piasharn | Thoughts on Tolerance (Reply)

"Tolerance is a virtue of a man without convictions."

--G. K. Chesterton

I recently came across the above quote on a stranger's livejournal, and was rewarded with an emotion that hung between annoyance and distrurbance.

(And while I've heard of Chesterton, I have never read any of his works, so my opinion of the man himself has nothing to do with my emotional response. However, the info for the user may have been a reason for my disturbed feelings. His website only added to it... and I'm not referring to the poor layout design or lack of grammar, either. At least it reminded me why I consider myself a Liberal.)

Or perhaps I was more disturbed by how the aforementioned LJ user flung the quote about as if it was the Word of God, and gave him permission to be intolerant of others.

Still, I can't help feel that the quote is completely wrong. I know many tolerant people who have very strong convictions. These convictions simply include the concepts of letting everyone live their own lives without shoving your beliefs down their throats. Or remembering that you are no better than anyone else, and are not God, thus you do not have the right to say what is 'good' or 'evil' and tell people how to live.

It's much easier to hate than it is to love or tolerate another person. It's easier to see the world in black and white terms than it is to acknowledge the infinite shades of grey that lie in between. How then is a tolerant person, who realizes this and tries to live by it, a weaker person than a bigot?

Then again, I tend to be wary of people who constantly insist that they are always right. As Albert Einstein once said, "Whoever undertakes to set himself up as judge in the field of truth and knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the Gods." We're just so limited... how can we be sure of anything that lies outside of our immediate senses? And can we even trust those fully?

Still, why is tolerance seen as such a bad thing by some people? None of us like having to live our lives by someone else's beliefs.

If someone could explain humans to me, I'd greatly appreciate it.