Cinema called antisemitic for dropping Jewish film festival over security concerns

[Frank Cox]

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/playhouse-cinema-hamilton-jewish-film-festival

A theatre in Hamilton Ontario cancelled a previously booked Jewish Film Festival after receiving threatening phone calls, emails and social media posts. So now the Jewish Film Festival folks are accusing the theatre of being antisemitic.

It seems these folks are in a no-win situation. Proceed at risk of having their theatre damaged or destroyed, or do what they did and cancel the showings and be accused of antisemitism.

Even telling someone at their first inquiry "your event may be controversial so we don't want to do it" could drop you into the same bowl of clam chowder.

Proceed and we'll destroy your theatre. Cancel or refuse at the outset and we'll destroy your reputation.

[Ryan Gallagher]

I think the real answer is to up the security footprint, but only if the festival is willing to foot that bill.

Cancelling doesn’t seem like the right call unless they are in no way prepared to plan for patron safety.

[Leo Enticknap]

I agree with Frank: it's a no win situation. Providing effective security for a film festival several days long is likely very pricey, and I also suspect that their insurance has an exclusion clause for terrorist incidents. Now that terrorist threats have been made, the local police could also be imposing costly demands on the venue, too.

It would seem to me that their only option would be to get out in front of the accusations (of anti-Semitism) with public statements to the effect that a movie theater is not an airport or a military base, meaning that the cost of mitigating terrorist threats is not baked in to their business model, and they don't have ready access to the expertise needed, even if they did have the money.

[Frank Cox]

Even with security provided (by who?) you still have the problem of what happens the following week after everyone involved has packed up their stuff and gone on their way.

The only workable solution I can think of would be for the film festival folks to put up a bond and indemnify the cinema - say, providing full insurance and security
for the next 10 years or so.

And I don't see how that would be practical.

So it's still a no-win situation.

Glad it's not me, I guess.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Security of your patrons and your staff should be your number one priority as a theater owner, everything else is secondary. To me, the reaction of this Hamilton Jewish Federation and some of those politicians seem extremely asinine and petty. Drawing the "antisemitism" card here also seems completely unwarranted and unfounded. The tone of the messaging sounds extremely prerogative to me. I'd personally reconsider if I'd ever do business with them again, not because I'm antisemitic, but I'm allergic to hypocrisy.

I'd rather risk people calling me an "antisemitist", rather than risk something bad happening at a place I'd own. Also, in consideration of business continuity: It's important for your patrons to feel safe at your place. Once something bad happens at your place, you can be certain that people will stay away in droves for a considerable while...

[Leo Enticknap]

To me, the reaction of this Hamilton Jewish Federation and some of those politicians seem extremely asinine and petty. Drawing the "antisemitism" card here also seems completely unwarranted and unfounded.

Put yourself in their shoes for a moment: the festival has just been canceled from under them due to events that were not their fault and they had no control over (terrorist threats), and now pretty much every venue in which it could be held is not going to have anything to do with them, for the reasons you give. If it can't be held somewhere, the terrorists have achieved their objective. So of course the festival organizers are going to use whatever language they feel they have to in order to bring the issue to public attention.

[Marcel Birgelen]

I can put myself into their shoes and I can understand their frustration, but that's no excuse for something that with all information available right now, amounts to false accusation down to possible outright slander. I even think that putting those words out there will not help them in any way, quite the opposite.

There is a fundamental difference between claiming that "antisemitism" in general has won, since "the terrorists" have apparently won and accusing the cinema of antisemitism, just because they kindly refused to be the ones holding the biggest bag if shit would've gone south. For the cinema, the situation would probably not be different if this would've happened to the local Bingo Association...