---
title: The Paradox Of Tolerance And The Philosophy of Good
description: The paradox of tolerance is often used as a license to silence others. Does tolerance really lead to a more intolerant society, or are we using that as a crutch to escape debate?
date:
    modified:
    created:
tags:
    - Philosophy
---

I go online a lot, if the existence of this blog did not make that obvious enough. In my experience, the internet is becoming extremely polarized and nothing convinces me more of that fact than this comic:

![[paradox-of-tolerance.jpeg]]

And wow, do I have a lot to say about it.

## The Actual Paradox of Tolerance

I won't lie to you, Karl Popper's "The Open Society and Its Enemies" is quite dense to go through. It's very wordy at times, and I have never managed to complete it. However, in the notes of Chapter 7 (which is at the end of the first volume), you can find Karl Popper mentioning the Paradox of Tolerance in note 4.

He starts it off with the statement "Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance". On first glance, this reads like what the comic wants to say. But read on.

>[!quote] "The Paradox of Tolerance" -- Karl Popper
> If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. In this formulation, **I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies** ; *as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion*, suppression would certainly be most unwise.

Popper does not advocate for *automatically* suppressing those that are intolerant towards other sects. Popper advocates that we retain the right to suppress them only if:

>[!quote] "The Paradox of Tolerance" -- Karl Popper
> [...]they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin
by denouncing all argument;[^popperstatement]

I don't like to automatically assume that people bring up The Paradox of Tolerance in bad faith. However, by giving people the power to quash an ideology as intolerant, as the comic tries to do, it becomes more dangerous than the problem it tries to solve. Once people have the power to suppress *any* view as "intolerant"[^polarization], the power can be used to silence any potentially upsetting speech.

### The Weaponization of Intolerance

When we strip away Popper's essential caveat in his Paradox of Tolerance (that we should rely on public opinion and rational argument to keep bad ideas at bay), we are left with an intentionally dangerous binary. *To maintain a tolerant society, we must eradicate intolerance.* It's easy to take that out of context, to strip it from the nuance in which Popper marinated it.

If the only requirement for silencing someone's ideas is to label them as "intolerant", then college debates would be over in seconds. Once you say that the other side is the one being "intolerant", you grant yourself a get-out-of-jail card when it comes to morals. "Defending tolerance", the comic says "requires not to tolerate the intolerant".

In short, by misconstruing the paradox of tolerance in this way, it is used as scaffolding to shield one's own intolerant behavior against criticism, by writing it off as "not being tolerant to the intolerant".

## Polarizing Filters

The internet is a harsh, toxic place. Echo chambers have become so commonplace that finding a platform that isn't immediately obvious as an echo chamber is truly special. We are witnessing a feedback loop of extreme polarization, and we are using the same 'paradox' to shut down the other side, as they use the same 'paradox' to shut down ours. Take this example between two polarized groups, A and B:

- Group A says to Group B : "Your beliefs are a threat to my existence. You cannot tolerate my presence. Ergo, you must be intolerant."
- Group A suppresses the beliefs of Group B, using this warped version of the paradox.
- Group B says to Group A : "Your attempts to suppress my speech and dictate what we say is fundamentally intolerant."
- Group B suppresses the beliefs of Group A, using this warped version of the paradox.

This is not even a hypothetical. This is happening [right now](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpve191wy47o), and [both sides](https://blog.x.com/en_us/topics/product/2023/freedom-of-speech-not-reach-an-update-on-our-enforcement-philosophy) fight the other.[^binary]

Both sides believe that they are the righteous defenders of the 'tolerant' society. Both sides view the other as the existential threat that Popper tried to warn us about. It feels like a race to the bottom, where both sides argue that the winner is just whoever has the most institutional power to enforce *their idea* of "intolerance against intolerance"

## What Is Good?

If the pursuit of a 'tolerant' society can be so trivially twisted into a weapon for oppression, it forces us to ask a much harder question; a question that I am not sure even has a good answer. That question is: "What *is* philosophically and morally good?"

I have seen this question be debated on for eons in online spheres. No one seems to have a good answer. And indeed, it is a difficult question, which is why it is so important. Just trying to answer it reveals many insights.

But it's exceptionally important here too. What's to say that *they* are being intolerant, and that our ideology is the true *good* one?

Perhaps, being good is truly subjective. Perhaps we are all doomed to forever be cursed with the curse of subjectivity, ultimately never agreeing on which ideology should prosper.


## Courage to Fight

Although it is likely that we will never know what Popper truly meant when he said "tolerance" and "intolerant" (such concepts often tend to be locked deep into the writer's head, always being re-interpreted), if there is something we had to take from Popper, it's this: suppression would be unwise, *provided that we can counter intolerance with rational argument*.

You may not have the power to change the world. I certainly do not. But to me, we should try to convince people—to use rational arguments and debate before sticks and stones—before resorting to bans and blocks. You may not have the patience to do so, and I understand that. But true tolerance requires the humility to admit that you might be wrong; just because you don't agree with it doesn't mean that you're automatically right.

The only way to survive a world where moral good is purely subjective, is to keep talking about it.

Karl Popper was not trying to give us a cheat code to instantly nuke our enemies. If anything, he argued for the opposite; A person that trusts in the resilience of truth has the courage to dismantle bad ideas in the open. He was warning us that violence and the total rejection of reason are the last resorts of a society that is falling apart. Let us not make that our first choice.


[^popperstatement]: Eagle eyed readers may claim that I am cherry picking Popper's statements. Yes, it is true that Popper stated explicitly that the tolerant must reserve the right to "suppress" the intolerant, for doing so is "criminal". Popper wants to bring in the hand of the law for intolerance, not just public opinion.
[^polarization]: This could change in the future. However, in the 21st century, especially in the internet era, where most people get their information via social media (which, in turn, makes it very easy to manipulate the masses by the people in charge), it is far too easy to promote a single point of view. People need nuance. That's *why* I'm writing this.
[^binary]: In a way, me framing this argument using a "two sides" analogy is adding fuel to the fire. Reality is ten times more nuanced than this. In reality, there are tons of 'sides'; you might see it as there being no 'sides' at all, just a bunch of blurry clouds of opinion.
