The Corruption of Tolerance

          Many people ask one another what the greatest moral issue is in America. They get in arguments and debates until a few radicals – activists for narrow-mindedness – pull out their individual beliefs and religions, and hold them like guns to each other’s heads. Swiftly the mainstream of society jumps into the center of the fray, screaming for tolerance. “You are no longer allowed to stand up for your beliefs,” society seems to advocate. Suddenly the pill of “tolerance” is force-fed to children in schools, and to parents at home or work. Because of a few radicals, all ideals are silenced. The only respectable belief is one that challenges no one else’s. In other words, the only respectable belief is none at all. In asking the question of what is the greatest moral issue, the answer seems to present itself: perhaps the greatest moral issue is tolerance, for it breeds indifference, and indifference, apathy.

          Tolerance sounds beautiful. It suggests that all religions and beliefs can coexist peacefully and respectfully. It preaches that everyone should be open-minded, and most importantly that no one should ever force a religion or ideology upon another person. The problem with this ideology is that it is often forced upon everyone the moment they engage someone of a deviating belief. In fear of conflict, tolerance is shoved upon just about everyone by society at large. What the word “tolerance” means, and what is expected of many people is quite different. While the traditional sense of the word suggests that we simply tolerate and respect other ideas and beliefs, what it now seems to mean is that society will no longer tolerate us unless we conform to its tolerant image.

          One of the problems this forced “tolerance” causes is indifference. The radical believers and philosophical advocates are the ones who forced the “tolerant” hand, yet they are the only ones who seem to be unaffected by its power and sway. The people who are affected the most by the tolerance movement are those who dislike conflict and disunity; in other words, nearly everyone. We hear the beautiful-sounding tolerance ideal, and we swallow it eagerly. Suddenly everyone is afraid of speaking up for their beliefs, in fear that people around them will label them “intolerant.” Tolerance becomes the only belief that is tolerated, but it is a shallow belief. It silences discussions that are essential for intellectual development and analytical contemplations of reality. It keeps people from sharing ideas that might upset others. Those who are “intellectual cowards” strongly advocate the tolerance movement because it protects them from intelligent engagement. They can label people “intolerant bigots” and it protects them from having to challenge or refute an idea. But what is the purpose of deep-thinking if there is no one to test it against? Eventually, we become indifferent to anything that might upset other people, and we go from “tolerant” to something called “acceptant.”

          Acceptance is a step beyond tolerance in that we not only allow others of a different worldview and mindset common respect, but we adopt their ideas and decide to believe them. Acceptance is different from tolerance, for tolerance requires differing opinions, while acceptance blurs out any distinctions. We decide that since we cannot really debate new, deep ideas, or discuss the possible fallacies of old ones, we will simply accept everything as a possibility. We could say we stand for everything, but our “possible beliefs” are so conflicting, that in reality we stand for nothing. This acceptance of everything destroys our ideological zeal, until we no longer care about what is truly correct. By accepting everyone’s beliefs but our own, we have adopted an apathetic mentality that is destructive to our society, and to the entire world.

          Apathy kills countries. Apathy silences all but the most radically devoted believers, and holds the door for them while they manipulate and take control of the world. Apathy tells citizens not to vote for whom they believe is the right candidate. Unable to consult their moral compasses, those that do vote base their decisions on whomever can give them the most immediate material gain, for apathy breeds laziness. Laziness begs for everything to be free. Communism answers.

          In the midst of the apathetic masses, those few radicals who refuse to recant continue to wage wars of ideological propaganda, and because of their radical nature, they do it in the most intolerant ways. Churches picket funerals of soldiers, children shoot or stab fellow classmates, and hijackers turn our airliners into bullets and wrecking machines, slaughtering thousands of unsuspecting – and quite tolerant – people. Is tolerance the answer to intolerance? Or does it simply lull us all into a lazy, false sense of security while we are repeatedly deceived and destroyed?

          Conceivably, the greatest moral predicament in America is the tolerance movement, for it not only differs greatly from authentic tolerance, but it encourages the apathy of the temperate and destroys the very heart of morality. Originally referring to someone who stands for and upholds his or her beliefs, the word “morality” is now traded for words such as “bigot,” and “hateful.” While the tolerance movement hypocritically forces their twisted version of tolerance upon those who oppose them, cruelly labels the devout and spreads intellectual cowardice and apathy, the word “morality” appears to lose its meaning altogether. When tolerance gives birth to acceptance, we allow this destruction of morality, because we accept it. Perhaps the greatest question to ask ourselves is this: If tolerance is the enemy, can it be toppled? Or could it be that upsetting this ideal is not, in fact, to be tolerated?

Irresponsibility and Logical Consistency

          There is much cognitive unconformity in our country, and it weighs heavily on the minds of the intellectual. To try to smooth out the ideological wrinkles in today’s society is a harrowing task, and it often lands us in a state of mental frustration, for no matter how well we can rearrange the tangled mess of differing and combating worldviews and analyze them subjectively and critically, there often remains an underlying fallacious cesspool of contradictions. When we arrive at a state of moderate understanding of the cause of this effect, we may see that the core of most issues in America – including ideological contradiction – is the pervasive lack of responsibility, which is manifested in our government and in personal beliefs, and is reflected in the resulting society that is created.

          It is most probable that irresponsibility begins at a completely physical, fleshly level. It usually comes from poor parenting and then grows in the young child, so that by the time the child is older and thinking for his- or herself, they have been instilled with the idea that they are entitled to whatever they want at whatever cost. In fear of social distaste, parents have been known to shush their children in public instead of openly disciplining them, have principals change their children’s grade to a passing one if they fail an important test, and keep other adults from rebuking their children too. In fear of other adults looking down on them for having undisciplined, out-of-control children, the parents will subconsciously make the fear a reality by failing raise their children to learn to take responsibility for their actions. By the time they are older, the idea that they can do whatever they want and get away with it will be cemented deep within them, for they have done so their entire childhood, and it has become their way of life.

          Eventually this idea spreads out into different regions of the person, until the irresponsibility is not only physical but it is spiritual as well. Religions that suggest judgment for immoral behavior are shunned, for to assume such beliefs would force the person to take responsibility for their actions. New beliefs are invented to suite their desires, for they indeed have itching ears. Those who are unfamiliar with religion will be repulsed by it and build their own religions to make man the god. They say they are atheists for they do not believe that god exists, but unfortunately they are misinformed as to what “god” means. In truth, they have made themselves gods, and they worship themselves on a daily basis. They are filled with a selfish idea of freedom which unrealistically demands all of the benefits of “freedom,” but ignores the heavy cost, for freedom is never free. They put a new name on hedonism, and they call it “Evolution.” They use this theory to crown themselves kings of their “own” realm, pretending with all their might that this world was not created. They are forced to shut their eyes tightly to the obvious majesty of Creation lest they see the truth and be forced to turn to a God who demands justice for their immorality. Since they are forced to accept the implausible in order to support the immoral, it gives birth to a whole new level of negligence: intellectual irresponsibility.

          Because their way of living demands blindness in order to function, their way of thinking must demand the same thing; this creates incredibly fallacious attitudes in society. They begin to adopt new customs, and take offense at anything moral. They use this “offensive” morality to excuse the irrationally “inoffensive” immorality. They begin to take pride in their sins, and pretend that their biblically unacceptable ways of living are not harming anyone. People who are hurt or alarmed by the growth of sin, and stand uprightly for the morally just are called “hateful bigots.” The intellectual irresponsibility creates an illogical laziness and foolishness in which the only reliable means of debate is childish name-calling and hypocritical labelling.

          This intellectual laziness breeds hypocrisy by fostering an acceptance of fallacious arguments out of convenience to support new movements, which eventually end up contradicting their own claims. For example, “independent” feminists insist on complete self-reliance, and then the very same people are heard complaining about the lack of chivalry in the world, not understanding how they are the very ones who exterminated it. Men who were raised to treat women with honor are not always ready for a woman who disdains or turns her nose up at the hand of respectful courtesy he offers to her. Many unsuspecting men are easily discouraged from trying to polish pearls that claim to be rocks. This illogical demand for chivalry then scorn when it appears is just one example of the illogical thought-processes caused by irresponsible intellectuals.

          Another example would be evolutionist lawmakers who spend unfathomable amounts of resources on American schooling, forcing all children to learn explicitly evolutionist-slanted propaganda. The very same people often are the ones with the audacity to call Christians “intolerant, hateful bigots” for “forcing” our beliefs on others, usually when we are merely standing up for our own. Christians and other religious peoples are required to be “tolerant” of Evolutionists teaching their beliefs to our children, but they are intolerant of us sharing our beliefs with them. This double standard is almost unthinkable, which suggests a consensually intellectual blindness. This thoughtlessness is perhaps the result of irresponsibility of thought, by irrationally and desperately struggling to maintain a lifestyle in which there is absolute entitlement and an absolute lack of responsibility. Perhaps the logical fallacies of society’s “best” could all begin in the stores with the indiscipline of our children.