Paradox of Tolerance?

[rjs330]

I think it's simpler than that.


If you are willing to tolerate my beliefs the social contract dictates I must tolerate yours.

What does tolerate mean in practice?

I think A is bad, you think A is just fine. As a mental exercise that's just fine. I can accept you think A is fine and I think it's bad. We can all get along.

Then you decide that since A is fine that we should allow A to be put into practice on a societal level and by putting A into practice on a societal level you now have created an at odds practice. And now I have to oppose you putting A into practice in society because I think A is bad for society. Now I am labeled as intolerant because don't want to allow you to do something that is harmful. By golly you are now going to force me to act tolerant because you believe it's good. And now I label you as intolerant.

We have just entered the real realm of practice. And we are leaving out a whole host of other problems.

True tolerance is never really put into practice because one side of an idea seems to always attempt at one time or another to force thier idea on others.

True tolerance is a pipe dream. Because we can always look back in history and see things that were tolerated that shouldn't have been by our standards today. Mistakes made in tolerance put into practice.


The subject always matters. We all can be tolerant of others ideas until those ideas are actually put into practice and the problems will arise.

 

[rjs330]

There is no paradox. The first meme is wrong because the answer is "Yes", a tolerant society should tolerate intolerance. The second meme is much more wrong, and frighteningly so.

Tolerance is very wrong. If anyone were to ever tell me they tolerated me, I'd be so insulted I'd wanna punch them in the nose.

How intolerant of you.

 

[Ana the Ist]

I think it's simpler than that.


If you are willing to tolerate my beliefs the social contract dictates I must tolerate yours.

Even if we express those beliefs?

 

[Merrill]

On a side-note, there are these concepts and phrases that the political left asserts about our government that are simply not true. It ties into this. Examples:

"Hate speech isn't protected by the First Amendment"!

I hear this one from leftists on tv, the Internet, etc. Reality:

1. There is NO concept of "Hate Speech" anywhere in the US Constitution, or even our laws. The very phrase "hate speech" is a leftist slogan, and not some real, legal concept. Some states have hate crimes, but that is something totally different. "Fighting words" or calls for direct, targeted violence, is not protected. But that isn't "hate speech"

"The Separation of Church and State"!

2. The phrase "separation of church and state" does NOT appear in the US Constitution anywhere. The phrase "a wall of separation between church and state" appears in an 1802 letter from Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Association.

The First Amendment reads "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;". And this contains the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause.

A close reading of this says that Congress cannot establish an official, national religion. There cannot be a Federal church, and no one can be compelled to join such a church. It does not say the government cannot in any way be involved in any religious matter.

 

[zippy2006]

True tolerance is never really put into practice because one side of an idea seems to always attempt at one time or another to force thier idea on others.

Tolerance in societies is both inescapable and unable to be absolutized. We must tolerate some things which are contrary to what we would prefer, and we must not tolerate everything which is contrary to what we would prefer. The reason our contemporary age has such difficulty with this issue is because we have been saturated with moral relativism and therefore have no ability to navigate issues of disagreement, coercion, tolerance, etc.

 

[Chesterton]

How intolerant of you.

Thank you. But don't even get me started on how I feel about lactose.

 

[LW97Nils]

There is no intolerance like leftist tolerance.

 

[FredVB]

Tolerance should be thought of as distinct from endorsement. One can argue against the position of others without persecuting them, too. But we should live without trouble among others who are different when they are not actually threatening us.

 

[timothyu]

So many seek attention for self while the majority would prefer to just ignore everyone.

 

[rambot]

Planning on killing us?

That's what I think. That question. That's what comes to mind for me.

Well, I'm not.
If you are convicted in your belief though, aren't you willing to die for it?

Are you willing to die for your stance on homosexuality?

I am MORE THAN willin to die for my belief in Christ and that he has died to take away my sin.... but for something like child baptism; a dogmatic question, no I'm not willing to die for that.

Our country has laws. We don't tolerate law breaking.

The second meme describes tolerance as a Social Contract. Much like

So what is it someone is thinking about when talking about not tolerating someone or some ideas in such a general context?

It's about not tolerating intolerance within our society and how we interact with each other.

If they sit on the other side of the aisle from me I see a meme that's trying to condition society into happily accepting my persecution and/or death so people won't blink an eye when they come to kill me.

To be clear, society has been happily accepting ACTUAL persecution of homosexuals for centuries.....and I'm really not sure what kind of persecution of Christians is ACTUALLY happenning in America right now. Considering how much power so many of us have in government and the fact that nobody is getting jailed for believing Christ died on the cross, I just don't see persecution.

How about instead of philosophical inquiry into general ideas about how it's cool to be intolerant, we just work on creating good public policies and learn to oppose views that are opposed to our own in a constructive manner?

Being intolerant of intolerance IS cool. It's why the United States went to war with the Nazis...it's EXPLICITLY why. Back then, many agreed Nazis were pretty terrible.


I mean ultimately if you have a SPIRITUAL problem with anything in the US, it is irrelevant to the legal status those things have a right to enjoy.

Opposing views, in and of itself, is one thing. But when those views affect the freedoms of others, it's not as simple as just "creating good public policy". Sensible gun control (I don't think gun violence is NECESSARILY a spiritual problem but...) is GOOD public policy, but folks will argue it infringes on the freedom of others.

 

[Hazelelponi]

I deleted my post hours ago.

 

[rambot]

I deleted my post hours ago.

I was looking at it during my lunch break and just finished up my last few ideas.

Apologies.

 

[Hazelelponi]

I was looking at it during my lunch break and just finished up my last few ideas.

Apologies.

No problem. I just decided against after posting. Sorry.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

I would love to be able to take credit for this but I cannot. I will post the meme below as it states things succintly and clearly.

However, I remember the first time I saw this. It was a few days after a discussion here on CF highlighted the idea for me:
View attachment 329750

Sadly, this didn't solve any kind of problems for me in my head. It was comforting to know that it was "a thing" but it didn't help me create an appropriate approach for dealing with intolerant people.

I realized though (after reading the meme below) that maybe we need to not be looking at tolerance as a moral construct. And really, why should it be a moral construct? There's nothing INHERENTLY moral about being tolerant any "everything". Not only that but tolerating something truly awful can very easily put ourselves in morally compromised positions. So maybe it isn't a moral construct...But then what is it....


And then.....
View attachment 329751

Thoughts?

I'm waiting for the 'official' definition of Tolerance to be handed down from on High...

 

[2PhiloVoid]

........ still waiting. Has it come down yet? I have my arms up, waiting, just waiting to receive it!

 

[rambot]

........ still waiting. Has it come down yet? I have my arms up, waiting, just waiting to receive it!

What do you think it is?

 

[rambot]

So many seek attention for self while the majority would prefer to just ignore everyone.

who is ignoring whom here?

 

[2PhiloVoid]

What do you think it is?

I have a guess to two. But if you want the honest truth, I'm kinda thinking, and always have thought, that 'tolerance' is just a cheaper secular substitute for the Golden Rule that everyone should be following anyone.

It's like, Social Contract ideas, particularly that of John Locke, became fashionable because people apparently can't help but fight each other without having some reason why they should be peaceable instead. And now, since the World in its wisdom today is dumping Jesus to the wayside, they know they need a secular replacement to fill the void left by the absence of the Golden Rule.

 

[rambot]

I have a guess to two. But if you want the honest truth, I'm kinda thinking, and always have thought, that 'tolerance' is just a cheaper secular substitute for the Golden Rule that everyone should be following anyone.

It's like, Social Contract ideas, particularly that of John Locke, became fashionable because people apparently can't help but fight each other without having some reason why they should be peaceable instead. And now, since the World in its wisdom today is dumping Jesus to the wayside, they know they need a secular replacement to fill the void left by the absence of the Golden Rule.

Arguably of course, we are living, secular though it may be, in one of hte most peaceful periods in history in terms of number of conflicts.
And of course we can remember that, even in continents where christianity was a leader, we had a faaaaaaaaaar thing from a peaceful society to live in.

 

[timothyu]

who is ignoring whom here?

I'm talking in life generally