
Wendy Cohen 
Bio: Wendy Cohen is the Manager of Community and Alliances at Participant Media and the Founding Editor of this blog. She was born in raised in Montreal and 4 thrilling years in New York she moved to the west coast to join the Participant family. Wendy was previously the Community Manager at the Huffington Post and programmer of the Media That Matters Film Festival. She is the Founder and National Director of Screening Liberally and produced her first film in 2007 called Every Third Bite, which was hailed as a "better Bee movie" by New York Magazine. Wendy is very afraid of earthquakes, knows all the words to Grease 2 (don’t judge), always has a month-old New Yorker in her bag and loves pluots.
Recent Posts
Join us on Thursday, November 19th at 9PM EST/ 6PM PST as we continue our Food, Inc live chat series with Patty Lovera of Food and Water Watch and Megan Lott of the Community Food Security Coalition.
Food and Water Watch is a leading national advocacy organization working to ensure that schools can buy hormone-free and organic milk and the Community Food Security Coalition promotes farm to school programs in the Child Nutrition Reauthorization. Grab your friends and family to watch Food, Inc on DVD and then join our live discussion!
Here is how to participate:
1) On November 19th at 9 pm EST / 6pm PST go: http://www.livestream.com/foodinc
2) Type in your question to Patty and Megan to the right of the video player where it says “Type your chat message here”
3) You will see all of the questions, in real time, to the right of the video player
4) Patty and Megan will be taking the questions live, on camera
CATEGORIES: Culture, Global Health
In honor of Veterans Week, we are thrilled to have an exclusive sneak peak of the feature film Warrior Champions. This documentary tells the emotional and inspiring story of a group of severely wounded American Soldiers, as they fight to turn nightmares of war into Olympic dreams. Iraq War Veterans Kortney Clemons, Scott Winkler, Melissa Stockwell, and Carlos Leon, as little as a year after losing limbs and suffering paralysis fighting for their country in Iraq, have set out to do what many thought impossible; to compete in the 2008 Paralympic Games in Beijing.
CATEGORIES: Culture, Ethics
This is IAVA’s brand new PSA, created in partnership with the Ad Council. This Veterans Day, let’s show all veterans that we’ve got their back.
CATEGORIES: Ethics, Human Rights
Food Inc. on DVD from TakePart on Vimeo.
Want to win a free copy of the Food, Inc DVD? Find out how on the Huffington Post.
CATEGORIES: Culture, Environment
TwitCause is helping honey bees this week! For every tweet that includes #HelpHoneyBees between November 5th and November 11th, Häagen-Dazs will donate $1 to the Honey Bee Research Facility at UC Davis. This bee lab is doing amazing research into the causes of Colony Collapse Disorder in hoping to find a cure for this mysterious disease.
Bee populations are disappearing at alarming rates and since Häagen-Dazs relies on honey bees for many of the natural ingredients that go into their ice cream, they started HelpTheHoneyBees.com.
You can learn more about honey bee research from UC Davis on Twitter by following Kathy Keatley Garvey (@keatleygarvey).
Get tweeting and help keep these inestimable pollinators buzzing!
CATEGORIES: Culture, Environment
Love Stonyfield yogurt? Have questions about sustainable agriculture and organic farming? Well now is your chance to ask Gary Hirshberg co-founder and CE-Yo of Stonyfield Farm as well as the National Family Farm Coalition about food, food politics and Food, Inc.
Join us for a live chat with Gary on November 5th at 9PM EST/ 6PM PST. He will be accompanied by Josh Trought of the D Acres farm and supporter of the National Family Farm Coalition. Grab your friends and family to watch Food, Inc. on DVD and then join our live discussion! The DVD hits shelves Tuesday, November 3rd but is available for pre-order now. Thank you to Stonyfield Farm and National Family Farm Coalition for their support!
Here is how to participate:
1) On November 5th at 9 pm EST / 6pm PST go: http://www.livestream.com/foodinc
2) Type in your question to Gary and Josh to the right of the video player where it says “Type your chat message here”
3) You will see all of the questions, in real time, to the right of the video player
4) Gary and Josh will be taking the questions live, on camera
CATEGORIES: Culture, Environment
On the next episode of South Park, Stan and the fam visit the Denver Aquarium to swim with dolphins on Stan’s birthday. But things turn bloody when Japanese attack and kill all the dolphins, ruining the celebration. Apparently Stan makes it his mission to save the dolphins from the Japanese.
Sound familiar?
Don’t miss the all new episode, “Whale Whores” Premiering On Wednesday October 28 AT 10:00 P.M. On Comedy Central.
CATEGORIES: Culture, Ethics
Director Louie Psihoyos traveled to Japan for the premiere of The Cove at the Tokyo International Film Festival. When he arrived at the Tokyo airport, he pledged to give the town of Taiji profits from any Japanese screening of the film — if the town of Taiji ends the hunt.
Psihoyos told the Associated Press: “Any of the money that is generated out of Japan, if they stop dolphin-hunting, will go to Taiji.” He continued, “Once the Japanese people see this film … I think they will shut down the cove. “This is not an animal-rights film. This is a people’s rights film for the Japanese people.” You can read more from the AP here.
CATEGORIES: Culture, Environment, Ethics
The Cove will be screened in Japan for the first time as part of the Tokyo International Film Festival. The TIFF previously rejected the film but reversed its decision in September and they have included it in their lineup.
The Cove screening is set for Wednesday October 21, 10:30 am. Advanced tickets are already sold out but there will be “walk-up” tickets available on the day of the screening.
Louie Psihoyos, the director of the film, is attending the festival and will do Q&A session following the screening. According to a press release from the Oceanic Preservation Society, Psihoyos decision to attend the festival coincides with a recent letter of invitation that he has extended to Taiji’s Mayor, Town Council and local citizens for The Cove movie to be shown in Taiji. “The Japanese town of Taiji is testing its residents’ mercury levels for the first time,” said Psihoyos. “The issue of mercury-laden dolphin meat being sold in Taiji and across Japan, often as mislabeled whale meat, was exposed through the release of the film ‘The Cove’. The multi award-winning documentary reveals the connection between the capture of dolphins in Taiji and the poisoning of those that eat the toxic dolphin meat.“
Visit the TIFF website to learn more about The Cove screening.
CATEGORIES: Culture, Environment, Ethics
Yeah, you heard right. Participant went fruit picking over the weekend with Food Forward, an amazing LA based all volunteer grassroots group that gleans excess fruit from lovely properties they are invited to and donates 100% to local food pantries. On Sunday morning, we all met at a beautiful home in Sylmar to pick oranges and grapefruits. Here’s a little taste of our fruit picking fun! (and HUGE thanks to Yelena Rachitsky for these gorgeous photos!)

The fruit picking team!
CATEGORIES: Culture, Environment
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