3 ms·

What is your response to the paradox of tolerance?

by baddox 6y ago

Udik 6y ago
That the solution to it- becoming intolerant towards intolerance- is an option that needs to be regulated. The default of society should be tolerance, and very well defined limits should be put on it, if the need arises. If any actor in society is free to decide what it is fine to to be intolerant to, then you have effectively given people license to be intolerant. Which is what is happening now. So, to be clear: intolerance should be frowned upon by default. The community can decide to be intolerant towards some things, but those things must be agreed, shared and made clear once and for all. And at that point, that agreed-upon intolerance becomes a law and can be actually enforced by the state itself.
- ghaff 6y ago
  So who is deciding these limits on what is acceptable and what is not acceptable? Will they be published in a paper somewhere?
  - Udik 6y ago
    Like any other law. As it is done in other countries, where for example hate speech is a crime, and firing an employee for political or ideological reasons is illegal. In other words: actively protected freedom inside the boundaries of the law.
- baddox 6y ago
  I'm not exactly sure what you mean, but it sounds similar Popper's standard response to the paradox: that we should reserve the right to use force to suppress intolerance, but it should be a last resort. And I agree. However, I'm not sure what kind of "regulation" you're referring to, because if you mean that, say, only the government gets to decide when to use force to suppress intolerance, there's the obvious problem of "what happens if the government is intolerant?"
  - Udik 6y ago
    > there's the obvious problem of "what happens if the government is intolerant?" Well, I guess that at some point you have to accept one risk or another. Any system can fail in one way or the other. I personally don't like laws limiting freedom of speech; but I also don't like angry mobs that openly and proudly exercise intolerance of anything that falls into their own entirely subjective definition of intolerance. I would like the state to protect me from those who try to set the limits of freedom of speech as it suits them; but I understand that if the state wants to take from the people the power to silence unacceptable speech, then it must provide some minimum guarantee by taking it upon itself. Best of all would be no laws, but education and common sense, and of course tolerance, from all parts: but again, what do you do if that fails?

What is your response to the paradox of tolerance?

by baddox 6y ago

What is your response to the paradox of tolerance?

Udik 6y ago

That the solution to it- becoming intolerant towards intolerance- is an option that needs to be regulated. The default of society should be tolerance, and very well defined limits should be put on it, if the need arises. If any actor in society is free to decide what it is fine to to be intolerant to, then you have effectively given people license to be intolerant. Which is what is happening now. So, to be clear: intolerance should be frowned upon by default. The community can decide to be intolerant towards some things, but those things must be agreed, shared and made clear once and for all. And at that point, that agreed-upon intolerance becomes a law and can be actually enforced by the state itself.

ghaff 6y ago
So who is deciding these limits on what is acceptable and what is not acceptable? Will they be published in a paper somewhere?
- Udik 6y ago
  Like any other law. As it is done in other countries, where for example hate speech is a crime, and firing an employee for political or ideological reasons is illegal. In other words: actively protected freedom inside the boundaries of the law.
baddox 6y ago
I'm not exactly sure what you mean, but it sounds similar Popper's standard response to the paradox: that we should reserve the right to use force to suppress intolerance, but it should be a last resort. And I agree. However, I'm not sure what kind of "regulation" you're referring to, because if you mean that, say, only the government gets to decide when to use force to suppress intolerance, there's the obvious problem of "what happens if the government is intolerant?"
- Udik 6y ago
  > there's the obvious problem of "what happens if the government is intolerant?" Well, I guess that at some point you have to accept one risk or another. Any system can fail in one way or the other. I personally don't like laws limiting freedom of speech; but I also don't like angry mobs that openly and proudly exercise intolerance of anything that falls into their own entirely subjective definition of intolerance. I would like the state to protect me from those who try to set the limits of freedom of speech as it suits them; but I understand that if the state wants to take from the people the power to silence unacceptable speech, then it must provide some minimum guarantee by taking it upon itself. Best of all would be no laws, but education and common sense, and of course tolerance, from all parts: but again, what do you do if that fails?