Twokinds ARCHIVE Forums

First Idea: I know I've done a subject somewhat like this before, but oh well.

Is total tolerance really possible in a community? I would personally say no. Suppose there is an intolerant idea the community encounters. Do they tolerate it? No? Then it isn't total tolerance. Yes? Then they're inviting intolerance, and it isn't total tolerance.

While that's going on, we could also consider destroying the intolerant idea, so that the next generation can live in an Eden of tolerance?

Not going to work. For one thing, it could never last- it would be a utopia built on hypocrisy. Second, routing out an idea, totally and completely, is a decision that the government cannot make for the people, but that the people make for themselves. (See Fahrenheit 451 for more details.)

Second Idea: Is it really that good to think totally logically? And furthermore, do we even have our definition of logic correct? I personally think Kierkegaard muddled it up when he said faith was the opposite of logic. I have a totally different definition of faith than most people, hence why I have a faith built on multiple things, logic being one of them.

Think about it. Logic is specifically defined as "The science and art of reasoning." That might be good for getting a job, money, etc. And money, is, of course, important- But money isn't everything. In fact, some might even say money is nothing. We have such a materialistic society that when someone says "Money isn't everything," the closest we get to believing them is a state where money is extremely important, but other things- like virtue and wisdom, for a bit of Socratic nostalgia- might play a role in a specific situation, and we should keep those in mind. Or in the back of it, at least.

We're in a society obsessed with information. I'd guess this is why our art is given the lesser terms "media" or "entertainment-" and our relationship with that is a whole other argument. (maybe idea #3?) Anyways, with this kind of society around us, it's easy to believe that logic -or at least pragmatism- is of primal importance.

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In my mind, intolerance, and anti-intolerance is one and the same. In my eyes, the only way to rub intolerant ideals out is to live at peace with it while letting those who carry it know that their ideals isn't well-recieved. Let's face it, we live in a world where society constructs and cultural memes are so diverse that what may be an everyday activity for one group of people may be considered unethical and inhumane by another. As said in the past, moral codes will always be subjective to the individual's perception, and thus will never be objective.

Regarding the logical idea, it's almost always a good thing to follow logic. There is not one known event in the universe that cannot be explained, at least partially, by natural causes. Faith is hardly the antithesis of logic, since it is the end result of flawed logic or logic derived from lack of information with theories used to fill the holes, regardless of how little sense it makes, but it is logic nonetheless.

Faithful thinking is good, only when mixed in moderate amounts when dealing with interpersonal relationships. It ties in a lot with trust, and that trust has to come from somewhere.

I usually find myself tolerating intolerant people as long as they keep their mouths shut. :P

Mea, you've hit it on the head. Tolerance no longer bears its actual meaning. Tolerance is a value of a liberal culture. It is one of the great blessings of the Enlightenment, as was reason. Tolerance and reason, are, in fact, two of the core properties of liberal culture and were a good bit of what has caused Western civilization to triumph the way it has. Unfortunately, liberalism has managed to poison itself and lies in danger of losing sight of those things which define it. Reason has given way to emotion -- no longer do people think, instead they are expected to feel. And it is not the healthy balance of a human mind blending logic and emotion; rather the feeling is all that matters. It converts the world to nothing more than five year olds. We lose our ability to control ourselves, we lose our ability to govern ourselves, and we lose our ability to defend ourselves. Reason is more than simple logic -- reason is a balance. Reason is looking in wonder and awe at the natural world, and then scrutinizing it to find the laws that drive it to be the way it is. The gift of reason permitted Western civilization to spread across oceans, to reach out into the stars, to probe the depths of the human mind. Reason invites tolerance and something that is truly tolerance invites reason.

But tolerance has been lost as well, and in its place, taken its name, is acceptance. Acceptance and tolerance are two different things. As Bright Eyes said, the tolerant "tolerate the intolerant" to a point. But what you warn of, Mea, and what we see more and more of in this world, is an attempted integration of 'tolerance' and intolerance. Rather than tolerating intolerance, we are told that we must simply deal with it. That there is no helping it, that perhaps we are at fault for the intolerant, and their actions are wholly excused. It is cognitive dissonance of the highest and most disconcerting kind. We now are expected to accept intolerance. The difference between tolerance and acceptance is this: when you tolerate something, you can always say "this is enough." Tolerance means that there is an underlying contract to society; something that says "so long as you obey the key concepts of our society, what you do is your own business, and once you break those key laws, we will cast you out." Acceptance says that all ideas are equal and equally valid. We cannot criticize the intolerant -- they are as right to be intolerant as we are to be tolerant. Unlike tolerance, acceptance has no underlying belief system to offer structure to civilization. Instead, acceptance promotes a tribalistic war of culture as separate groups, with nothing to hold them together, attempt to reconcile the existance of people with contradictory beliefs which are just as right as their own. Acceptance of such things obviously leads to one end -- the end of those who accept the boot on the neck of their civilization.

Everyone appears to have good points here. Even Avwolf seems to have immersed the issue to a level of greater depth. So, I'll just state my brief two cents and check-out.

Idea One:
I agree that a state of total tolerance is impossible within a community. Human perceptions, decisions, thought processes, etc. are simply too variable to allow for a condition within a community to possess such grandeur as total tolerance. It would mean the elimination of the diversity within human personalities. It's both absurd and cureless.

Idea Two:
When thinking of logic I guess it's natural to cling to the procedures of the empirical process such as Scientific Method.

However - couldn't the initial stage, the identification of a knowledge problem or even a formulated hypothesis, be considered a moment of faith? There isn't a state of proof yet after all.