NEWYORK: New York city Mayor Eric Adams said that hate has become the modern day COVID that is moving throughout our city and country and the globe at a pace that is alarming.
Speaking at “abate hate and hate violence summit” Mayor Adams said that hate has become so pervasive and comfortable and we have normalized hate. He said that there was no community that escapes the hate that we’re seeing.
He said that time has come to learn how to shake hands again.
“Let’s learn how to smile at each other again. Let’s learn how to hold the door for each other again. Let’s learn how to have a decent conversation with each other again and don’t look to prove someone is wrong. Let’s be a deep listener so we can understand so we can be understood. Let’s understand as human beings, there’s nothing written in our anatomy to state we must agree all the time. What we must not do is be disagreeable,” he said.
He said that last year we did something called breaking bread, building bonds and there were 1,000 dinners across the city at each dinner table was ten people that came from a different ethnic, religious, or cultural background, and they did something revolutionary.
He said that they talked to each other, shared a conversation, talked about what it is to be a Sikh, what it is to be a Muslim, what it is to come from the Caribbean or the African diaspora and they left the room becoming ambassadors for love instead of ambassadors for hate. “All of those small things are the basic principles that will allow us to win again,” he said.
“If we don’t become intentional and focus on the dismantling of hate, then we’ll never be the champions that we once were, he said adding that this is the greatest country on the globe, no other place is dream attached to its name and that dream should not be a nightmare that is rooted in hate.
He said that he is excited about what the future holds as we start the process of uniting our city, and it cascades throughout our entire country. “I think it cascades throughout the entire globe. It starts here in New York, one of the most diverse places on the globe. If we can live together in Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, Bronx, Staten Island, then we can live together across the seven continents of the globe,” he added.
