Page 4 - UNESCO-JFLH

Beyond Coexistence

to Tolerance

26D05 김세경

Beyond Coexistence to Tolerance

26D05 김세경

In 1950, the Korean war occurred, and made one in every five people in Korea
into a victim, because of ideological confrontation. A few weeks ago, on May 25, the

Minneapolis officer arrested George Floyd and made him unable to breathe by keep-
ing his knee on Floyd’s neck. Just because he was Black. Right now in Germany, there

is a far-right political party, named Alternative f r Deutschland, which is nationalistic,
populistic, and racist. All these things have resulted from a lack of tolerance. The

tolerance for the various ideas, various races, and various cultures.

People sometimes mistake that tolerance and coexistence are the same
things. You have to understand that these two concepts are completely different.

Coexistence is just locating in the same place. On the other side, tolerance requires
a much deeper understanding of each other. Various ethnic groups are now living

together in America, but countless of racist attacks are happening. They are coexist-
ing, but not tolerating each other. One human quality the world must pursue for the

better place is tolerance, not coexistence.

However, it is not easy to say ‘Embrace and tolerate everything from now on!’,
because lots of opponents and various perspectives exist. So it is important to hear

and see other examples. You can’t embrace if you don’t know, but you can embrace
as much as you know.

So this world that we live in, this world in which every conversation has the

potential to devolve into an argument, where our politicians can’t speak to one an-
other and where even the most trivial of issues have someone fighting both passion

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