Tolerance Contra Acceptance

As citizens we shouldn't accept people forcing us to accept anything

The greatest virtue to arise out of the Enlightenment was tolerance.

Originally to be tolerant was to acknowledge difference of religion and opinion not with violent scorn or murderous vengeance, but with some degree of understanding and level headedness.

Since then, however, the idea has been frequently and wrongly conflated with acceptance.

Consider the difference in the meaning of both words.

To tolerate means to bear or to endure.

Acceptance means to take or receive willingly.

The difference, then, could not be greater.

Tolerance is a modest word used to describe a middle class virtue while acceptance is an extreme word used to describe a socialist vice.

Amongst those in the middle class, for example, almost everyone can tolerate difference insofar as they’re not proactively being harmed by the person with differing beliefs.  And the middle class regularly does tolerate difference -- without resentment or much ill will. 

Under socialism everyone is mandatorily made to pretend to endorse and support all belief systems, regardless of whether or not they privately disagree with them.  And this is called acceptance -- the government and the elite using polite nudges, fines, fees, and criminal penalties to get the public to passively consent to accepting everything and anything in the name of benevolence.

For those, then, who wish to continue living in a republic, acceptance clearly isn’t acceptable.

Nor should it be.

As Americans we should tolerate those that disagree with us, but refuse to accept those that don’t — or never will — share our values.  For when we do accept anyone and anything the American Dream ceases to be an aspirational and enduring cultural ideal, but a fleeting socialist fantasy.