Voices of Tolerance from Promoting Tolerance Current Fellows
Watch and read the voices of tolerance of the fellows of the Promoting Tolerance Programme 2017. Find below interviews and quotes with fellows from Turkey, Ukraine, Georgia, Lithuania and Poland.
The topic of the 25th edition of the Programme is “Confronting Bigotry and Intolerance in the Face of Rising Populism”. First we focused on the challenges that populism creates in the different countries.
The main challenge comes from the government in the moment, they make use of the fragmentation of the society, instead of curing the fault lines, they create earthquakes in society.
For me one of the biggest threats of populism is the destructive populist competition.
The lack of power and courage to do reforms is the biggest threat.
We need to be more successful in communicating with our constituencies than the populists. It means more engagement and listening. We need to learn their concerns, not demonize the voters of populist parties.
We should get rid of echo chambers and tunnel views. We should not speak only to the people like us, but we should speak with the people, who are not like us.
Furthermore, we asked the fellows about their proposals on ways to confront bigotry and intolerance in the face of rising populism. Find below some of their replies.
Education is the key shield and weapon for confronting bigotry and intolerance.
A long term solution to fighting populism is education. Furthermore, show the real consequences of populist policies and as well present the truth.
We should teach young people that empathy, understanding, talking to each other is good.
All solutions must come from grass roots movements.
Promoting Tolerance is relevant today, because it is the best way to promote open societies, which allow for both personal and economic development. An open society is the best way to achieve prosperity in the future through tolerance, openness, more economic and civil freedoms.
Promoting tolerance is relevant today, because there are still many excluded groups, which are discriminated for their otherness.
Promoting tolerance is relevant today, because tolerance is the only approach, which highlights the individualism and respects the autonomy of an individual.
Watch below voices of tolerance in a series of videos, devoted to the quarter of a century of the Programme. The videos include full recordings of 25th Anniversary (including the keynote speeches and panel discussion) and a series of interviews with high-level guests, alumni, panellists, current fellows, FNF and AJC representatives. All videos can be found in the YouTube playlist below on our FreedomTV Europe channel.