Filmmakers Lily Qi and Sarabi Woods covering events in downtown Chicago for
Activism Now. David A. Holcombe When the Black Lives Matter and other social justice uprisings hit Chicago last year, the creators at Soft Cage Films were ready. The nonprofit film production company has been documenting social change, combating oppressive systems, and amplifying underrepresented voices of color in film through experimental techniques, artistic collaboration, and engaging storylines since its founding in 2012. Before 2020, the team worked in person all over the city and produced a wide array of films including a musical inspired by real events of police torture at Homan Square and the community work to stop it, a drama about a revolutionary street artist s fight against capitalism, and a supernatural horror film that was the group s first feature
I bring up this tired old cliché because of its applicability to the Parentis, father and son. The father, Michael Parenti, is a hardcore Communist activist who wrote for the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) theoretical journal
Political Affairs among other CP publications. He is the author of 23 books (some used as college texts) and countless more articles. His specialized area of focus is on the structural class conflict of capitalist society and power. His communist affiliations were written up in the pioneering study book,
Covert Cadre” Inside the Institute for Policy Studies by S. Steve Powel, Green Hill Publishers Inc. The son, Christian, is a correspondent for