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Arielle Brown, Graduate, TMD UIUC Tolerance is more than the common saying, “Let us agree to disagree.” Tolerance needs to be grounded in compassion or love, because these concepts include unconditional positive regard. Compassion-based or love-based tolerance conveys the message: “Let us acknowledge our differences and not pretend they do not exist. However, let us have a discussion about our differences along with our similarities. I view you as a human being with your own worldview, experiences, perspectives who is worthy of respect and compassion; I hope you can see me the same way.” Many times we can best define a concept by first stating what it is not. I will illustrate this with compassion-based tolerance. Compassion-based tolerance is not: pretending differences do not exist, taking on others’ beliefs through hostile debates, or coercion. My understanding of tolerance expanded as I faced instances of discrimination and microaggressions as a Black, Christian, heterosexual woman. In addition to being told I did not belong in competitive academic programs because of my race and gender, my participation in dialogues regarding religion and LGBTQ+ individuals was limited due to assumptions individuals had about me. My spirituality and character were automatically rejected because it was assumed that my Christian identity influenced me to hate the LGBTQ+ community. While I understood and learned from these experiences, I realized that assumptions yield muted voices and invisibility, which makes it impossible for compassion-based tolerance to exist. As an individual who has been tolerated without compassion (that is to exist without acknowledgement, respect, and power), I strive to listen before I speak and to find connections more than I find differences. Tolerance in dialogues highlights the unspoken similarities between individuals. Have we as humans experienced similar forms of trauma? Oppression? Joy? Moreover, I understand that tolerance means self-compassion and self-acceptance. The more we respect and accept ourselves, the more we can respect and accept others. This is because once we have a sound sense of self, we are not forcing our opinions on others or ignoring their opinions. Instead, we have peace in who we are and we wish to share our perspective with others. Jesus Christ exemplified compassion-based tolerance. He dialogued with all individuals, heard their stories and perspectives, and loved in spite of the Pharisees’ desire to marginalize certain populations. Many Christians have not embraced what Jesus modeled, and many individuals have assumed that all Christians are like the Pharisees, who sentenced people to death for their differences. Ultimately, successful dialogues about tolerance and Christianity should include the discussion of how individuals view Jesus Christ and what this means for the treatment of LGBTQ+ individuals today. These dialogues should also be sensitive to and acknowledge the hate and hardship LGBTQ+ populations have endured because of their identities. This should also be true for those who have been ostracized because of their faith. This environment would create empathy, which is needed for compassion-based tolerance. Everyone needs love is the foundation for true tolerance. Compassion-based tolerance means that one can love and be loved.

Alexander Rhomberg, Undergraduate, TMD Loras College Coming to Loras College has opened the door to a variety of new scenarios in which tolerance is necessary. To me, tolerance is the ability to love someone for who they are, even if you don’t relate with them in particular ways. I have had the privilege of being able to attend Catholic schools my entire life who practice my faith. Because of where I grew up, I have mostly been surrounded by a predominately white community who share similar beliefs as I. College has given me exposure to lots of people who I differ from in ways I have never experienced before. As a result, I have had to adjust my understanding to know that not everyone shares the same religious beliefs as me, not everyone has the same culture as me, not everyone has the same sexual orientation as me, and more. This has personally not been a very hard thing to do because I am someone who believes you should love everyone for who they are, and especially for the beautiful things that make them different from you. Pope Francis is quoted with saying, “Love is the only light which can constantly illuminate a world grown dim.” For the world in which we live today, the topic of love displayed by this quote is especially true. Our world is beautifully diverse in many ways, defining who we are as a people. The communities to which we belong are in many cases the product of centuries of conflict and, therefore, have moved towards increasing homogeneity. History contains plentiful amounts of genocides and discrimination, including recently with the Tutsi people in Rwanda and the Rhohingya Muslims in Burma, that show the pain and suffering that comes from an extreme lack of being tolerant. Tolerance is vital for our survival as a human race. Without tolerance we would be reduced to a collection of individuals, each out for him or herself. Isolated viewpoints would be so strong that we would not be able to share love, a result of our desire for worldly perfection by similarity of self. In contrast, the beauty of tolerance can be witnessed through our ability to live together and love each other because of our differences. It can be seen that the United States has come a long way in learning acceptance as a result of pain and discrimination. From race, to sexual orientation, all the way to our youth, America has better learned how to be tolerant of itself. However, society still struggles with acceptance of each other today in numerous ways. Movements as a result of violence in relation to minority groups are a prominent piece of our recent history as a nation. Acts of change such as Gun Control, Black Lives Matter, LGBT Rights, and more have shown America’s recent struggle with tolerance, and is something that can be fixed by simply learning how to love. Tolerance is only present when one can love a person for who they are, not just accepting their presence, but loving them as human beings and admiring the beauties behind their differences.

Rebecka Green, Undergraduate, TMD Loras College "Tolerating" women in the public sphere. "Tolerating" the legitimacy and livelihood of black bodies. "Tolerating" the right to LGBTQ+ unions. “Putting up” with difference should not be a source of pride—it should be the first step in a challenge to uplift the diversity in America. Tolerance should go beyond "allowing" people to exist; it should be encouraging people to exist, helping them to exist, and being in solidarity with their existence. Tolerance means intertwining with pluralism. April 3rd, 2018’s "Punish a Muslim Day," felt like taking two leaps back after taking one step forward in light of recent social justice marches and initiatives. The event's flyer was distributed primarily in England, but publicized world-wide, and was structured in a "point system" where acts of violence against Muslims were given X amount of points for level of severity. In Rochester, Minnesota, a city with a high population of Somali-Muslim immigrants, "Punish a Muslim Day" was nerve-wracking for local residents. But I saw "tolerance," or more aptly, "pluralism," when several Rochester church leaders took shifts posting outside a local mosque during the day’s five prayers. Likewise, I am reminded of 2013 events in Egypt, when, after catastrophic church-bombings, twenty Muslim men held hands and created a line of defense outside a Catholic church as its parishioners attended mass. These acts go beyond tolerance—they are pluralism—an indisputable encouragement of existence and solidarity with suffering communities. A popular method of peacemaking is "act first, talk later." We see this in the examples above; faithful resistance to oppression invites understanding in our communities. But do we know how to talk to one another? Especially in matters of ultimate, ideological importance? While in London recently, my class visited with Myriam Francois, a prominent human rights activist. She said: “One of the hardest things for liberals to do is to be tolerant of non-liberals,” saying what few have dared to admit in the wake of the 2016 election. Americans in particular tend to think in such dualisms—Democrat or Republican, Christian or non-Christian, straight or not-straight, and the list goes on. Specifics of these identities and ideologies are often perceived, by both sides, as an irreconcilable clash of values and have created a deep polarity in our country. But tolerance means possessing a vulnerability and openness to being challenged, to being wrong. This means recognizing that the vast majority of people, across the ideological spectrum, believe, vote, and pray the way they do out of a deep-set belief, whether influenced by family, experiences, or media, that they are doing the right thing for their loved ones and community. When we possess such a vulnerability, only then can we move from the static fact of diversity into energetic pluralism, seeking to dialogue with and understand all peoples, despite whether they belong to our preferred brand of “preaching to the choir” or not. We can be tolerant and cooperate with difference—but we should seek to become pluralist, active collaborators for change.

Violet Lutgen, Graduate, St. Mary's College of California Essay: One of the first places I went with my now-partner was a cafe in Denver with a Bible quote on the wall. I can't remember the specific words, but it was a call to accept those who sin--accept us on this Earth, for the good of one's own soul, because God will judge us in the end. This is what tolerance is not. It does not have an agenda. It does not have a metaphysics. It does not come from a place of superiority, or of insecurity. This September, I was picked up from the Saint Mary's campus by a rideshare driver who chatted and laughed with me the whole way home. He told me about his family and how driving part-time helped him pay for this car, this big SUV with plenty of space for rowdy kids in the backseat. He kept calling me "sir" and "gentleman," even though I was wearing a skirt and stockings, eyeshadow and eyeliner. I think the question of pronouns simply did not occur to him. I got the sense that he had seen me, taken me in, and shrugged to himself. Had told himself, "I guess this is what the kids are into these days." This, maybe, is what tolerance is: not a perfect understanding of one another, but a willingness to look for similarities before looking for differences. Weeks later, I was standing in line at the Pleasant Hill Safeway after a nerve-wracking walk through the neighborhood during which a woman had shrieked at me from the back of a pickup truck for how I was dressed. When I got to the front of the line, the checker asked how my day was, and I told her it was only okay. She recognized me, I think. I am a regular at that store. She, too, took in what I was wearing, the skirt and the crop top, and intuited that today had been a strange one for me. She did not say anything about it. She smiled more warmly than normal, and laughed when I ventured a joke, and called me "dear." I left feeling better than before. Too often, we try to codify our kindnesses. To justify them. This is the beauty and terror of words: they are able to make any point of view seem reasonable. With enough words, one can convince oneself that judgment is tolerance, that divinity demands punishment. Tolerance is not about stringing the right words together in the right order. It is about the emotion underneath, and that, fortunately, is a much easier thing to understand and control, a question each of us can ask ourselves: Do we want to act out of fear, or out of love?

Casey J. Krolczyk, Graduate, TMD St. Thomas As I picked myself up off the brittle and brown grass of a November soccer field, my wrist was swelling and throbbing in pain. A collision during practice left me with what turned out to be a compound fracture. That would have been cool if it wasn’t for the fact that the opposing force was the ball. A well-placed shot from the team captain didn’t find the back of the net, but my wrist had paid the price for saving the scrimmage. Before I could get off the field and on my way to the athletic trainer, my protective façade of tough-guy nonchalance had crumbled. My 15-year-old brain was left to contemplate the consequences of my teammates seeing me crying after being assaulted by a soccer ball. Arriving in the trainer’s office, I sat down next to a bucket filled with ice and water. I always struggled with jumping off the end of the dock into the Minnesota lakes I grew up around, and I wasn’t particularly keen on the plunge into the icy water next to me. “Just relax,” she said. “The cold is going to get the swelling down and help you heal what’s hurt.” I took a deep breath and relaxed my hand into the water, taking the first step to mending the broken bone. Tolerance is the ice water of civics and public discourse, initial action that must be taken to address a social problem, no matter how uncomfortable it may be. Our impulse may be to withdraw and to try and ignore the pain that plagues us, but the injury will still be there. Left unattended, it will continue to worsen. I feel privileged to study the law partly because I see the profession as an opportunity to engage with the world at a different level. We’re being trained to dive into the issues with zero-sum outcomes, to bring opposing parties together, and to find the path forward to the most just and truthful outcome. In short, we thrive in the cold water where the injury is most acute. While I delight at the prospect of doing this professionally, there’s so much more need for those skills than what the legal community can provide. There’s pain in today’s world. It’s the fights over guns and sanctuary cities, the resurgence of racism, the changing economy and gender norms, and a thousand other issues. I’m neither educated nor arrogant enough to think that I have the answers to the problems we face, but I can invite others to join me in taking the cold plunge that tolerance requires of us. When we encounter situations where our own values clash with others, we need to acknowledge the discomfort that comes with that conflict. We can’t stop there though. Ask questions. Be curious, and find ways to build relationship beyond the narrow scope of the issue. Tolerance means acknowledging conflicting values while still building out a common ground that can be the basis of constructive change and solutions.

Rachael Mary Lee, Undergraduate, TMD St. Thomas What does tolerance mean, you ask? Tolerance is a black man walking around a store without being followed or suspected of theft. Tolerance is not being fired when receiving a bad diagnosis or learning of a genetic predisposition for a disease. Tolerance is holding my girlfriend’s hand in public, unafraid, without fear of being attacked or harassed. It is talking openly about my personal life at work, not worrying that I will be fired from my job, and it is getting married to the person I love. I have spent my life looking for it… Looking forward to the day our world would achieve tolerance. But now, with more years and experiences under my belt, I know that tolerance is not what we need. Tolerance is the skeleton framework, the bare minimum, without all the muscles and the sinews and the life. Tolerance is not the finish line, it is just the start of the march toward something greater: the march toward acceptance. Acceptance is equality in the media. It’s seeing people like me, relationships like mine, on television, side by side with those that are more “typical”, with no real differences in how they are treated. Acceptance is trans, POC, and differently-abled actors and actresses playing trans, POC, and differently-abled roles. It is women and minority groups in well developed, compelling, speaking roles, unconfined by stereotypes, and strong men showing emotion without shame. Acceptance is consistency in treatment of black and white activists, black and white criminals, black and white candidates. It is government made up of men and women, of straight and queer, and of every shade of skin there is. Acceptance is expecting and receiving positive reactions to mixed race or same sex relationships. It is brides and grooms surrounded by happy, supportive families, basking in the glow of the best days of their lives, whose biggest concerns come from what kind of flowers or flavor of cake they have chosen. Acceptance is intelligent architecture, making every space accessible to people of all abilities. It is sensible health care and mental health education. Tolerance is the absence of violence and discrimination against minority groups. A tolerant world is a world in which one does not need to live in fear of being attacked, verbally, legally, or physically, for who they are. Of course, that is a looming goal towards which we must push hard every day, but we have so much farther to go than that. Acceptance is love and compassion, the celebration of differences, the understanding that it is our differences that make the world interesting and life worth living. People do not want to be tolerated. I know that I don’t. I do not want people to put up with me. I want a society where people look at each other, acknowledge the unique things that make them who they are, and come together to revel in the intricacy and beauty of the world we live in.

Rebecca Barraclough, Graduate, TMD UNC Tolerance is a concept that has changed for me over time. I once defined it as simply being understanding and accepting of others - no knowledge or significant effort required. After becoming a counselor, however, I learned that tolerance involved the effort of learning about others as well. Even more recently and more importantly, after becoming a mother and watching my child grow, tolerance has come to mean a whole lot more. Tolerance is a never-ending journey of self-discovery, reflection, and self-improvement. I am lucky enough to be the parent of a bright and strong-willed child who is not shy about being her own unique self. She declares that she has a "different sense of fashion" and wants to be a boy when she grows up but for now she is a girl but just likes to dress like a boy. I have faced by own deep-seated concepts of gender and found that I needed to explore more carefully what gender means so that I can support my child's identity and development as she moves through elementary school and beyond. Tolerance to me now involves taking proactive steps to become educated about other ways of being in this world and not simply saying that I accept and understand others. Tolerance means I have a responsibility to admit my own flaws, own and confront my own prejudices, and take steps to address those by truly engaging with others in meaningful conversations. Finally, it also means being an advocate for those who face prejudice and simply being present to listen to another's journey. Tolerance truly is an active endeavor and not a passive one as I had once assumed it to be. My child has given me the gift of understanding tolerance in an entirely new way and I can only hope that I live up to her expectations of being her advocate, her shoulder to cry on, and a sponge for all the new things she will no doubt teach me over time. My hope is that I can apply that in other areas of my life so I can learn from, advocate for, and be present for others. Tolerance, to me, truly is a life-long journey of discovery and learning.

Sarah Arney, Undergraduate, TMD UNC Religion and gay rights--do they have to be at odds? I feel the unspoken answer looked for here is, “No! Tolerance is the answer, and let me tell you why!”. But I’d like to challenge that. In the religious context, I don’t think tolerance makes much sense. Because of this, focusing on toleration in our faith communities sets the bar too low for what we should really be working towards. Tolerance is living beside someone, publicly acknowledging their rights while privately disagreeing with their “choices.” This works in the political sphere, but not within religious groups. In politics, we separate church and state, so a person must use secular reasoning when they make laws. Therefore, a person’s religious conviction about the morality of gay relationships isn’t a valid political argument. That religion in reality sometimes influences our legislation is a flaw in the system, not a legitimate discussion about the relationship between religion and rights. That issue is basically decided, and the courts will continue to work out the minutiae. In politics, we know tolerance is the goal, and through government we know how to get there. Religion is different. There’s not a separation between a person’s private beliefs, and those that rule the community. In Christianity (my religious background), we are all each other’s keeper. When Christians think someone is doing something wrong, they have a duty to point that out and keep the person from sinning. A person’s religious arguments for what is sinful are valid when creating doctrine, so as long as viable arguments exist that say gay relationships are sinful, religious groups can make intolerant doctrine. Therefore, the political kind of tolerance--in which believers would need to publicly give a gay person full religious privileges while privately believing they were behaving sinfully--wouldn’t work in religious communities. It would defeat some of the main purposes of religion: to act on sacred beliefs and genuinely support others in a journey toward God. Religious groups should not internally strive for tolerance then, because they cannot actually be tolerant; gay people and allies in religious communities need to seek something else. Work is currently being done in various religious communities to convince faithful people to make their doctrines more inclusive, and those channels of dialogue should remain. However, the spiritual needs of gay people and their allies are not being met in the interim, so we should support making new communities where their relationships will be genuinely valued and respected. The conversation I want to have in my religious community is not about how to tolerate gay people, but rather whether we will fully accept their faith and relationships. I will work to convince them that we should, but they may decide their doctrine and gay rights are fundamentally opposed. I must respect such a choice, while encouraging communities to grow that will support gay rights. Tolerance may be a worthy goal for our state, but in faith we can ask for so much more.

Brett Jarvis, Graduate, TMD Idaho State House One of the great inventions of the post-industrial revolution era is the steel I-beam. The I-beam works because it leverages pieces that face in different and opposite directions. Two thin steel “flanges” run parallel with each other, with a perpendicular steel “web” connecting the two and running the distance between them. It gets its name because when viewed in a cross section the metal pieces make an “I”. The I-beam is such an ingenious piece of engineering because compared to traditional steel beams the I-beam is made up of much less steel without sacrificing any of its strength. This means I-beams can be used in large construction projects, spanning vast distances and supporting weight that would otherwise be impossible. Tolerance plays a similar role. In our democracy there are as many different viewpoints and opinions as there are participants. Although these differences have notably been the source of friction in our society, they are what gives our democracy strength. Differences in opinion, experience, perspective, and values strengthen us the same way different sizes and skills strengthen a football team. Tolerance is what allows these differences to help us, not hurt us. Tolerance means respect, patience, and civility. It means not portraying those we disagree with as strawmen and extending a hand of intellectual charity. In short, tolerance means having sympathy and empathy. For example, a person who believes in faith-healing is tolerant when she tries to understand the motives of those who disagree with her. She is tolerant when instead of assuming that her ideological opponents are out to diligently chip away at her God-given freedoms, she sees that what they really want is for the State to fulfill its obligations to protect all of its citizens. Conversely, tolerance means that someone who believes children should be given the best healthcare available does not oversimplify the views of those who practice faith healing. Such an advocate realizes that faith-healing proponents have sincere, heartfelt religious beliefs and are frightened that their own government would make them choose between practicing their religion or prison. Until opposing sides can see from one another’s perspective, we will be sincerely limited in making the progress we are capable of. My wife’s grandfather is one of the smartest men I have ever known. He was an actual rocket scientist during the cold war and later worked with the Idaho National Laboratory. Naturally, he saw life through an engineer’s lens. One of his wise observations delivered in engineering terms that has always stuck with me is “ethics are the grease that lubricate the gears of society—without them everything would grind to a halt.” I do not pretend to have even a fraction of the knowledge Grandpa has of the physical sciences, or his wisdom about people, but I see another parallel between the engineering world and human interaction: “Tolerance is the I-beam that spans the vast distances of democracy. It embraces our differences to make us better than we would be on our own.”

Henry Shafer-Coffey, Undergraduate, TMD Idaho State House If I had a quarter for every time I’ve heard someone say “America is more divided than ever” since the election, I wouldn’t be writing this scholarship essay. I could probably pay off my student loans and buy a sports car. But there’s a reason I’ve heard so much about our nation divided. We can’t agree on very much these days. We watch different news stations. We read different websites. We don’t agree on guns, abortion, or gay marriage. Half of America loves the president; half of America wants him impeached. And healthcare makes rocket science look like tinker toys. In trying times like these, we must find common ground. We need tolerance now more than ever. But what exactly does it mean to be tolerant? Tolerance begins with recognizing one simple fact. We all grow up in a different house, in a different place, with different parents. None of us choose these things, but they do a lot to determine who we are and what we believe. I was born in the North End of Boise, Idaho. Most of my childhood consisted of eating organic food in the back of a Volvo station wagon. I didn’t choose it. I didn’t question it. When I got older I started to challenge many of my parent’s beliefs. These days we disagree on plenty. But my fundamental sensibilities were still shaped by coffee shops and farmers markets. I was predisposed to be a democrat. But if I had been raised outside of Boise, and my family owned a lot of guns, I would probably be a card carrying NRA member. If I had a different religious background, I might have deeply held beliefs about faith healing. Tolerance is realizing that even if we end up disagreeing with our upbringing, we are still a product of our life experiences. Tolerance is acknowledging that we will never understand what some people have gone through, or how they arrived at their beliefs. Above all tolerance is listening. Listening isn’t just waiting for someone to stop talking so that we can argue back. We have to work hard to see where other people are coming from. Certainly there will be issues that are incredibly challenging to see eye to eye on. If someone believes that life begins at conception, they cannot accept abortion. If someone is not religious, they cannot accept a child dying without treatment. These beliefs are deeply held and difficult to change. But by simply having a discussion we can bridge important gaps and find common ground. We have to remember that everybody is coming from a different place, that nobody is right all the time, and that everybody deserves to be heard. People tell me that “America is more divided than ever”, but I’ve read my history textbooks. I know we’ve been divided before, and I know we always come back stronger. It might be as simple as listening a little more, and yelling a little less.

David Givens, Graduate, TMD Pitt Most Americans agree that tolerance—the ability to abide an idea or group one does not agree with—is an important virtue. Incidentally, most people also view themselves as tolerant (Putnam, 2010). Research shows that a majority of people believe they exhibit positive values through their lives and actions; this belief holds even among white supremacists and perpetrators of hate crimes (Blee, 1998; Franklin, 1998). Individuals regard themselves as ‘tolerant’ as long as they are not actively, consciously oppressing someone who identifies (or is defined by society) as a member of a minority group (Fritzsche, 2000). The importance of tolerance—receiving tolerance as well as practicing it—was thrown into sharp relief for me after the birth of my first son in 2013. Joshua was born with Down syndrome, a genetic condition that means in some ways he is a more vulnerable member of our society. For our family, Joshua’s needs have illustrated the difference between tolerance and true acceptance. The former is a kind of bare minimum requirement for engaging in public life; it is allowing another person or group of people to exist. There are adults today, living with Down syndrome and other intellectual disabilities, who were not granted that basic acknowledgement of humanity, immured in institutions for much of their lives. This social legacy persists today behind the veneer of tolerance that is still too often applied to people with disabilities, from polite, pitying smiles and exclusionary policies to education rights waivers and legalized subminimum wages. Looking past that veneer, it is easier to see similar patterns across our society and social systems. The systemic injustices that continue to plague communities of color, immigrants, LGBTQ communities, women, religious minorities, and others are protected or excused because American society has not progressed beyond being merely tolerant. Most people perceive themselves as “good,” but good intentions are not enough to make that perception a reality. Similarly, being simply “tolerant” is not enough to fully accept people different from oneself into a larger community. Our family has been very fortunate to have worked with people—doctors, therapists, teachers—who do not “tolerate” our precious little boy, but who welcome and accept him. And that acceptance, with the support of his family, is setting him up for a full and happy life. And that is the critical difference. The ambivalence that lurks within tolerance implies limitation; it suggests that one has done enough (and is good enough) simply because the existence of others is accepted. This is perhaps the uncertain juncture at which many within our society find themselves now: standing between the path forward to greater tolerance and genuine respect and the road back into our society’s legacy of thin and impoverished tolerance, cloaking distrust, violence, and contempt. While recognizing others’ existence is a necessary first step, we as a society can and must build on the opportunities that tolerance provides. It allows for possibilities in interaction, discourse, and understanding that pave the way for greater empathy and mutual respect.

Chris Talbot, Undergraduate, TMD Pitt Our world is getting only more full of people and more interconnected. So in a way, this means our world is actually becoming smaller—we all are being thrust into contact with various types of people, cultures, and behaviors. And this all means that, if we hope to continue living in a smoothly functioning society, each of us must attempt not only to be tolerant of different people and cultures, but also to grapple with the question of what it means to be tolerant. Having taken some time to do both, I’ve come to some conclusions about what tolerance means to me. First, it involves keeping in mind the humanity of our peers. We must remember that the interests of real people—who, like us, have feelings, goals, friends, families—are at stake when we make many of our choices. These choices can either help other people, or harm them. Tolerance, then, means actually choosing not to do real harm to people. To be clear, this doesn’t mean we have to agree with everyone. But it does mean that we should choose not, with our words and actions, to dehumanize, de facto deprive the rights of, and stigmatize those with whom we disagree. For instance, being tolerant does not require one to attend and cheer at gay weddings if he or she disagrees with gay marriage. It means simply that he does not disturb the weddings themselves, wish bad consequences upon the marrying couple, or say that being gay makes them less human. Another basic principle of tolerance is that it must apply both ways: I have the right to disagree with you, and you have the right to disagree with me. This is why, in the above case, tolerance permits a gay couple to happily marry, while simultaneously permitting a compatriot to argue that the marriage should not be lawful; after all, if we permit only of those arguments which we favor, we violate somebody’s right to disagree—we violate basic principles of tolerance. Further, tolerance means acknowledging that you will never fully understand other people, but still attempting to do so. Before disagreeing with a lifestyle, a belief, a behavior, doesn’t it make sense to locate those who actually live, think, or act in these ways? Of course. Being tolerant means attempting to listen—to hear what different people have to say, in the hopes that you can get a clearer picture of where they are coming from. To me, to be tolerant is, essentially, to do one’s best to uphold those values we hold near and dear: freedom of opinion, freedom of choice, and communality. This makes tolerance not merely a belief or doctrine, but an everyday choice—to acknowledge the humanity of people, refuse to harm them, listen to them, and do your best to understand them.