Peer-to-Peer Activity: Storytelling
Overview
Participants share personal experiences of situations pertaining to Commitment VII and how they handled it. Participants will view or listen to examples related to the topic of inciting hatred.
Competencies
- Participants identify examples that illustrate the impact of their words.
- Participants examine how cultural and environment-based factors affect how people interpret speech.
INTRODUCTION
- Begin the activity by sharing a success story about protecting a mosque in Sierra Leone. (See below or under Resources tab.)
- Alternatively, share the short film My Enemy, My Brother (see below or under Resources tab) to generate discussion about resisting hostility, hate, or violence and promoting understanding.
- Optional Slides (under Resources tab) may be used to guide participants’ Storytelling.
DISCUSSION
- Invite participants to share personal experiences pertaining to their commitment to avoid speech that can incite to violence or discrimination.
- Demonstrate this activity by sharing a personal story of your own choosing or guide participants’ sharing and subsequent discussion by asking questions under the Discussion Questions tab.
CONCLUSION
- Encourage participants to share insights with family, friends, or within their faith communities.
Sample Story: “Protecting a Mosque”
As an example of religious leaders publicly denouncing incitement to violence, the facilitator could refer to the mission report on Sierra Leone given by the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, Heiner Bielefeldt:
Some interlocutors mentioned the case of a Christian woman who claimed to have had a dream in which she had seen Muammar Gaddafi suffering in hell. From this alleged vision, the woman inferred that a particular mosque in Sierra Leone, which had been sponsored by Gaddafi, should be destroyed and replaced with a church. This strange incident, which attracted some publicity in the country, was generally recounted as a success story because the Christian churches in Sierra Leone had reacted rapidly in rejecting the woman’s antagonistic message, thereby defending their good relations with Muslims and the country’s religious harmony. The United Council of Imams explicitly praised the Christian churches for their quick and clear response.
Facilitator may guide participants’ sharing and subsequent discussion by asking the following types of questions:
- What types of hate speech are more likely to occur in your surroundings?
- What role does culture play in this area?
- How decisive is the role of the family in this respect?
- Can hate speech occur with good intent?
- Has there been a situation where you had to intervene to mitigate the consequences of incitement to violence in the name of religion?
- What is the role of social media in this respect?
- Can hate speech laws be abused to stifle dissent and target religious minorities?
- PDF: Module 7 Storytelling Slides
- Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, a story about Sierra Leone Christian leaders who protect a mosque (paragraph 26)
- Short film: My Enemy, My Brother (The film runs for 16:11 minutes.)
Internet connectivity is required to stream the short film, My Enemy, My Brother.
If it is not possible to screen this film during the session, participants can watch this film on their own prior to coming to the session. (The film’s length is about 16 minutes.) During the session, participants may summarize the film’s content before beginning their discussion.
Additional Tips for All Peer-to-Peer Activities
- The #Faith4Rights modules are flexible and require adaptation by the facilitators before their use. Case studies related to peer-to-peer exercises in the 18 modules need to be selected by the facilitators from within the environment where the learning takes place. The #Faith4Rights toolkit is a prototype methodology that requires contextualization, based on the text of the 18 commitments, context, and additional supporting documents.
- Not all issues raised need to be resolved. This would be an impossible and even a counterproductive target. The aim is rather to enhance critical thinking and communication skills, admitting that some questions could receive many answers, depending on numerous factors.
- Tensions may occur during discussions related to “faith” and “rights.” Most of these tensions are due to human interpretations. Learning sessions are spaces for constructive dialogue in a dynamic process where tensions can be reduced with the help of clear methodologies, including pre-emptive situation analysis and evidence of positive results in areas of intersectionality between faith and rights.
- When preparing the sessions, facilitators need to factor in the profile, age, and backgrounds of participants. Focused attention on the learning objectives can transform tensions into constructive exploration of new ideas.
- Meaningful engagement requires democratically pre-established rules. Facilitators should dedicate time with participants to elaborate these rules together at the outset and act all along the training as their custodians.
- The time frames suggested in this #Faith4Rights toolkit are merely indicative. Facilitators may adapt them freely to suit the needs of their group of participants. The key balance is between respecting the overall time frame while not cutting short a positive exchange momentum.
- To ensure optimal and sustainable benefit, facilitators may create a “training notebook” for participants during their peer-to-peer learning sessions. It would contain a compilation of templates to help participants keep track of what they have learned throughout the program and eventually use this notebook as their personalized follow-up tool.
- When technically feasible, facilitators are also advised to project the module under discussion on screen in order to alternate between discussions thereon and showing the audio-visual materials listed in each module or any other items selected by the facilitator.
- “Now this is the command: Do to the doer to make him do.” (Ancient Egyptian Middle Kingdom)
- “Repay injury with justice and kindness with kindness.” (Confucius)
- “What is hateful to you, don’t do to your friend.” (Talmud, Shabat, 31,a)
- “Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them and be influenced by them for good or ill.” (Buddha)
- “By self-control and by making dharma (right conduct) your main focus, treat others as you treat yourself.” (Mahābhārata)
- “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your kinsfolk. Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Leviticus 19:18)
- “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 7:12)
- “Ascribe not to any soul that which thou wouldst not have ascribed to thee, and say not that which thou doest not.” (Baha’u’llah)