The Paradox Of Tolerance 👥
The Paradox Of Tolerance
I am sure we've all come across this before when discussing intolerance and tolerance. When someone accused of being intolerant responds with, "but you are being intolerant of intolerance, you hypocrite!"
My question is, if we can be tolerant people standing against intolerance, is the response above a genuine comeback or just a deflection of the truth.
The prefix 'in' in the word 'intolerant' makes it a negative word. Therefore, I see the argument as a double-negative. It is like saying, "I won't give nothing," which really means you are going to give something. Being intolerant of intolerance means being tolerant.
"No, You're Intolerant!"
Due to my debunking stated above, this response is clearly just a deflection. If you took the logical conclusion of this argument, all tolerance would disappear. We would be left with a 'Lord Of The Flies' libertarian/anarchist dreamscape.
If someone said this to me, I would probably reply with, "Yes, I am intolerant of intolerance." This would probably make the accused confused, and I would take the higher ground in the argument. As well, I would be telling the truth, not a lie which is deflecting the essence of the question.
A Throw-Away Comment?
However, my comment is also just a dodge. I can't think of a good, well-constructed to this person's deflection, so I hit them back with my own one-liner. That is the thing with arguments. We usually disregard well-made arguments in favour of powerful and witty one-liners. Both of the responses don't justify their point.
We need to stop thinking of ways to get the higher moral ground in an argument but instead have well-thought-out debates. This may be long and arduous, but it gives both sides time to explain and justify their beliefs.
Well said. It can be difficult to look at things from someone else's perspective. This only works if BOTH parties are willing to listen. This is usually where smugness and climbing of moral high grounds begins. One party is listening while the other sees this as their "opportunity" to change minds and simply will not be able to comprehend a coherent retort. They see their "opponent" listening, and mistake this as weakness or lack of their own argument. They smell blood and see red, then are incapable of intelligent discourse. Been through this many times unfortunately. :)
This is a valuable philosophy to expend some effort into. However I do think that the terms of taking the "moral high ground" to be individually subjective.
Hence when you take your "high ground" even in that argument then another person could perceive your position as nothing other than a smug snootiness and then understanding and respect goes out of the window.