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gee… i wonder how long before florida-da “surgeon” general Ladapo begins to reference these “highly scientific” documentaries in his rabid anti-vax crusade here.
“no” he says to the Broward County school that is experiencing a measles outbreak, in fucking 2024! “no”, he says, “parents don’t need to quarantine their infected children” 
this is dangerous. this is cynical politics. this is rhetoric designed to assuage the very ill-informed into voting for a type of fascism that will kill believers, along with those they hate.
i simply can’t anymore with the regressionist slide (which seems to be steeper and gaining momentum) that declares a story, in a book, written some two millennia ago, to be the directive over all - excusing 2000 years of science, advancement and knowledge - to bring about some mythical perfect whiite ethnostate.
please don’t call me “eeyore”, i will not give up. i will continue my seemingly miniscule efforts to turn the tide here…
but i am old and i am getting very tired.
this shit must stop.
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You know, I miss the good old fashioned reptilian and hollow earth conspiracies. Maybe some government UFO stuff. Weekly World News. Hitler’s brain in a jar.
Now everything is just Alpha Males™ and antisemitism. There’s no fun in it.
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Same as it ever was, if you went even a little below the surface of a consipiracy theory. Been true for millenia.
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It’d be swell if there weren’t enthusiasm and laudits for movies that lead to people getting themselves and other people killed.
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wikipedia says the santa monica film festival was created by albert birdie deQuay in 1997. and in 2001 deQuay handed all festival management activities to deep ellum film festival until it was later dissolved in 2003.
the most important part of this article should have been who took over the film festival and yet is completely absent. instead the focus is all just stating the obvious about the quality and content of these films.
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“We the Patriots USA” Your name game ain’t that strong.
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oh wow, thanks for this detective work! explains a lot. ugh.
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In the words of the revered Hanson Brothers;
In an mmm pox they’re gone.
In an mmm pox they’re not there.
In an mmm pox they’re gone.
In an mmm pox they’re not there.
Until you lose your hair. But you don’t care.
Yeah, they way that the howling void of ignorance tries to gussy itself up in respectability really grinds my gears.
Those were all racist and anti-Semitic too. 
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It’s always antisemitic and racist…
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Yeah I found the same yesterday when I was trying to find out who are what is behind the current Santa Monica Film Festival. It’s certainly not transparent.
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So the film festival @shermwick is sort of the ancestor.
After that film festival died in 2003, Angelika Katz worked to organize the Santa Monica International Film Festival in 2007.
She had a consultant named David Katz (not sure if there’s a relation). He had previously started the Malibu International Film Festival in 1999 which had moved in 2005 to Santa Monica.
Some kerfuffle happened and David Katz left the Malibu Film Festival and he has run the Santa Monica International Film Festival ever since.
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I was wondering the same thing as @shermwick and found only that several sponsors of the festival are listed on the www.smff.org website and include:
LouLou
Wolk and Levine LLP
FilmFreeway
Baerskin Tactical Hoodie
Studio Supreme Films
DJ Jacques
Delta8Pro
DimpleDCP
Tito’s Handmade Vodka
It’s not clear if additional sponsors exist but are not listed, but it seems plausible there are more sponsors.
Rules and terms for the selection process can be found on one of the sponsor websites, which indicate that selections are based on two rounds of preferential votes before final selections are made by a final vote among members of a programming team:
An online article indicates that Nikki Carbonetta (along with David Katz) is a member of the programming team. She was a make-up artist on the 2009 pandemic movie Carriers (39% Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes). I am sure other members of the programming team are known and could be found out with a better search.
Those are the two people I found.
If you go searching a bit more on one of those names, you’ll probably stumble upon the name in this chat transcript from an anti-vaxxer Zoom call I mentioned above.
Who uploaded it is a mystery and I’m a little shocked people used their real names, but it’s dated March 1, 2023.
19:47:51 From Nikki Carbonetta To All Panelists : Does the Spike from having had the virus cause the same damage?
…
21:00:02 From Nikki Carbonetta : Thank you three for being the heroes that U are!!!
There’s a second chat by the same anti-vax group dated April 22, 2022 as well:
19:58:14 From Nikki Carbonetta : Dr.Seneff you are the light and the way â¤ï¸Steve and team you too!
Dr. Seneff is someone who argued roundup caused covid-19.
There’s always the chance this is another person with the same name or I suppose someone impersonating them, but google only shows one person.
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