SYDNEY SIEGE PROMPTS #BETHEBRIDGE GROUP TO URGE AUSTRALIANS TO BUILD STRONGER COMMUNITY TIES by Anne Barker A new group representing key religions and faiths has urged Australians to build stronger community ties in the wake of last months siege in Sydney. The group called #BeTheBridge includes members of Australias Muslim, Jewish, Christian and atheist communities. Members gathered on the steps of the Sydney Opera House earlier to call for more empathy and tolerance of different religions and cultures and greater efforts to eradicate ignorance. The group includes Gill Hicks, an Australian who lost her legs in the 2005 London terrorist bombings almost 10 years ago. We need to have a greater understanding of the other, she said. Because while there is any division ever in the world when we say its an us and a them culture, then there is a need to bridge that divide. Ms Hicks has urged Australians to embrace those who are different. I think that they are already there and ready to receive, she said. Just go that extra step - find someone you dont know, say tell me about you, learn some more before you presume theyre someone to fear. Rabbi Zalman Kastel from Sydneys Jewish community said the campaign builds on the positive sentiment that emerged on social media after the recent siege, including the #illridewithyou hashtag on Twitter. Its great to ride with someone but we really need to know each other, he said. We really need to take the time to actually get together. And were symbolising that today with this group. Were going to be the bridge. And were encouraging other people to be the bridge as well. RABBI SAYS ITS A LONG-TERM PROJECT He said while people were tolerant they needed to make a greater effort to get to know others properly. I think we have a healthy sense of tolerance, but not enough of a sense of wanting to really get to know people that appear different to ourselves from different cultures, he said. People can happily be in parts of Sydney and never actually get out of their house to meet anybody thats from another suburb. Some people mix a lot but theres a lot of self-segregation as well, that serves no purpose. Its a long-term project. He said the consequences of not getting to know people better included hatred, ignorance and fear. We get fragments of information about other people and then we generalise, he said. I mean our minds automatically fill in the rest of the picture, unless we have other experiences – positive experiences. In my own case, before I got out of my comfortable bubble in St Ives I didnt know any Arabic people, any Aboriginal people. They werent part of my radar, part of my world. Ms Hicks said her greatest gift after the London bombing was to wake in hospital without hatred or bitterness. She hopes to use her own experience to make a difference among others. I would like to say just how proud I was as an Australian to have my colleagues in other parts of the world email me, text me, when the responses from the Australian people were coming through after the siege and say wow, look at how Australia has responded, she said. And I think for me it absolutely resonated with the idea that we cant control random acts of extreme violence but we can control how we react and how we respond. And as horrific as that (the siege) was, that weve lost precious lives, we responded as a nation exemplarily, and the rest of the world watched that and took note. So something for Australia to feel, in the depths of how horrible that was, to feel a sense of pride in our unity. Similar campaigns have been launched overseas. Source: abc.net.au/news/2015-01-06/sydney-group-tries-to-forge-stronger-community-ties-after-siege/6002690
Posted on: Tue, 06 Jan 2015 06:01:29 +0000
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