It just seems to me that people are generally un-accepting of other people's opinions. With most it's a my way or the highway approach and there is no room for compromise. What we need is tolerance for different lifestyles and ideas, what we need to do is listen at least as much as we speak. It is not right to immediately dismiss one's opinions as "stupid" just because they conflict with your own. Sure people today are much more tolerant, but in no way are we all the way there, we constantly fight battles every day that serve to put certain people down. Your life, your opinions belong to you, the same is true for other people so try to have some respect.
What intolerance can breed is hatred, fear, war you name it. Sure I don't expect this to change in the near future, just keep this in your memory
So, tomorrow I start my all-Arabic-no-English-program, meaning this will be my comment for the next few months.
ReplyDeleteI would just like to ask: Is tolerance the acceptance of everyone's contradictory beliefs as all equally legitimate?
I agree that there is a serious problem with individuals forcing their opinions on others, and expecting them to accept their beliefs wholesale without any investigation. I would never support any action that would punish an individual solely for his ideas with force. This would be a violation of that individual's natural rights, for his ideas alone, no matter how vile they may be, do not violate another's natural rights.
However, I also have a problem with simply accepting everyone's contradictory beliefs as equally valid. An individual who believes communism is correct, and and individual who believes capitalism is correct cannot both be right, for they contradict one another. At the very least one is wrong, at the very most they are both wrong. Though, again, I would not support using force against one solely because of his beliefs, I would support voluntary otstracization of another because of his beliefs.
I am not friends with others solely because our beliefs contradict. People with serious contradictory beliefs cannot be friends because they think one another is morally wrong. You cannot be friends with another when you think his beliefs are immoral.
While I agree one's beliefs are one's own, and everyone should leave everyone else alone, I do not think accepting everyone's contradictory beliefs as equally legitimate is part of the equation because it is irrational. If one thinks tolerance is accepting of all contradictory beliefs as equally legitimate is rational, then that person cannot believe in truth, which is a contradiction in itself, but that is for another day.
fair enough, blindly accepting another's beliefs as true is not the best way to go about things. people need reason behind what they believe, because without reason man is just another animal.
ReplyDeleteWhat I meant by that though is just repeating my belief that people need not bash others over the head with their own ideas
nicely done dave
ReplyDeleteYeah I agree with Steve. It's one thing to be tolerant of another's beliefs and accept that they have them (which we should do). It's another thing to feel ok about everything everyone says. And it's not a bad thing to show your disagreement with someone. As long as you're attacking the belief, not the person. Where it gets personal is where intolerance is.
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