What's "Inappropriate tolerance"?

[anphanax]

From Wikipedia:

"Tolerance is a social, cultural and religious term applied to the collective and individual practice of not persecuting those who may believe, behave or act in ways of which one may not approve."

"Tolerance implies both the ability to punish and the conscious decision not to. It is usually applied to non-violent, consensual behavior, often involving religion, sex, or politics. It rarely permits violent behavior."

I would assume that no persecution of those engaged in violent behavior is an example of "inappropriate tolerance". But "violent" behavior leaves a crapload of gray/grey area (violent as in violently chopping down a tree, violently attacking an animal, another person... the reasons for doing so, what's acceptable, what's not, etc).

The reason i'm asking, is because i'm a bit bothered by some of the stuff i've been reading lately. E.g. "some things deserve more tolerance than others" seems to show a parellel to "some people are more equal than others". If used by a powerful group, with lots of followers, to perform evil deeds, it seems like "tolerance" could be corrupted quite badly, yet still stand up in the minds of many as valid "tolerance".

There are several examples of where the tolerant seem to come off as intolerant. For instance, banning "hate speech" (oh goodie, another gray/grey area). I'm sure many of you read slashdot, so I don't have to elaborate there hopefully.

Some people might argue that Tolerance is better in whole, because people's ideas of it differ, BUT that doesn't seem good as a whole to me, because it might prevent people who aren't being as tolerant as they should from seeing the wrong they're committing (well, the wrong in my mind. there's no universal rule set that at least I'M aware of).

I wouldn't have even asked if it weren't for the possible groupthink effect on people. A sort of "well, everyone in my normal group feels this way, therefore everyone else should think similarly" thing. That might make sense, but of course something making sense doesn't make it so, logical fallacy. Not everyone seems to be aware that's a logical fallacy though. Not everyone seems to even know what a logical fallacy is.

Excuse my bad grammer.

Just wondering if anyone here had any opinions :P.

[Refalm]

Tolerance has worked for many years in my country, until some Dutch celebrities got killed by fundamentalists.

Now, my whole country is filled with muslim hating bigots. Tolerance works until everything seems to go wrong.
The question here is: is tolerance sometimes going too far?

[anphanax]

What does fundamentalist even mean anymore?

Are the people who go around killing others really stressing strict and literal adherence to a set of basic principles, defined by their religion? That's strange, because i've heard from Muslims (not directly, but from TV and the internet) that the murderers do not represent their religion. I don't know much about this "Jihad" thing, as i've never studied, read, or even touched a Qur'an.

But, back to my point (sort of). If they're not following their religion's rules strictly, they don't deserve the title fundamentalist.

In fact, fundamentalist almost seems bigoted itself, if used improperly. For instance, let's say you see some nut-job picketing funerals (Fred Phelps, to be specific) and slandering people, and call him/her a fundamentalist. That's like classifying the students in a classroom who follow the rules, with the people who sniff markers, act out, and write "AIDS" on their head. It's not entirely fair. If I'm wrong, please correct me, but isn't Fred just as "evil" as the people he's picketing. I thought slander was a sin (If you're a bit dense, look through his website at http://www.godhatesfags.com/. Saying someone "looks like an anal copulator", and trashing people's appearance is slander), and I thought his whole thing was to get people to stop sinning. I honestly don't understand that man.

Here's an exact URL, to the people who insist on having evidence of this slander: http://www.godhatessweden.com/html/royalfamily.html (sister site, and linked to, from godhatesfags.com)

[Orethrius]

Isn't tolerance of that horse's ass one of the signs of the end times?

I mean, here we are, on the brink of accepting the FREE WILL of others, and this moron comes along to start the crusades anew - as if Shrub wasn't doing his part to that end.  If you actually READ the Bible, you'd be disgusted with all the intolerant pricks around the world today, who use it as a crutch for their bigotry.  Too bad the KKK grand wizard hasn't imploded in a ball of white-hot flame yet, to REALLY drive the point home.  GOD IS PISSED... but not for what some work-a-day HACK says He is.  Our refusal to recognise free will shall be our own undoing.

[Kintaro]

The only thing there is reason to be intolerant of is violence.

[hm_murdock]

Actually, Phelps is not guilty of slander on his sites.

The law considers this print.

It's libel.

[Aloone_Jonez]

I don't see anything wrong with tollerating people's views even if they are anti-homosexual, racist or against a specific religion. I believe as long as the don't hurt anyone they have the right to expres their views. tollerance in my veiw should be just as much about free speech as anything else.

[Kintaro]

I don't see anything wrong with tollerating people's views even if they are anti-homosexual, racist or against a specific religion. I believe as long as the don't hurt anyone they have the right to expres their views. tollerance in my veiw should be just as much about free speech as anything else.

I agree, Freedom of Speech is important.