July 6th 2023

Friends,

I have found myself leaning hard into the word Comrade recently.

It slips easily from my lips as I talk with our unshakeable team, unyielding filmmakers and a wider community of stubborn social justice colleagues.

So, with a wide grin, I recently learned that ‘Comrade’ has the same Latin root as the word ‘Camera’. They both derive from ‘in the same room’ — those that are in it together —and indeed, we are all on the same beautiful, fragile planet.

And so let me begin again.

Dearest Comrades,

The community who receives these emails hardly need a heightened sense of urgency. These days we are all circling hard discussions about the collapse of climate systems, the retreat of democracy, and misinformation out of control. But speaking for myself, I have news which has made me more aware than ever that There. Is. No. Time. Like. The. Present.

What follows is both an announcement and an invitation.

The announcement: Today I am sharing that I’m currently under the care of a neurosurgeon because like 300,000 others every year around the world, I’ve been diagnosed with a brain tumour. I’m stepping back from Doc Society — after 18 years of nonstop creative collaboration, dedicated craft, joyous partying and fierce camaraderie. You may know that for years 6 women directors - Beadie, Maxyne, Megha, Sandra, Shanida, and myself - have been leading the organisation in a flat power-sharing model. So I can do this, knowing that someone else will step in to be unfeasibly late for meetings and break the printer constantly.

Whether you know me from a distance or up close and personal, I want to acknowledge that as a newsletter announcement, this is pretty heavy stuff. But know that I am extremely calm and have literally everything I need around me. My poetry and philosophy texts are an important part of that and I’ve found myself returning to Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius, who wrote these words almost 2000 years ago:

"In the end, what would you gain from everlasting remembrance? Absolutely nothing. So what is left worth living for? This alone: justice in thought, goodness in action, speech that cannot deceive, and a disposition glad of whatever comes.""

Take a deep sigh if you need one but what I really want you to do is read on…

The invitation: The leadership at Doc Society has never been more certain of the way forward for us as a team: As one committed part of a rising and ever more interconnected global documentary community.

Together we and our international partners are ready to triple down, right now, to deliver vital system-shifting narrative change work.

Doc Society Mission:

We bring people together to unleash the transformational power of documentary film.

We stand in solidarity with filmmakers and work to unite them with new friends and allies, building new models globally.

We aim to innovate, share and innovate again.

A commitment to anti-racism, economic & climate justice is embedded in and informs all we do.

Last week we announced the launch of a global Democracy Story Unit to sit alongside our Climate Story Unit. To deal with the climate crisis and realise a just transition, the world needs more democracy; the negotiation of a new social contract between people and the state. Doc Society is centering all we have learnt in narrative strategy over the past two decades to help address these two critical and intertwined issues.

This year, in collaboration with the incredible D.I.S.C.O network (Decentralised Independent Story + Culture Organisers) we are also deep into the Independence Project – a co-created global research project that will, for the first time, fully articulate the unique and vital contribution to society, culture and democracy of independent film. To create a manifesto and directly demand the support we need from distributors, funders and commissioners to help us build a new, equitable, and politically protected indie media distribution system.

Comrades, we know that your work is as vital and urgent as our own. How about we triple down and build rocket boosters for our shared work together right now?

We — the team, our boards and our partners — are ready to hear from you and have our emails below ready and waiting.

I’m signing off with music and poetry. This playlist is a slice of the crazy good tracks that Doc Society has spun at our events, labs and parties over our first 18 years starting with “Work” by Honey Dijon. And anyone who has ever been to a Good Pitch or any of our other convenings knows that poetry runs through our work like spring water. This is from “For the Children” by the Beat poet and ecologist Gary Snyder:

To climb these coming crests
one word to you, to
you and your children:

stay together
learn the flowers
go light

With Love & Rockets

Jess Search
Co-founder Doc Society