Well-known filmmaker and activist Michael Moore is in west Michigan on Wednesday night, kicking off a series of events focused on public policy.
The event, called ‘It Only Hurts When I Laugh,’ brings Moore to Kalamazoo to talk Flint’s water crisis and disparities in low-income communities.
The series is titled, 'Coming Together or Pulling Apart: Making Public Policy Work for Everyone'. It's presented by Western Michigan University’s Lewis Walker Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnic Relations and other partners.
Tim Ready is the institute’s director.
"This is really inspired by the times that we’re living in. The political discourse is getting kind of wild, and people are dissatisfied."
"And people have different solutions, or think that they have different solutions to the problem. But at the base there’s a lot of the same issues, I think."
Ready says the series hopes to take that dissatisfaction and direct it into positive change. How can we use public policy as a tool to do better?
"We want to say - what are the common denominators?"
"Let’s get beyond the left and the right fighting and all of that, and say – what are the moral issues? What do we want for our society? And can’t we do better?"
Michael Moore speaks at 7:30 p.m. at the Miller Auditorium.
The event is free and open to the public.
Registration is encouraged, which you can do online at WMich.edu/WalkerInstitute.
