When tolerance fails ::

Tolerance is one of the highest public virtues of the West. Gay rights and a host of other liberal causes progress thanks to this value. What people in Western Liberal Democracies think and do in "private" should not affect their rights including the right to the full range of employment. Yet "liberals" are as guilty of intolerance as "conservatives". Finker writes about a good piece from the (conservative) London Institute for Contemporary Christianity about the dumping of a conservative Catholic by the European Parliament.

Apparently despite saying:

The state has no right to stick its nose into these things,’ he reasoned, ‘and nobody can be discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation... this stands in the Charter of Human Rights, this stands in the Constitution and I have pledged to defend this constitution.

Someone who own view is that homosexuality is a sin cannot be Commissioner for Justice, Freedom & Security. Rosemary Righter wrote in the London Times:

...if the EU Parliament’s apparently successful hounding of Signor Buttiglione affected only the smooth running of the Commission, it would be a matter of small consequence, an insignificant flutter in the EU dovecotes. But if an EU citizen is to be debarred from public office for holding personal beliefs that are at odds with the prevailing social orthodoxy — and to be debarred despite a categorical statement that he would not let those beliefs intrude upon policy decisions, or result in any form of discrimination whatever — then it is not only “the European project” that is undermined; it is democracy itself. In democracies, majorities rule with the assent of all, an assent founded on the belief that the interests of all citizens will be taken into account.

"I can tolerate anything except intolerance" seems to be the liberal chant. Yet to believe something, even to seek to convince others of something, is not in itself intolerance. What this slogan is really saying is that "we" cannot tolerate views that differ from the prevailing ones! Enter the thought police... ¶ 7:39 AM [to Del.icio.us]

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