this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2023
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It's not that easy. Social contact theory can work when there's a relatively objective standard like "physical violence" but you'll often believe that the people you disagree with are being intolerant, and they'll believe that you're being intolerant. If the general rule is "I'll only tolerate people if I'm convinced that they're tolerant" then very soon no one will be tolerating anyone else.
With that said, I don't think there's a "paradox of tolerance" simply because tolerance is hard. The people talking about a paradox want to get credit for "tolerating" just the people they don't mind having around, but you have to tolerate the people you hate, the people you think are a threat to you. Otherwise you're not tolerant.
We get muddy when we move from "physical violence" to "the threat of physical violence". It runs us into the "I'm not touching you" game on one end and Nextdoor paranoia on the other.
Is someone tolerant if they come right up to the line of what defines tolerance and acts like an asshole within the strict bounds of the law? Is someone intolerant when they violate (often unwittingly) some local rule of decorum or social taboo? Is someone intolerant if they are startled into a panic? What if they conspire to sow panic without actually getting their hands dirty inflicting harm? If we're the victim of violence from an unknown source, what then? If we're the victim of violence that we falsely attribute, are we intolerant? Is the falsely accused subject now flagged as intolerant?
More broadly, how do you tolerate someone or something you don't know or understand? How do you deal with perception bias?
I'm reminded of growing up in the 90s and having people freak out over "loud rap music". The media bias against young black men and their taste in music is very clearly an example of intolerance. But the dialogue of the era framed playing this music (particularly the edgy stuff like NWA or Biggy) as itself an act of intolerance.
How do you square that contradiction? Who gets to adjudicate the offender and the offended? What gets defined as tolerable?
OP's image doesn't really set that out.
This all makes sense when you remember that the underlying topic here is bigotry. Ergo, tolerance is defined in those terms. Not in the more general terms.
The right uses the "paradox of tolerance" to hide what this is ultimately about, a common tactic.
It isn't about tolerating all ideas. It is about tolerating groups of people different from yourself.
Put another way, if society has a rule "don't be a bigot" and then someone is a bigot and gets in trouble, is society bigoted against bigots? No. Of course not. Thinking that would be asinine. Society is enforcing rules against bigotry.
Bigotry is not a synonym for Racism. Bigotry is maintaining a personal opinion or prejudice even when holding that opinion or prejudice is unreasonable.
Can "Bigotry" include someones belief that a group of people are inferior because of their race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual preference ? Yes it can but it's so much broader than that.
Someone can also be a Bigot by holding the opinion that only Apple MacBooks should be allowed on Airplanes because they are the only ones with safe enough batteries and then refusing to change that opinion when presented with contrary evidence.
Bigotry isn't about people, it's about ideas, opinions, and prejudices all of which can be positive or negative on literally anything at all.
We have the "Paradox of Tolerance" because if we tolerate anything, including intolerance, then we have intolerance. If won't tolerate intolerance then we also have intolerance. It's that simple and it's also vastly over blown.
What we need to do is reject the unspoken implication that we must have a perfectly tolerant Society. Some amount of intolerance needs to exist but only so far as it has a positive outcome. Intolerance of racism is a good example, intolerance of non-defensive violence is another.