Blog: Featured Post

A Letter to College Students: 10 Ways to Side with Humanity

By Lonnie Ali and Daniel Lubetzky

Over the past two months, people of all races, ethnicities, and religions have experienced enormous pain and suffering. Acts of terror, war, and ensuing hatred have deepened the cracks that were already threatening to divide our communities.

You, our nation’s young people, have been implicated in this. The campuses on which you live, learn, and strive to become the people you want to be, have turned into battlegrounds. Some of you are angry. Some are scared for your lives. Others feel confused and alone.

This is not your fault. It is not one group’s fault. Extremist ideologies sow division wherever they go. Most of you are not radical. We see you. Most of you are compassionate. We hear you. The overwhelming majority of you want to supplant the forces that divide, destroy, and diminish with ones that unite, build, and bring light to the world. You want to replace polarization with problem-solving to benefit all people.

As a passionate Muslim and a passionate Jew, we have come together to humbly share a path forward for how to transcend the construct of “us vs. them” and side with humanity instead.

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End of Year Note 2023

Dear Friends,
As we approach the close of this tumultuous year, I am reflecting on the challenges we’ve experienced in pursuit of our mission to foster kindness in the US and across the world.

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Terrorist Attacks by Hamas- Builders vs. Destroyers

As someone who has dedicated my life to build bridges between people, most centrally among Israelis and Palestinians committed to resolve their conflict and build a better future for their children (ie., OneVoice & PeaceWorks Inc), I hope everyone will unanimously and vocally condemn the appalling terrorist attacks by Hamas. Hamas proudly targeted women and children as hostages. Ukrainian President Zelenskyysaid it best: terror like that perpetrated by Hamas must be eradicated or else violent extremism metastasizes and harms us all.

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You can’t make big ESG commitments while failing at the basics of kindness

Ultimately, what we achieve as corporate leaders, even in the form of social impact, must work hand in hand with how we go about achieving it. How we act along our journeys is at least as important as–if not more so than–the destination. For example, if we are donating a portion of profits to at-need communities, but not being open-minded, respectful, and honest in how we lead in the workplace, we risk undermining our larger goals by contributing to a disrespectful, intolerant, or unethical culture. In fact, a company with no stated social mission that is modeling positive values like integrity and respect may be doing more good for our world than one with a big ESG commitment failing at the basics of kindness.

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Americans think the “other side” is the problem when it’s really the solution

When we were building the OneVoice Movement in the Middle East, dignitaries, celebrities, and citizens alike joined us in asking Palestinians, Israelis, and global advocates for peace, “What are you willing to do to end the conflict?” The question was central to what became a movement of more than 650,000 people, from both sides of the conflict, who eventually realized the only real answer would require the individual involvement of all citizens – necessitating conversation, partnership, and even compromise with “the other side.”

How did we get to the point at which sworn enemies were willing to work together? And is this kind of partnership feasible in the United States where 4 out of 10 Americans think civil war is likely in the next ten years? The answer is yes, so long as all of us recognize just how wrong we’ve been about one another.

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The Media Is Over-Covering Divisiveness. It’s Going to Destroy Us

In 2000, President Clinton hosted a peace conference at Camp David that gave many hope for peace in Gaza; but a few months later, the Second Intifada, a major Palestinian uprising against Israel, began. Having been working in the region for decades to found and build PeaceWorks, a company that used market forces to foster peace between neighbors in the Middle East, I was confused and depressed by the news. On Western television, I saw pictures of ruthless violence and terrorism from Palestinians, giving me the impression, at least initially, that the moderates I knew had succumbed to extreme ways. But when I went to talk to my Palestinian friends, and they showed me what they were seeing on the television, I was shocked:. Their news programs depicted all Israelis as merciless killers.

On both sides of the conflict, the news media seemed like it exclusively published stories portraying the worst of the other side, characterizing all Palestinians or Israelis as hateful enemies. It turned out that my friends hadn’t changed at all; they just weren’t the ones the media were showing. And in portraying things falsely in such a negative light, the media fed the conflict rather than helping resolve it.

We Americans are now facing this same problem, with potentially devastating repercussions for our democracy and our ability to lead the free world.

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2022 High Point University Commencement Address

Today, I want to talk about a light and fluffy subject: your generation’s role in steering humanity in the right direction. No pressure, Dalton. 

But in all seriousness, Dalton, I love what you shared about “leaving everywhere you go better than you found it…and finding ways to give grace and inspiration to the people around you.”  

I want to talk today about HOW to do that as you are all simultaneously challenged and blessed with graduating as our world is re-entering a stage of dramatic consequence. 

The ship of humanity is moving in the wrong direction, and it will be upon all of you to steer it back on track. 

To illustrate this point, I want to compare the circumstances when my father’s generation came of age, to those when my generation and your generation graduated from college. 

My father was fifteen-and-a-half when he was liberated from the Dachau concentration camp by American soldiers. He was barely alive.  He never got to go to school past third grade, let alone college. Several of your grandparents were around your age when they were sent to free Europe from tyranny and darkness. 

By contrast, when I was fifteen years-old, my family immigrated to America from Mexico. I was able to attend college during a period when passionate but cordial debate was the norm. I remember observing political leaders vehemently disagree on a particular topic, while maintaining a friendship rooted in respect. Our world was far from perfect – but the arc of human progress trended in an upward direction. Freedom, open markets, human rights, civility, and the quest for knowledge were all advancing.  

It seemed almost too good to be true.  In fact, it was so good that we began to lose sight that Our Great American Experiment isn’t so much a fixed state of affairs as it is a purposeful daily affirmation – something that we opt into, live out, and vote for not once every four years, but every single day – through how we engage with one another. 

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