I can't tolerate offensiveness...

For the most part, I try not to use this blog as a soapbox.  However, this post might be the exception because I’m getting pretty frustrated with some of the ideals that are becoming the social norms in our culture. 

For the life of me, I can’t understand why tolerance has become the ideal that is to be cherished above everything else.  I mean, think about it - tolerance isn’t necessarily a positive thing.  I tolerate wearing pantyhose and high heels in the summer time because I have to for my job in certain situations.  But, I hate it.  As soon as I have the opportunity, I take them off.  I don’t want to take the time to figure out how to enjoy wearing them on a regular basis – I just deal with them when I have to and then run as far away from them as I can until they come back to torment me again.  

The same thing is true of people.  If I choose to tolerate you, I’m probably not offering to accept you or engage in a deeper dialog with you.   I’m saying that I’ll let you be because I have to, but I’ll run away from you again as soon as I get the chance.  Tolerance is different from acceptance, no matter what the pundits try to tell you.

And, it frustrates me to no end that every single thing that we say or do has to be put under a microscope to insure that it doesn’t offend anyone.  The latest example of this is the VW Super Bowl commercial.  If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you can read the story here:

Volkswagen Super Bowl Ad Called Racist

The crux of the issue is that the commercial has actors using a fake Jamaican accent, and it is therefore being attacked for being racist.  I’m sorry, but I don’t think that VW has any underlying racist agenda.  Their only agenda for spending this much money on advertising is selling more VWs.  And, you can’t tell me that you’ve never bounced around the house singing “Don’t worry, be happy!” in a fake Jamaican accent.  Were you doing it to be racist?  No! You were doing it because it invoked happy thoughts - which is exactly what VW was trying to do!

So here’s my real question:  Whatever happened to good, old-fashioned respect?

And before you call me intolerant and get offended, let me tell you a little story.  I am a Christian.  My faith in God is at the core of who I am.  It shapes my worldview.  It influences the way that interact with people.  It informs my choices.  So, it might surprise you to know that one of my very best friends (let’s call him Ray) when I was in graduate school was an atheist.  In fact, Ray was literally a card-carrying member of the Secular Humanist Society of America (I saw the card).  What’s more, Ray was a vegan (way before it was cool) and a hard core animal rights activist.  He was the kind of person who would walk by my desk where I was munching on M&Ms and minding my own business and would stop to remind me that innocent cows were tortured to produce the milk that went into making my M&Ms.

But, Ray and I became the best of friends precisely because we recognized our differing viewpoints and RESPECTED each other’s right to hold those views.  We engaged in conversation – and occasionally in heated debates – and through it all we continued to be friends in spite of our disagreements.  Ray introduced me to all sorts of little Indian and Middle Eastern restaurants.  And, I took on the challenge of coming up with just the right ingredients to create some yummy vegan hushpuppies for him to try.

I can’t imagine how many cool things I would have missed out on if I had chosen to go down the path of tolerance instead of respect.  Tolerance would have put up a wall between me and Ray.  Mutual respect drew us into a friendship.  My experience in graduate school would not have been as rich if Ray had chosen to be offended when I talked to him about my faith in God.  Instead, mutual respect allowed us to enter into deeper dialogs about faith and the cultural issues of the day.

I think that we as a culture have set the bar too low when we strive for tolerance above all and when we are forced to filter everything we say to insure that no one is offended.  Instead, I think that we should aim for respect -- instead of looking for a hidden agenda behind every word that is spoken, we should be very slow to take offense.

Imagine how different our world would be if people would live by the following two principles:

“Do to others as you would like them to do to you.” – Luke 6:31

“Watch out that no poisonous root of bitterness (offense) grows up to trouble you, corrupting many.” – Hebrews 12:15

If you’ve read this far, thank you for tolerating my rant, and please forgive me if I’ve offended you…