Relativism and Toleration

Toleration therefore gives us only the dictum attributed to Voltaire, that I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it. Relativism, by contrast, chips away at our right to disapprove of what anybody says. Its central message is that there is no asymmetries of reason and knowledge, objectivity and truth. Relativism thus goes beyond counselling that we must try to understand those whose opinions are different. It is not only that we must try to understand them, but also that we must accept a complete symmetry of standing.” – Simon Blackburn, Truth: A Guide (2005)

Toleration and relativism run together in the public mind. It is assumed that when you say to someone ‘I disagree’ you are also saying ‘You need to stop what you are saying’, ‘This conversation is over’ and suppression and force will soon follow. It is assumed that when you say, ‘You are wrong’, you are also saying, ‘I do not respect you’. I like these remarks from Blackburn as he helpfully clarifies that toleration and relativism, or conversely, intolerance and some belief in objectivity or realism, need not always go conceptually hand-in-hand.

Tolerance is the act of treating another as a fellow human being, despite differences in belief, faith or opinion you may hold. Relativism is the view that there are no differences. Framed like this, it seems like practising tolerance and realism is the harder option – genuinely valuing and caring for another with whom you hold serious disagreements. Relativism emerges as the much easier — and I think much soggier — option of saying that you can all get along because there are no disagreements, and if there are they are illusory since neither party has any way of being closer to the truth of things.

Blackburn is right to point out that you have to think someone is wrong before you will tolerate them – otherwise you are not tolerating them, you are just getting along normally. When an act of genuine toleration like this occurs it is a much more significant human moment. It also occurs to me that toleration-as-relativism is more of a conversation stopper then toleration-as-realism since the first throws up its hands in defeat, giving up on the project of either parties in any way being correct, reasonable, true, good or right, whereas the second affirms that each will continue to view the other as a person worthy of dignity as the conversation continues and they debate and attempt to arrive at consensus.

Christianity is often painted as being fundamentally intolerant in orientation, since it makes it its business to disagree with other religions about God, and to disagree with large portions of society about morality. These remarks from Blackburn show that there are no grounds to correlate disagreement and toleration. It reminds Christianity to disagree in a way which is tolerant, and it ought to lead non-Christians to question whether the popular tendency to label Christianity intolerant and race towards relativism is a wise one.