{"id":43176,"date":"2026-04-24T08:57:43","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T06:57:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wearewater.org\/insights\/water-has-urgent-stories-be-the-one-to-tell-them\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T11:12:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T09:12:26","slug":"water-has-urgent-stories-be-the-one-to-tell-them","status":"publish","type":"waw_insight","link":"https:\/\/www.wearewater.org\/br\/insights\/water-has-urgent-stories-be-the-one-to-tell-them\/","title":{"rendered":"Water has urgent stories. Be the one to tell them"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"We

In every edition of the We Art Water Film Festival, we discover stories that explain, denounce and illuminate paths of solidarity and resilience. \u00a9 MD sajjad hossain<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>

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Many of us have never experienced what it means to be surrounded by contaminated water or to see our loved ones fall ill because of a lack of access to safe drinking water. We can imagine what it is like to live without water, sanitation and hygiene, but more than 6 billion people worldwide, according to JMP data, most likely do not experience this in their daily lives; some of us have never suffered it.<\/span><\/p>\n

In many regions of the world, millions of women ask themselves every day whether the wells they walk for hours to reach will dry up. What will the next journey be like? Many Indigenous communities are displaced by extractivism, and their demands remain ignored and concealed by unchecked economic interests.<\/span><\/p>\n

The works of the <\/span>We Art Water Film Festival<\/span><\/a> have revealed many of these invisible stories: painful accounts that do not appear in the media and rarely become trending topics, despite their gravity.<\/span><\/p>\n

Across five editions \u2014 now entering the sixth \u2014 the 156 finalist short films show that three minutes can be enough to denounce, move, and open our eyes to our complex and conflict\u2011ridden relationship with water.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n

\"We

The Mithi River<\/span><\/a> in Mumbai runs through informal settlements such as Dharavi, which covers more than 216 hectares, and was considered, in 2012, the largest slum in Asia. \u00a9A.Savin<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>

Rivers turned into sewers<\/h2><\/div>

Rivers, t<\/span>he veins of the Earth<\/span><\/a> and the essence of our lives, have been the cradle of many civilisations. Today, however, they are also the mirror of a silent crisis. River pollution is a widely documented problem, yet its true magnitude remains unknown to much of the world. In the most recent edition of the Festival, several short films starkly showed how life around many rivers has become almost impossible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some of these accounts reveal a painful truth: the rivers that sustain the lives of millions of people are languishing in silence. And yet their stories rarely make the headlines. You can watch the short films at the links:<\/span><\/p>\n