The Necessity of Tolerance

[William Prest]

Those who wish to control others by ignorance, censorship and fear, do so by dividing us into identifiable groups that are profiled, demonized, sequestered and then tortured, murdered, and harvested for whatever value they may have including organs for recycling. History is written in blood, paranoia, irrational fears, prejudice and genocides. The reasons are complex, but identifiable within the imperialist capitalist context and range from cutting costs, alienating the exploited, dumbing down the young, smashing ethnic differences and culture, attacking sexual orientation, age, sex, intellectual difference, substituting a pantomime life and promoting a condition of disease whether physical and mental. These are the means by which we as a human race are fractionated and made ineffectual in our individual lives and in the collective sense.

Individually we have to learn tolerance toward others and this is done be realizing that all people are potentially good or evil, have suffered though differently, have ideas, dreams and goals and want to be loved and love others. We are also ignorant at the beginning and must learn everything from those who have lived before and in the natural context of various locations. Nature is diverse and this can be readily seen by the diversity we see in individual people. Darwin saw this in other species as well as individual human beings. Yet instead of accepting these differences, we are programmed to react against differences.

The rulers, whether aristocratic, theocratic, bourgeois or monetarist have always sought to control the ruled by every means at their disposal. Today that means is by “shock and awe” via the total shock doctrine and terror. The ruled are hit with every conceivable horror that can be experienced all at once. This puts people into a state of psychic shock and renders them helpless in the face of a catastrophe whether natural or manufactured. The all at once approach is the method used to dismantle whole peoples and countries and includes total war, the imploding of the economy, random disappearing of people, public torture, destruction of everything needed for life and all that is held sacred. This is to create a mood of total desperation. Despite the very obvious and seeming errors that are committed such as the total dismantling of the armed forces in Iraq in 2003-04, there is actually a covert and sinister plan to aid in the dismantling of a people, via civil war to distract them and allow free access to natural resources. In N. America, the dismantling is coming by way of de-industrialization and the dismantling of the industrial infrastructure.

The roots of this are the encouragement of xenophobia that has been at the heart of dividing people along all kinds of differences. This is something that has been going on virtually since the dawn of class division in civilization. There are thousands of examples to refer to in immediate and deep history. We do not have to look very hard to find examples. We see it in the genocide of Rwanda where 800,000 died needlessly as a result of colonial inspired hatred toward minorities and the fanning of tribal wars. Weapons were provided to both sides, consisting mostly of machetes. Thus the population was encouraged to hack each other to death and did so after the minority was demonized, sequestered and then hacked to pieces. In Iraq it was shock and awe after Saddam Hussein gassed the Kurds and attacked Kuwait. After the invasion, Muslim minorities carved up Baghdad into several enclaves and then warred on one another through civil wars while the US and allies pummelled the city from the air.

In ignorance, we are encouraged to believe in various things and this differs from region to region on the planet and from lines of differences. Theologists bring children up to follow certain beliefs. Questioning “the truth” is something that is not encouraged and is condemned when it raises its bold head. The truth can differ from place to place and each one is truer than the other. Indeed, in the religious context, truth can vary from sect to sect, each one sees themselves as the holder of truth and the others as liars even if there is the merest shadow of difference between them. The same holds true for politics whether right of left. There are sects within sects and this is often called sectarianism. By way of ethnicity, we see divisiveness reigning supreme when a culture considers themselves the acme of perfection and enlightenment while all others as inferior, even barbaric. Yet despite this, in the contemporary period, we see plenty of ethnic mixing though often in a ghetto fashion.

We are encouraged to respond negatively against immigrants, against minorities, against colour, against sexual orientation and other causes. At the heart of this is the economy. It is s way to smash organizing among the people across all these lines. All it would take to end this, is to develop an attitude contrary to this “norm”, to accept others despite diversity, because of diversity because it is nature.

The real reason today for a rising fascism is the manufactured collapsing of the economy and the sudden reaction encouraged against those who have jobs that the nationals did not want in the first place. When de-industrialization and unemployment rises, suddenly any job looks good and the people doing once undesirable jobs are now viewed as being in the way. As a basic prejudice already exists, it is an easy call to whip up hysteria against a minority by the encouragement of fascist thugs to fan the flames of resentment in the “local” population. Thus one hears calls such as “British jobs for British workers” and calls to extradite the immigrant work force to “free up these jobs” for locals. The immigrant work force was initially brought in as a “cost effective” work force to do all the dirty, dangerous, heavy, unhealthy and hard work that locals turned down because they were cheaper than locals who were often unionized. Immigrant labour was just another way that bosses used to smash unions. In other times and places, these jobs were the domain of slave labour. Too often we forget that most of us are also great-great grand children of immigrants who got here because of historic conquests that displaced and subjugated the original inhabitants.

Gandhi once had to deal with a Hindu man who had murdered a Muslim family and didn't want Gandhi's death on his conscience as Gandhi was on a fast to death to stop a civil war. Gandhi pointed a way out of hell by telling the man to adopt s Muslim child who had lost family and raise the child as a Muslim, though the man was a Hindu. This meant that the man had to become familiar with Muslim ideas, ways of life and culture while being a Hindu so he could teach the Muslim child. He had to break down prejudices, cross ethnic lines in order to become a good father to the fatherless child and expand his own awareness in the process. That then is what we all have to do. We have to cross over and break down all barriers between one another and see the world through different eyes instead of self centric and limited points of views. There is no obstacle that can serve as an acceptable excuse for not doing this. To not do this is to devolve to a condition of a war of each against all others in a slide to mutual hell on Earth, alone, isolated, demonized and in paranoid terror. This is what the rulers would like, for it serves their purpose to have us war against others for trifling reasons, so that they are left in peace to do what they will with us and the planet for their own greedy ends.

Therefore this call is made to accept each other openly, without prejudice, even if we can't speak a word of each others language. Learn to communicate! Take the initiative as the means exist today, such as in no other time that can allow for easy inter-culture communication. Learn to see things from the others view. You may be surprised how close to identity we all are on primal causes like economy, family, friends, love and so forth. Overcome your own blocks and question the so-called sacred truths given by self appointed or designated authorities you have been brought up to absorb. Probe deep with an open mind. If you are a man and another man says he loves you, accept it as a supreme compliment. Women have an easier time with this one and men can learn from women in so many ways. There is no such thing as a superior sex. Both are needed in nature.