For starters, what is tolerance? "The ability or willingness to tolerate something, in particular the existence of opinions or behavior that one does not necessarily agree with." In GSA (Gay straight alliance) we push this concept a lot. Our first objective is to create a safe place where EVERYONE can be themselves. We don't judge and we give everyone a chance to speak about their week. Our second objective is to spread tolerance. When I say that we spread tolerance, I don't JUST mean for homosexuals. Everyone has a tolerance problem, and there are many different things that you can be intolerant about.
Everyone has pet peeves or things that they don't like about people and things that they do. You may not like something about someone but you still tolerate. If you hate it when people smack their gum but you don't judge them for it, and you don't yell at them or something, you're tolerating it! :) You may not like someone at all, but they're your best friends friend so you tolerate them.
All of this ties in closely with what you believe. There are things that everyone will NOT tolerate. For me, I will not tolerate closed-mindedness and homophobia. Of course there are other things, like most people, including me, will not allow anyone to harass their friends. Basically, you do not tolerate harassment. Everyone can state their opinion, of course! I'm all for listening to other people's side of things; if you continually say it though, or keep on bugging someone about it, it's harassment.
So basically, I'm just asking that everyone try their best to be open-minded about other peoples opinions and that you help spread tolerance, not just for GSA's sake, or homosexuals sake, but for everyones sake because NO one likes being discriminated against.
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