The centrist founder of Operation HOPE, a Los Angeles-based financial literacy organization, opines about America and the Middle East: "America protects our flag, and even our currency from degradation,
but somehow we have not yet seen the wisdom of protecting the 1.5
billion people who practice an otherwise peaceful religion called Islam,
both here and around the world, from the il[l]-conceived and wrong-headed
'so-called' religious views of a recent local nutcase with a camera,
here in the U.S. As a friend told me, if someone in the Middle East published a film
saying these same things about Jesus Christ, more than 20% of
Christians would be standing on the edge of insanity, having to be
talked down from their emotional ledge, and walked back from irrational
actions."
He argues that entrepreneurship must be encouraged in the Middle East, as it is in America: "That said, the real problem was and is not the American nutcase,
nor his Libyan counterparts -- but rather the utter lack of hope, a
legacy of poverty, a lack of opportunity and aspiration, and no new jobs
throughout the Middle East. Think about this -- no real job growth, for a region that will soon
be 60% under the age of 25. There is no larger national security
threat that a region that is 60% under the age of 25, with no
aspirations (at least not positive ones), no opportunity, no jobs,
little exposure to the broader world, and too much time on their hands.
This doesn't just 'not work' in the Middle East, it doesn't work here
in the United States of America either. What the Middle East needs now are not so different from what
American inner-city youth need now, or what the poor and discouraged
youth in Paris and European suburbs need now - and that comes down to
aspiration, hope and opportunity. More " specifically, JOBS."
John Hope Bryant: "My Week In The Middle East & USA"
