Tolerance versus respect

Re: A little respect, Letter to the editor, aug.28

Because the letter writer feels so passionately, it is a pity he under-appreciates the fundamental difference between the tolerance and respect.

“Tolerance” is a legal guarantee dating from at least the 17th century, which concerns the relationship of the state to the individual. Religious tolerance means that the state has no interest in an individual’s religious beliefs or practices. Tolerance is essentially a one-way relationship: it does not demand any particular action, so in that sense it is never frustrated. But because tolerance is a legal claim, if someone feels he has been wrongly denied tolerance, he can do something about it, viz. go to law.

“Respect” is different, a non-legal two-way relationship with expectations. If respect is not reciprocated the whole social relationship fails. If the initiator expects reciprocation, and is disappointed, he now has a grievance he did not have before. The extension of tolerance or the claim of tolerance does not cause this bad effect.

Because respect is a social relationship, and usually mutual, nothing much can be done about its denial.

We may indeed hope that in an ideal society everyone ought to respect everyone else, but if that fails no one can go to law to demand respect.

Tolerance may indeed turn out to be better, as the 17th-century legislators agreed. D.J.C. Phillipson, Carlsbad Springs, Ont.