Tolerant of the Intolerant

I was at dinner with someone who espoused a decidedly right wing religious philosophy. He was quite outspoken and self-righteous about his viewpoints. I proceeded to take what I saw as the moral high ground to point out how intolerant his beliefs were, how exclusionary and inflammatory the rabid right was. Incensed, I extolled the damage the religious right had accomplished down through the ages including of course the Crusades and the Inquisition. The terrorism from the Middle East was next on my list of evidence when he stopped me cold with this statement. “So you are tolerant of everyone except the intolerant.” 

There it was—caught in my own web of judgment. It was not only a clever return, it was all too true. How could I claim tolerance as a philosophy unless it truly extended to even the intolerant. That bit. Isn’t it justice to deny acceptance to those that deny others? But I didn’t want to look in the mirror and be a more rationalized version of him. 

Then I hit on some psychology that helped me make the shift. People’s conversation is almost always a mirror of their internal dialogue. Snap judgements will almost always tell you far more about the person who judges than their target. So the intolerant are already living in a prison of their own ‘impossible to meet’ standards. Their beliefs give me a clue to the walls they have up in their mind. Instead of hammering at those walls, what if I choose to show them that they themselves are acceptable—even if their viewpoint will never be. Can I tempt them to leave the fortress rather than declaring siege?

So there was my answer, my true moral high ground. My opinion had not changed as to the damage an extreme right or left has reeked on society down through history. But I now try to model the behavior I can only hope they might eventually adopt. It beats being one of the intolerant …