Everyone remembers in the movie The Princess Bride when the short, bald (and probably French) Vizzini constantly declares that things happening right before his eyes are “inconceivable.” Finally, the valiant and swashbuckling Inigo Montoya points out his misuse of the word, proclaiming “I do not think that means what you think it means.”
It seems the liberals are taking a page out of Vizzini’s playbook with their use of the word tolerance.
Tolerance is the term used when leftists want to ram something down our throats. If we are told that we are not tolerating something, we have been trained to think that we being corrupt or unkind. In fact, it is just the opposite.
In the dictionary definition of tolerance, words like endure and to put up with are used. These words immediately show us the negative side of tolerance.
Something that is good is not endured. Chocolate is not endured or put up with, it is simply enjoyed. It was not brought into practice by activist judges claiming that Americans are not tolerant enough of it.
This is also the case with liberty. When Patrick Henry proclaimed “Give me liberty or give me death” he was not tolerated, he was respected and remembered for it. Like chocolate, his idea of liberty did not need to be forced into Americans’ minds because of a few radicals. It was the right thing. We do not tolerate our God given rights today. We try to spread them to others.
A major example of so called tolerance is the demand for acceptance of gay marriage. Gays as people are not tolerated, they are and should be respected and treated with dignity as brothers and sisters in our human family. However, a few activist judges taking on the role of the legislature are demanding that we “tolerate” gay marriage, regardless of what our morals tell us. The only reason that gay marriage needs to be tolerated, or endured, is because it is wrong in the first place. Something that is right has no need to be endured or put up with.
Tolerance only needs to be applied to something wrong. That is why it is being used so often today as an argument for many immoral practices.
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Very good points, and I love the Princess Bride reference :)
~C
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When I ran a google definition search on “tolerance,” these were ALL of the definitions that I found that related to tolerance in the sence that we mean here (the rest were about drug tolerance or in plants and stuff):
“Allowable deviation from a nominal or specified dimension”
“attitudes and practices that prohibit discrimination against those whose practices or group memberships may be disapproved of by those in the majority.”
“permissiveness: a disposition to allow freedom of choice and behavior”
“willingness to recognize and respect the beliefs or practices of others”
All of these seem pretty positive to me, rather than passively and reluctantly allowing something to exist while being looked down on. The most negative, in my opinion, is the word “permissiveness,” which isn’t bad at all.
I do think you brought up some interesting ideas, and you have a well written blog, but I kind of don’t buy it. You wouldn’t “tolerate” chocolate, you tolerate ideas and beliefs. It’s about the same thing as acceptance or open-mindedness. We don’t need to be open-minded about chocolate, but we do about gay rights.
One time my English teacher told me my use of the word "inception" was incorrect, but I know she is wrong.
Going to your point of tolerance, I don't know if you correctly identified it with only a liberal group who uses it; I've heard it being used for debate purposes by everyone on the spectrum. I suppose the only reason it could be seen as being a major liberal term is in its relation to gay marriage.
I want to share a definition of the word "tolerate" that I found:
"To allow (something that one dislikes or disagrees with) to exist or occur without interference."
In this way, the use of tolerance in conjunction with gay marriage is very plausible. Currently, the US doesn't fully recognize the right of gay marriage, and therefore the policy is inherantly antagonistic of it. So if someone says you are not tolerating gay marriage, they are rightly declaring that you aren't allowing something you disagree with to occur without interference or antagonism.
So, that is why I believe you are incorrect when you state:
"Tolerance only needs to be applied to something wrong."
Tolerance applies to something that you disagree with, not something that is wrong, since right/wrong are only opinions and not plausible measurements. And if you disagree with gay marriage, then it can easily be said you are intolerant of it, should you choose not antagonize it.