Paradox of tolerance
The paradox of tolerance states that if a society's practice of tolerance is inclusive of the intolerant, intolerance will ultimately dominate, eliminating the tolerant and the practice of tolerance with them. Karl Popper describes the paradox as arising from the fact that, in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance.[2]
Tolerance and freedom of speech[edit]
The paradox of tolerance is meaningful in the discussion of what, if any, boundaries are to be set on freedom of speech. In The Boundaries of Liberty and Tolerance: The Struggle Against Kahanism in Israel (1994), Raphael Cohen-Almagor asserts that to afford freedom of speech to those who would use it to eliminate the very principle upon which that freedom relies is paradoxical.[11] Michel Rosenfeld, in the Harvard Law Review in 1987, stated: "it seems contradictory to extend freedom of speech to extremists who ... if successful, ruthlessly suppress the speech of those with whom they disagree."[12] Rosenfeld contrasts the approach to hate speech between Western European democracies and the United States, pointing out that among Western European nations, extremely intolerant or fringe political materials (e.g. Holocaust denial) are characterized as inherently socially disruptive, and are subject to legal constraints on their circulation as such,[13] while the US has ruled that such materials are protected by the principle of freedom of speech and cannot be restricted, except when endorsements of violence or other illegal activities are made explicit.[14]
Criticism of violent intolerance as a response to intolerant speech is characteristic of discourse ethics as developed by Jürgen Habermas[15] and Karl-Otto Apel.[16]
Homophily and intolerance[edit]
A relationship between intolerance and homophily, a preference for interacting with those with similar traits, appears when a tolerant person's relationship with an intolerant member of an in-group is strained by the tolerant person's relationship with a member of an out-group that is the subject of this intolerance. An intolerant person would disapprove this person's positive relationship with a member of the out-group. If this view is generally supported by the social norms of the in-group, a tolerant person risks being ostracized because of their toleration. If they succumb to social pressure, they may be rewarded for adopting an intolerant attitude.[17]
This dilemma has been considered by Fernando Aguiar and Antonio Parravano in Tolerating the Intolerant: Homophily, Intolerance, and Segregation in Social Balanced Networks,[17] modeling a community of individuals whose relationships are governed by a modified form of the Heider balance theory.[18][19]