Harness Community

Community dinnersfrom march to july, harness hosted intimate gatherings in la, nyc and oakland with 100 influential activists, artists, and media leaders in our community. These dinners facilitated reconnection with our community, unveiling a resounding desire for belonging in a values-aligned community and a hunger for spaces to gather and feel cared for. The community requested support in advancing narrative change and intersectional organizing around issues such as bodily autonomy, protecting democracy, criminal justice reform, and more, which informed our programming for the year.

Industry power gatheringfrom october 19-20, harness, in collaboration with the pop culture collaborative, convened 30 leaders championing narrative change in hollywood from bipoc-led and/or centered organizations. In the wake of industry strikes and reduced dei commitments, this moment is crucial for building collective power, shared learning, and developing of impactful strategies to guide our field forward.participants represented the narrative change ecosystem, including executives of strike-friendly production companies, producers, distributors, writers, showrunners, strategists, and organizers, coming together to discuss priorities and strategies to enhance narrative power in the entertainment industry. We will leverage insights from this gathering to inform our industry impact initiatives.

Educational salonsbuilding on priorities that emerged from the community dinners, harness organized two salons to mobilize artists and influencers to shape the public narrative on bodily autonomy. In partnership with the aclu and harness community experts, the new york city salon, moderated by america ferrera, featured renee bracey sherman of wetestify, activist and author raquel willis, chase strangio - deputy director for transgender justice with the aclu, and j.j. Straight - deputy director of the liberty division of the national aclu. The la salon, co-hosted by laverne cox, aimed at transforming storytelling in tv and film. Both events saw 60 participants committing to over 150 actions to advance narrative strategy and advocacy campaigns, focusing on addressing escalating attacks on transgender rights and reproductive justice in the conversation.harness retreatover three days in october, our annual harness retreat took place at 1440 multiversity in the california redwoods, hosting 110 artists and movement leaders. The retreat, co-created with participants, prioritized fostering a sense of belonging, in-person connection, inspiration, strategizing, and dreaming a vision of a liberated future. The retreat is where the foundational relationships of the harness community are formed, where we unearth innovative collaborations and where we identify the priorities that drive our future work. 98% of attendees stated that the retreat met or exceeded their expectations.a few of the collaborations sparked during harness retreat weekend: - strategizing on narrative change interventions for the 2024 election - organizing a trip to the u.s.-mexico border to advance conversations around immigration reform - expanding the network of native voices represented in hollywood - creating music and art installations showcasing the work of bipoc women across the rural south - launching a campaign to tackle pay and budget transparency in film and television - working with bipoc artists to deepen work on criminal justice reform, racial and gender justice, and reproductive justice