No criticism. No dismissing. No scoffing. And absolutely NO MOCKING.

In a free society, ALL IDEAS should be open to discussion, criticism, and yes, even mocking. Nothing should get a pass. But some don't want that - they want special protection of their special ideas.

If it were up to me anyone who repeatedly posts homophobic statements and calls members of another minority group "vermin" would be banned from DU.

and that usually involves somebody expounding at length on religious dogma or right wing politics. Both will have me politely edging toward the exit, the former having me check my wallet first to make sure the religious expounder hasn't stolen it.

If I'm having a bad day, I might interrupt the speaker with a few uncomfortable questions in an attempt to get them to shut up or at least stomp off in disgust.

Other than that, I allow other people to be as nuts as they want, as long as they don't go into lengthy tirades about it or try to use it to limit my access to services available to them.

in forager bands anyone not a part of the band was a danger to survival. Therefore a tendency to fear otherness became an ingrained part of our genetic makeup. Simply put, there was a time when fearing and hating anyone "different" improved your ability to survive. We simply haven't evolved much beyond that geologically very recent past. That's probably the main reason that multiculturalism doesn't work as well as we all wished it would.

a lesser traveled room here on DU?

Didn't that start when we were... fish?

And every single person who questions the tenants of your faith may cause the foundation to crumble.

This is especially true of literalists - prove something in their book wrong, and suddenly they have a problem. This is not as much of an issue for those that view their holy book as allegorical, since something being "wrong" is OK when you're just telling a story.

So the fundamentalist whackjobs want no one to question their faith, and force their faith on others, because the alternative is a very large risk to losing their faith.

It's an evolutionary thing.

We started out (waaaaaay back when) caring just about ourselves. Then about our offspring and (sometimes) our sexual partner(s). Then the circle widened to include the extended family. Then "fake" families like a tribe. Then bigger "fake" families like religions and countries. (you hear the family references in "brothers in arms" and "Pastor" or "Brethren and Sisteren&quot

This took millions of years. But now with rapid communications and the ability to go just about anywhere on the planet in a relatively short time, the circles are even now expanding to the different races and even animals.

I found his ideas all very interesting.

[font style="font-family:'Georgia','Baskerville Old Face','Helvetica',fantasy;" size=4 color=teal]In particular they don't understand that tolerating the intolerant is not tolerance...it is apathy.

Then these same people make large threads from positions of privilege to lecture us about how, if we were in their shoes, we would not survive without faith in god.

Then lecture us claiming we are wrong for daring push back against the shit thrown on us on a daily basis.[/font]

Tolerating something does not include respecting it.