Yesterday, on January 19th, 2019 DNH attended to #WomensMarch2019 and marched to end the violence against women in which one of our DNH founders, Tuana, volunteered.
We also marched to achieve LGBTQIA rights, worker’s rights, civil rights, reproductive rights, disability rights, immigrant rights and environmental justice for all women.
A desire to suppress something comes from hate, and hate comes from fear. And don’t forget, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” -Martin Luther King, JR.
We visited Ambassador Carlos Garcia -Secretary General United Nations Association of El Salvador- in his office. Mr. Ambassador told his journey and explained his vision, seek to strengthen universal peace. He greatly encouraged DNH and gave his critical advise. It’s the first step and we hope to work together with Mr. Ambassador so we can make youth more involved in peace projects and decision making processes.
Consulate of El Salvador in New Jersey, the Consulate General of Mexico in New York and the United Nations Association of El Salvador (UNA-SV) in collaboration with Union County College, Grito Cersa and Vocal Music Studio, had organized the First International Youth Concert for Peace, which held on Saturday, December 8, 2018, at the Auditorium of the Union County College,
The purpose of the concert was to empower young Latinos and other minorities living in New Jersey, through art, music and culture in which the spirit of brotherhood, solidarity and peace prevail in all hearts.
DoNotHate was invited to this great event by Ambassador Carlos Garcia, Secretary General of the United Nations Association of El Salvador. We had a chance to meet with new people including Annette Quijano who is the Deputy Majority Leader at New Jersey Legislature General Assembly. We send our thanks to everyone who has played a role in organizing this amazing event.
DoNotHate held its DoNotBully Campaign at Thomas Edison Energysmart Charter School (TEECS) in Somerset, New Jersey from Nov 12 through Nov 16.
The weeklong event included the hanging of a school pledge signed by students with their hand prints, a symbol of putting a stop to bullying.
The week continued with a school assembly with a presentation and dance performance about bullying and its effects.
“Don’t speak to me about your religion; first show it to me in how you treat other people. Don’t tell me how much you love God; show me in how much you love all His children” says Senator Booker.
On August 8th, Wednesday, we went to Senator Cory Booker’s office. As New Jersey’s first black senator, he first was elected in first 2013 and then got re-elected in 2014. While having an academic background in Stanford, Oxford, and Yale, he is a very active and influential person in society.
In his office, we met with Imani R. Oakley: a constituent Advocate at U.S. Senate. She is, indeed, is responsible for leading the Senator’s youth outreach. She opened her doors to us to discuss our future projects and our goals. The meeting was very efficient since we had a chance to both introduce ourselves and get an information on how we can be more productive in the society as DoNotHate and reach out to new people.
We believe we can only overcome hate and anything that comes from hate by reaching out to as many people as we can, especially the youth. Our beautiful differences make us unique in so many ways and they shouldn’t be used as a barrier to divide us into categories; instead, they should unite us.
We send our love and thanks to Senator Cory Booker and Imani R. Oakley for having us and supporting our journey! As United We Stand, we will defeat hate. Join us on our journey!
The article about our visit to Beth Tikvah at Wayne Today newspaper.
As Do Not Hate we attended to Friday Service in Temple Beth Tikvah as a guest of Rabbi Meeka who we interviewed and have been in contact with for some time. We had the opportunity to get to know each other in person, which was just amazing. Rabbi Meeka is one of our biggest supporters on our way to spread our goal and try to reach out to as many people as we can. She is such a wonderful, brave and a loving person. As Do Not Hate, we have the desire of; a world without hate, a world where everyone has mutual respect for each other and accepts one another. And by every step we get closer to our goal. As united we stand against hate.
Last week, we had the wonderful opportunity to talk with John Rogers, an associate pastor at the First Congregational Church of Montclair. We got his take on hate and hate crime and also discussed some contemporary issues. A couple minutes into the conversation it was obvious that he was someone who is dedicated to making the world a better place and teaching the youth to be more accepting and open minded. We learned a lot from John and hope that you do too…
These past weeks, we have been working on our DoNotBully Campaign and yesterday, March 20th, we started Bullying Awareness week in our school for the first time. Our team worked so hard both physically and mentally to put up this week and make it both fun and serious. We did an assembly and we took a pledge to stop bullying. On Thursday we will have a confession circle in which students will come, sit and open up about their problems and experiences connected to bullying, hate or hate crimes! We will end the week on Friday, by having a dress-down to wear DoNotBully T-shirts
Last week, we had a chance to meet and interview Rabbi Meeka Simerly. She is sincere, heartfelt, and passionate. When we interviewed her, we saw a strong woman approaching life with much energy, creativity and enthusiasm; a leader without any vanity.
Rabbi/cantor Meeka Simerly is a Reform Rabbi at Temple Beth Tikvah Wayne, NJ, who is dedicated to her job. She is a woman who devoted herself to love and peace.
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