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Derby Open Centre
Promoting understanding through personal experience
Prejudice comes from ignorance, lack of understanding and fear of the unfamiliar. The best way to overcome and prevent prejudice is to enable people of all ages to meet those they see as different from themselves.
The Open Centre provides opportunities for people to meet members of the many communities that make up our city, to find out about their backgrounds, to talk over differences and to discover the common ground we share.
With our visits, workshops, talks and speaker panel we work with people of all ages, from primary school to those who have retired - and many public and private sector organisations use our services.
Over 100,000 school pupils and adults have used the resources of the Open Centre since it opened in 1981.
We are not a faith-based organisation but our services include visits to places of worship (Mosques, Mandirs, Gurdwaras, Churches) because religion is important to many people in many communities.
Things have changed a lot since 1981 - just as we cannot assume that those whose grand parents were born in Britain are active Christians (in fact the majority are not) so we cannot assume that those whose grand parents came from the Indian sub-continent are active Hindus or Muslims.
Each of us is an individual, not a stereotype. It is contact between individuals, and understanding between communities, that the Open Centre is all about.
Respect is a two-way street
Respect is not something given by default - it must be earned by communities and individuals based on what they do, not on what they say or claim to believe.
Respect between communities is a two-way process and it is not sufficient for the wider community to make contact with, find out about and understand the minority communities that make up our city.
We see lack of understanding and distortion of views on all sides and we often hear: "they do this, they think that" with no evidence at all.
Our aim is to be a two-way street: as much to enable those within our ethnic minority communities to find out about, and properly understand, the views of the many different groups outside those communities as it is the other way round. Only if we properly understand one another can we engage in genuine dialogue - or it becomes an argument between those who are deaf to the views of others.
We want atheists to understand Muslims, Muslims to understand atheists, Christians to understand Hindus. Hindus to understand Christians - on fact, everyone to understand everyone. We must be open and honest about the world views we share, and about the world views that make us different. However, we are all bound by the moral and legal rules of our shared society.
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