Tolerance: Its Significance Today

TOLERANCE: ITS SIGNIFICANCE TODAY A peaceful society can be created only by fostering a spirit of tolerance towards and acc eptance of diversity. The ability to be tolerant of the actions, beliefs, and opinions of others is a major factor in promoting peace in society. Intolerance is one of the greatest challenges we face in the 21st century. Intolerance is a rejection of individual differences between religions and cultures. When intolerance becomes organized or institutionalized, it destroys democratic principles and threatens world peace. The world’s prime need today is tolerance and acceptance of others. One of the stark realities of life is that divergence of views exists between human beings, which impinges at all levels. Differences are bound to exist everywhere, whether at the level of a family or a society, a community or a country. Now, the question is how best unity can be promoted or harmony is brought about in the face of human differences. Some people hold that removing all differences is indispensable for bringing about unity among people. However, this view is untenable, as it is not practicable. You may not like the thorns accompanying the roses, but you cannot pluck out all the thorns and destroy them completely, for if you pluck one thorn out, another will grow in its place. Even if you run a bulldozer over all the rosebushes, new plants will grow in their place, bearing roses bound to be accompanied by thorns. Given this, roses can only be had by tolerating thorns’ existence.