Toleration: A Two-Edged Sword

http://www.mooseyscountrygarden.com/willow-tree-garden/water-sloping-border.html

This also originated as an expository writing assignment--isn't it great that I can justify blogging for class?

Toleration is a funny concept great idea. Supposedly it means the act of acknowledging the right of someone else to be different. But if you take this concept to its logical end, you’ll understand how ludicrous wonderful it really is. Let’s say Joe wants to play loud music right outside my room. If I’m a tolerant guy, then I should let him do that, right? And when Ulrikke decides she needs to practice her axe-throwing skills in living room, then I should try to be understanding of our innate differences. Then when she gets bored with my car and starts hurling axes at me, I should just duck tolerantly, right? Can you see how this might not be is such a wonderful concept.

“No, you’ve completely misrepresented toleration!” What’s that? I haven’t presented both sides fairly? Hey, it’s my post, right? But because I'm tolerant, we’ll look at the other side.

Proponents of toleration would say that the above scenarios aren’t fair, because they ignore the fact that Joe and Ulrikke should be tolerant too. Ideally, Joe would realize that I preferred not to have loud music played next to my room and demonstrate toleration by desisting. Ulrikke should be tolerant of my desire not to have to duck flying axes in my living room. Then, we’ll all be tolerant together and we’ll each be tolerant of every other and nobody will be hurt by another’s intolerance.

Is that the way it works? No, obviously our world does not function in this utopian state of idealistic toleration. You can probably call to mind hundreds of instances of intolerance—someone cutting in line ahead of you, living next to a loud roommate, getting a parking ticket, having to abide by a dress code, getting a poor grade on a paper, being shushed in church, being told to turn your music down, etc. Yep, our world is chock full of a lack of tolerance.

You still don’t like my examples? What’s wrong with them now? Why are you feeling uncomfortable?

I’ll tell you why—because these are all examples of people being intolerant to you. It’s a lot harder to think of times when you’ve been intolerant to others than to recall times when you’ve been wronged. And that’s the problem with great thing about the doctrine of toleration. If you’ve been wronged, you can cry ‘intolerance,’ and if someone complains about your actions, just tell them to look up the meaning of the word ‘tolerance.’ It’s diabolical perfect!

Why I Like Mornings

Jonathan Gerrans, Fall '07.

I like the morning because it’s when the Sun shows up. Everything is dark at first—dark and quiet. Then a bird trills, and you realize that the landscape has begun to brighten. More birds begin to sing and there’s this overwhelming sense of excitement. You can almost smell the expectancy in the air.

Suddenly, it happens. A ray of light only eight and a half minutes old streaks over the hill and crashes straight into your face. The moment when the when the door of darkness cracks open and the brightness beams through is the most glorious experience of the day—maybe even of the century. You realize that you have been waiting for this moment all your life without even knowing it. The day is born, the world is new, and you were there to see it happen!

And then your roommate’s alarm goes off and fluorescent light sprays across the room; you remember that you have a test today and a paper to write, and that you really ought to fold your laundry. But somehow, the prospective is not as dreary as it should be. Because it’s morning and the Sun showed up.

Hello,

my name is Joel, and I’m a senior at Southern Adventist University.

It’s been so long since I’ve posted anything, I thought an introduction/explanation might be a good idea.

Since last time I have: written an awful lot, read a whole lot more, and learned even more than that, ran in a triathlon, passed my senior oral exam, learned Mendelssohn’s 5^th symphony, and received an invitation to Google Wave, among other things.

I have not: exercised very much, spent much time with my friends, had regular meals, been bored, been overwhelmed—barely.

I look forward to a time when I can post more regularly, but that time is not now. Thanks for your patience and your prayers.

http://JACAC.deviantart.com/art/A-tree-and-a-storm-sky-107064667

Excelsior

Brief Update

It's been a long time since I've posted anything of significance. I'm still around, just pretty busy. Camp ended, then we moved to Massachusetts, then Christy and I came back to Southern, and now I'm studying like crazy for my Senior Oral History Exam. I'll be back from that after the 15th of September--if you see me before then, tell me to go study!

Excelsior

Caritas in Veritate

So, the Pope recently issued a long (like 100 pages) encyclical, section 67 of which contains the following noteworthy paragraph (emphasis original):

In the face of the unrelenting growth of global interdependence, there is a strongly felt need, even in the midst of a global recession, for a reform of the United Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and international finance, so that the concept of the family of nations can acquire real teeth. One also senses the urgent need to find innovative ways of implementing the principle of the responsibility to protect[146] and of giving poorer nations an effective voice in shared decision-making. This seems necessary in order to arrive at a political, juridical and economic order which can increase and give direction to international cooperation for the development of all peoples in solidarity. To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority, as my predecessor Blessed John XXIII indicated some years ago. Such an authority would need to be regulated by law, to observe consistently the principles of subsidiarity and solidarity, to seek to establish the common good[147], and to make a commitment to securing authentic integral human development inspired by the values of charity in truth. Furthermore, such an authority would need to be universally recognized and to be vested with the effective power to ensure security for all, regard for justice, and respect for rights[148]. Obviously it would have to have the authority to ensure compliance with its decisions from all parties, and also with the coordinated measures adopted in various international forums. Without this, despite the great progress accomplished in various sectors, international law would risk being conditioned by the balance of power among the strongest nations. The integral development of peoples and international cooperation require the establishment of a greater degree of international ordering, marked by subsidiarity, for the management of globalization[149]. They also require the construction of a social order that at last conforms to the moral order, to the interconnection between moral and social spheres, and to the link between politics and the economic and civil spheres, as envisaged by the Charter of the United Nations.

Please understand that I am not the type of person to disseminate wild rumors needlessly... I started reading the encyclical (and I still haven't finished the whole thing yet) for the very purpose of dispelling what I figured was one of those rumors. I'm not going to draw any conclusions for you, and it's probably not time to run for the hills yet, but it's definitely something to pay attention to.


In other news, I was the subject of a very funny blog by a fellow Cherokee native, Francis Kelly. Check it out!

-Excelsior