August 24, 2010

Tolerance is over-rated

Tolerance is over-rated.  At least the type of tolerance that the left is demanding of America. The truth is that the United States is tolerant enough already. When your opponent is radical Islam, tolerance is not needed. In fact, it's not even advisable.


This is not about the Ground Zero mosque. This is not about the First Amendment. Look around, there are mosques in America. They haven't all been hunted and firebombed by angry Americans. That those mosques are still standing and that Muslims aren't being hunted down and killed in the streets like Dutch film maker Theo Van Gogh or the Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks in Denmark who offended Muslims, with cartoons. That's tolerant enough.  Americans are tolerant of Islam, in a you do your thing and we'll do ours but don't demand Sharia law in America sort of way.  What Americans are not tolerant of is radical Islam, or those who would deliberately fan those flames.

Tolerance doesn't mean we have to like a Muslim's ideas about putting up a mosque at Ground Zero. It doesn't mean we need to shut up and suck it up and keep our opinions to ourselves. The builders of that Ground Zero mosque have every right to build it, just as everyone has a right to boycott it and rally against it. To do so is as fundamental a right as it is for them to build it. But let's not fall into the trap of allowing ourselves to be called intolerant because we don't like it and want to stop it. That type of tolerance is over-rated. Because the builders aren't being tolerant of American sensitivities or sensitivities of the families of 9/11 victims.  There's plenty of things to be intolerant of, murder principle among them.  Being intolerant of the 9/11 terrorists is in my book, perfectly fine.  Being intolerant of those who would be intolerant of American sensitivity to that event seems like nothing more than tit-for-tat.  Maybe to some it would seem to be immature as well.  But you know what?  I don't really care.

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