Earlier this summer, the chief rabbi for Great Britain warned about a new intolerance being imposed in the name of tolerance.
“I share a real concern that the attempt to impose the current prevailing template of equality and discrimination on religious organizations is an erosion of religious liberty,” Lord Sacks told a House of Commons committee in June. “We are beginning to move back to where we came in in the 17th century””a whole lot of people on the Mayflower leaving to find religious freedom elsewhere.”
Though not as pronounced on this side of the Atlantic, we can see the same trend that so worries Lord Sacks. Here too the imposition comes in the guise of nondiscrimination laws and codes. Here too the result is the same: Faith organizations are told whom they must employ and what they must assent to, or face being shoved off the public square.
“Tolerance” has become the new watchword, even the new religion. Every opinion is to be ‘tolerated’, even accepted, as equal in value to every other opinion.
Very dangerous.
I agree that tolerance is the new watchword — but the people who use it are remarkably intolerant of any views other than their own.
For instance, (from a distance at least – I am in New Zealand) the press outlets which preach tolerance seem remarkably intolerant of say the tea party movement.
And, clearly this philosophy can be traced directly back to the concept of the “[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime_Directive]Prime Directive[/url]” which is surprising when one considers the implications of such a philosophy:
[blockquote]The concept of non-interference can be seen to prevent foreign contamination of unique native language and customs. On the other hand, dedication to non-interference has been shown to go beyond this. The dedication is such that by 2364 Starfleet had allowed six races to die out.[/blockquote]