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Constantin von Barloewen's
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QuestionHow can the decent people of the world help each other while the actions of their leadership are self-serving and internationally divisive? Bo ChamberlainAnsweroriginal language english
Constantin von Barloewen: There are possibilities today to use technical connections wisely, the internet proves that these possibilites exist, that everybody can reveal his/her opinion in public. Of course it is a fallacy to believe that the modern forms of the digital revolution, of the internet, of the mass communication, of the TV, of the radio, of MTV, of CNN, of the movie industry, briefly, the fact that people get closer to one another, that they travel more, to the farthest places in the world, to Surinam, to Butang. All these technical, this getting-closer-technically has not led to the fact that people dealt with one another more peacefully, on the contrary, the past decades have shown growing ethnic-religious conflicts, fundamentalism as a form of anti-modernism in the islamic states, in Algeria, in Iran. People don't get closer to one other in the context of an interreligious and intercultural dialogue because of the possibilities of digitality, on the contrary, they drift apart, that is to say the soul does not seem to catch up, the technical possibilities of the digital revolution and of the mass media don't lead to a fraternization of people, they even seem to lead to an alienation. This is deplorable if we think about the meaningful and peacemaking possibilities technology can have, however not necessarily; and the main concern can only be how to use technology so that it will contribute to peace and this modest attempt today is an attempt to use the digital revolution in the context of a policy promoting peace. But we experience this paradox very clearly, that the technological pinnacle of the media industry, that the getting-closer because of many travels does not free us from an increase of fundamentalism or ethnic-religious conflicts, from the particularisation, the balkanization of the world. This balkanization has increased in the past three decades, it has not decreased despite of the digital revolution. This is alarming.
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