Our thought leader of the day is Hadiya Masieh, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Groundswell Project. The Project is committed to counter violent extremism with peace and community building. Hadiya’s vision is to build empathy among neighborhoods, helping people to celebrate their similarities instead of pointing out their differences. The Project is playing the long game, building systems to free people from prejudice, hate, and extremism.
Listen to Hadiyah and make our neighborhoods extraordinary!
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[00:01 - 07:34] Introduction
- Introduction of Hadiya’s story
- How she was influenced as a youth to join a non-violent extremist organization
- Hadiya explains how extremist organizations capture the idealistic views of young people
- How she removed herself from the extremist group
[07:35 - 12:35] Offering Solutions to the Passion of Youth
- Giving youth an alternative to radicalization
- Being on a quest… Asking yourself, “What do I do next?”
- Putting our passions into something positive
- Bringing others back to center and then on to a positive next stage
[12:36 - 21:03] Solutions Way Cooler Than Any Extremist Groups Can Offer
- Beating extremist groups at their own game
- Going into small communities of people… universities, neighborhoods that are places where there are low prospects for people
- Finding the people doing good in those communities and then help them flourish
- An explanation of how the Groundswell platform is structured
- How the Groundswell system promotes the cross-pollination between efforts in communities
- Connecting the dots in a given location so people know what good is going on around them
- Building a deterrents to hate and radicalization in our communities
[21:04 - 31:03] Some Antidotes to Hate
- A great example of people coming together around building a community garden
- People will protect the things they create together
- The story of Brad Galloway - former Neo-Nazi - who now helps bring people out of far-right, hate organizations.
- Life After Hate - organization in North America much like GroundSwell
[31:04 - 38:31] Where are the Peace Builders?
- The pretense of caring
- Facilitation - a puddle, makes a river, makes a sea
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