Stouffer 1 Matt Stouffer Jennifer Young English Comp 1- 8:50 November 17, 2013 The Ironic Tolerance Movement

Every night, before I hit the hay, I like to unwind with some relaxing, light political television. Some nights its Fox News with John Stossel and the gorgeous Megyn Kelly, other nights its MSNBC with some disturbed Democrat and raging Republican going at each others throats. One night in particular I tuned in on Piers Morgan Tonight. Yes, Piers Morgan, the half Catholic and half Universalist Englishman who has the most annoying accent known to man, which he uses to interrupt any guest he pleases. Regardless, he was interviewing one of my favorite Evangelical leaders, Pastor Mark Driscoll. To give you a preview of what Mark is most known for, he is the most downloaded pastor in the world, and has firm beliefs about Scripture and Jesus. Mark is very engaged in culture and believes the church should contextualize to the culture in a way that does not demean or disobey Scripture. Mark is supposed to be questioned by Piers about his new book. Instead, Piers just hammers away at Mark with questions about worldview tolerance and how Mark should just drag the Bible kicking and screaming into the 21st century. The conversation went around in circles. Piers would say that Mark is intolerant, Mark would defend himself, and it just went on and on. It was a decent interview, but one definition stalemated the conversation, and that was the definition of the word tolerance.

Stouffer 2 There are two types of tolerance these days. There is an old view and a new view. The old view, which is the one that I hold, says there is objective truth that can be known, and that truth does not change depending on what I think or feel. Different people may think they know the objective truth, but they can all work together to debate, learn, and figure out how to come to the actual objective truth. So, there is a right view and there is a wrong view. For example, when people thought the Earth was flat, they were wrong. We can know for sure that the Earth is actually a spherical shape, and no matter how bad someone wants to believe that its flat, its still going to remain in its spherical shape. Opposite of the old view is the new view, in which a growing number of people in western culture have accepted. This new view of tolerance says that there is no objective truth that can be known, and that all people can have different views on what is objectively true. No one can actually know the truth, so whatever they think is the truth, must, in fact, be the truth. Making a world with many truths that contradict and make no logical sense if they are all valid. Going along with this view makes it wrong to argue, debate or even disagree with anyone who holds to a different view. This is because what is important is making sure no one is offended. So everyone is right, and no one is wrong. This view can also be paralleled to relativism (the belief that all truth is relative to the person). So here is the problem with the new view of tolerance, its one of the most hypocritical philosophical movements that has hit the western world. Let me explain why. While holding to the belief that there are no wrong opinions, the new tolerance view says that anyone who disagrees with the new tolerance is wrong. So, in essence, let

Stouffer 3 us tolerate everyone besides those who disagree with us. Yep, I see no problem with that logic. Sorry for my obvious sarcasm, but this is outrageous. The new tolerance view is actually intolerant! The view will tolerate anyone and everyone who says that anyone and everyone is right, but once you say that someone is wrong, you are in fact, wrong. Mark Driscoll also wrote about this topic and said regarding the new tolerance and its hypocrisy that Today there are not sins. There is only one sin, and that is calling anything a sin. The new view of tolerance holds morality in a weak grip. To them, morality is sort of like listening to music. Everyone has their different taste in genre, style, sound, and artists, but no one is actually right. Its just an opinion. Opinions are such thoughts like Nirvana is better than Pearl Jam, or that Jimi Hendrix was a more creative guitarist than Eric Clapton. In music, you can take what you like, and leave what you dont. The old tolerance view holds morality in a much tighter grip. To them, morality is like checking out of the grocery store. You get to the cashier and they scan all your items. The screen says that the total comes to $43.75, but the cashier tells you that you owe him $225.85. In this case, you would not say Oh, I see that your view is that I owe you $225.85, and you are right, because all views are right. So here, take my credit card. You instead would say something along the lines of, You are out of your mind, the screen says $43.75, and I dont care what you think, you are wrong. No questions, your opinion holds no value right now. This is how the old view of tolerance sees morality. This is all to say that if you hold to the new tolerance view, you cannot get angry with anyone who disagrees with you. Say a person robs you, demeans you, cheats on you or goes as drastic as killing someone you love. You cannot follow your belief in new

Stouffer 4 tolerance and rightfully get angry with them. For it was right in their own eyes for them to do those actions, and who are you to tell them otherwise? But, of course, you do get angry and call those people out. Why you do this is simple. There is absolute truth and it matters.