INTOLERANCE DEMONSTRATES A LACK OF MORAL COURAGE –“social intolerance, kills no

INTOLERANCE DEMONSTRATES A LACK OF MORAL COURAGE

–“social intolerance, kills no one, roots out no opinions, but induces men to disguise them, or to abstain from any active effort for their diffusion. […] And thus is kept up a state of things very satisfactory to some minds, because, without the unpleasant process of fining or imprisoning anybody, it maintains all prevailing opinions outwardly undisturbed, while it does not absolutely interdict the exercise of reason by dissentients afflicted with the malady of thought. A convenient plan for having peace in the intellectual world, and keeping all things going on therein very much as they do already. But the price paid for this sort of intellectual pacification, is the sacrifice of the entire moral courage of the human mind.”– JS Mill

COUNTER PROPOSITION (One of my favorite quotes)

“Whenever we say we are being tolerant, we must ask whether our tolerance is a matter of convenience or conviction. Tolerance is costly. It is an investment in the commons. If being tolerant is easy, it’s most likely that it’s a convenience – we’re just failing to pay the cost of maintaining the moral commons.}