Poll: Is "tolerance" a form of forced acceptance?
 

I saw something interesting in today's Fort Lauderdale newspaper. There was an article about the recent ruling by the California Supreme Court regarding gay marriage. They have a comments forum, and predictably it gets pretty heated.

[anyway...]

One of the comments hit me as both pathetic and thought provoking. An individual posted that basically, the notion of "tolerance" was other people forcing him to accept people who are different from him. Now, I didn't have a chance to cross-examine this person to find out what his definition of tolerance is, nor do I understand what he means about the term "forced", but it occurs to me that some people believe that tolerance, by the standard definitions of race, color, creed, national origin, sexuality, gender, and perhaps disability is in fact a bad thing, and that they are "forced" to accept others.

Do you believe that "tolerance" is "forced acceptance", and why or why not?

N-

I see it both ways.

humans are tribal and tend to not like people who are different. Some would argue that it is a higher level of consciousness that gets beyond those base instincts and allows people to accept and even embrace those who are different.

The bottom line is that some people are jerks some of the time, and some people are jerks all of the time.

Usually the people demanding tolerance are the most intolerant......that being of us who disagree with them and our right to do so. PC is gonna kill us.

+1.

I remember from college and grad school . . . if the person's vocabulary was filled with words like "tolerance," "insensitive," and all of those other great PC buzzwords from the 80s and 90s, you could be sure they were the most intolerant, close-minded people in the room.

Yep.

I learned in college when people started talking about "tolerance", they really meant "blind acceptance".

Personally? No.

For a bigot or racist? Yes.

Being tolerant is not being PC. My parents taught me to respect other people up until they prove they don't deserve it.

True enough in the literal sense but the word "tolerance" has been co-opted by the PC crowd. Now it means, just as Legion said, 'Blind acceptance'. It seems to be a major tactic of the PC crowd to seize words and redefine them for their own purpose of disguising the true meaning. I make it my mission to be Un-PC anytime I can....if only to piss them off.

I don't see it as blind acceptance in the PC crowd so much as it is a fear of labelling.

Who feels that being PC is a new label for a political leaning?

By the way, my Black Labs tolerate my cats. If it were not for me they wouldn't blindly accept.

Michael,
I may be missing something but I don't see the PC Mofia as being afraid of labelling...more like coercing the rest of us to comply with what THEY feel is 'more sensitive' and thereby avoiding the truth. In the dog scenario you are using the traditional meaning of the word ;-)

Well yes, the PC Mafia I agree. They are the religious right of the PC crowd, HAHA. If you can say that...:D I'm against all coercion. When its roots are in agenda I bristle.

I think a significant slice of society are honestly trying to relabel to be more respectful. I've no problem with that kind of sensitivity. Overall if a human being is honestly trying to be sensitive to another then it is a show of respect.
I've never been fond of the word "retarded" nor "handicapped". THey have a note of finality that I don't agree with. I'm OK with "challenged" as a quick sample. On the other hand some might call me vertically challenged. Fuch that. I'm 44 and my height is pretty ******* final. I'm short.

For the politically adroit the term "PC" is now being thrown around casually as a wide sweeping political label which I disagree with. Another symptom of intellectual laziness. But, hey! We all need new buzz words to keep things SPICEY!SmileWavy

Good reply.

Oh, just noticed that you are from Santa Cruz...perhaps the most PC place on the planet ...of course I'm ribbing you.

Tolerance means accepting bigots' failings as well.

What do you think about that?

I find that those that preach tolerance are the least tolerant of all. Like gays who label everyone who dares criticize them a homophobe.

The word for that is Hypocrite.

At any rate, yes, "tolerance' is definitely forced acceptance. I think it's BS. I refuse to play along.

Hillarious! And accurate. South Park hits another home run.

here's a nice one
Construction workers in Holland, during hot working day, wearing shorts and t-shirts
received word from one of the project executives that muslim folks living in that area, complained that they were showing to much skin...

the boss took the complaint and said that if the neighborhood folks really had a problem with it, he'de see what could be done about it

http://www.telegraaf.nl/binnenland/4013865/_Moslims_klagen_over_korte_broek__.html?p=23,1

for years those immigrants asked for tolerance
yet now they turn out to be intolerant


if i had been the foreman on that site, i would have ordered the crew to loose the t-shirt (and keep the shorts, there's limits that even i would deem to much :D )

Weren't you telling me about how Sweden had the muslims in check?

you must be mistaken,
i've never even been to Sweden, and seriously can't comment on their policies

I have on the other hand had debates with you about muslim extremist terrorisme and fear of it in the parts where i live eg non-issue in Belgium (it's a couple quite a distance away from Sweden)... which is a completely different story, since A the article above, is from Holland , which is arguably not Belgium, but it is close by, and B is not about muslim extremist terrorisme, but muslim inability to frigging adapt to things that are normal around here

2 different things
being annoyed by something as small as this, does not mean we have terrorisme on our hands...

Pardon me. Holland is even better. I guess it is a non-issue as long as it's not you or yours being terrorized or killed. I was not trying to imply that this was terrorism, just the peace loving muslims demanding you to change to suit their beliefs. Do you think those complainers were "extremists?"

bla bla bla mule...
it's an example of tolerance gone wrong, no more no less

y'all have more problems of idiocracy then we do with "tolerance"
i can list plenty of examples of PC BS going banana's in the US

like the man that got arrested at an airport, for giving lemonade to his kid, that turned out to contain alcohol without him knowing, and his kid was taken away, had his stomach pumped, placed in foster care for days, and what not

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/offbeat/2008/04/mikes_hard_lemonade_breaks_up.html

frankly, i would be more worried about such absurd things then a muslim calling somebody to complain about my asscrack showing while i squat to lay bricks or something like that...traumatizing a kid with a stomach pump procedure, over drinking half of that mikes lemonade... takes a bunch of rule following retards to not notice which is worse for the kid...never mind having a friggin security goon meddling with things that aren't his to meddle with, it's borderline gestapo methods

You got that right!!! You have to accept us, but we don't accept you BS typical liberal hypocrisy:rolleyes:

South Park nailed it!!!!