Tonight I’m recalling warm Warner Bros. memories.

 

Working there was a lot like being on the Starship Enterprise. It was a physical manifestation of IDIC (Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations) in Action!

 

I was just lying in bed thinking about some of the people I met, knew and adored at Warner Bros. when I worked there between 1994 and 1999 and then again from 2000 to 2004.

 

Names like Moshe Rosenthal (from Israel), Sean Sharifian (from Iran), Phannuel Gbewonyo (from Africa) and others floated in to warm my heart.

 

Moshe gave me a small multi-color glass vial that he bought in Israel. I cherish it to this day.

 

Phannuel always had the biggest smile every time I saw him, as did Sean Sharifian.

 

I imagine, now, that they were all living a dream while working at WB, as I was.  We all seemed to be one big happy international family.

 

And then 9/11 happened

 

Suddenly, there were police at the gates wielding those undercarriage mirrors that you see in the Middle East and other war-torn places where car bombs are a constant threat.

 

And there were security guards looking in trunks and the interior of our vehicles.

 

Word was that there might be “sleeper cells” embedded in large communication companies, so no stone was left unturned in routing them out.

 

I could well imagine that every foreigner’s credentials were scoured again, and that each of my international friends was called in and grilled.

 

And I was heartbroken.  I went to each of them to see how they were getting by. They assured me they were okay, but some of the light had gone out of their faces.  I suppose other people started to view them  in a different (paranoid) light, even though they remained after the scrutiny ended. I let them know that I had their backs and to let me know if anyone gave them grief.

 

Candlelight Vigil

 

When the hijackers were identified as Saudi Arabia citizens, I walked around my condo complex to let the 250+ families there know that I was going to hold a candlelight vigil that evening in the parking lot for whoever wanted to join it. I felt helpless to do anything else, but this was something I could do in response to the event.

 

The people who joined the vigil were mostly international, military veterans , or recent immigrants. One woman was from the Middle East; she was wearing the traditional head covering and had been in tears, I could tell.

 

I asked her if she had been harassed. She said, “No. Thankfully.”

 

Then she said, “I left everyone I loved and everything I knew  to come here to get away from this kind of madness. And now here it is.”

 

I teared up. I knew her story wasn’t unique. Many others had done the same thing, looking for a life in a land that didn’t include murderous hatred and bigotry.

 

The American Dream had become a nightmare overnight for so many of them… Even today, nearly 20 years later, they’re viewed with suspicion, feared and hated.

 

I watched as America turned a tragic event into a crusade, into the rationale for permanent paranoia and xenophobia.

 

No one born since then, including my two grand nieces, has any idea of what America was like before 9/11

 

Not that it was perfect, but it was heading in the right direction, thanks to series like Star Trek which offered us a different, more hopeful future. At Warner Bros. we were becoming a Starship Enterprise, with people from all over the world working together in harmony to make beautiful music, movies, and TV shows together.

 

I want to see that happening again all over this nation. I want people to embrace IDIC, to celebrate the rich multicultural heritage that drew so many people to these shores from all over the world.

 

I hope my grand nieces someday live in a nation (and a world) that celebrates and embraces diversity. The Biden-Harris administration has rekindled my hope that they will … perhaps not in my lifetime, but in theirs.

 

Warner Bros. had the right idea

 

Alas, Paramount didn’t seem to embrace the concept, even though it was the home of Star Trek.

 

When I visited a Star Trek (motion picture) producer’s inner sanctum, nearly every person in the place (and there were at least thirty in there) was a white male. There may have been an Asian male or two, but what I noticed most starkly was a sea of white male faces.  There were zero females.  I was completely stunned by that.

 

I had expected another Warner Bros.  — people of different nationalities and cultures, men and women.

 

I went away mighty disillusioned. I very much doubt that was the only room like that at Paramount.

 

At Warner Bros. in the MIS department alone, there were people from almost every corner of the world, except Antarctica.  People from Armenia (Caro Avanessian), from Europe (Fabio Ehrengruber); there was Marisol Galario, and the others already mentioned. There were people from Mexico, South America, you name it. It was absolutely wonderful!

 

And yes, there were plenty of LGBT folks at Warner Bros., too.

 

The more you meet people from other places and cultures, the sooner you discover we’re all pretty darned special and wonderful in countless ways.

 

People who can’t see that need to get outside their homogenous bubbles and discover the joy and wonder of diversity.

 

At Waltons’ Mountain Home