Originally Posted by
Noogah
This is a worthy post. I SOOO know what you mean. On YouTube, I PM an atheist, and we debate. It began when I commented on some Atheist video that did nothing but put down Creationists. The guy responded to me, and we went back and forth for awhile. Eventually, he apologized (much to my embarrassment) and we became pals. Since then, I've TRIED to make it a personal policy to respect beliefs, even if I believe they are false. Of course, I'm human, and my emotions have gotten the best of me in the past (PhilosopherStoned, UM, you should know.)
Also, a misconception is that tolerance means you have to like the belief, of believe it, and not debate it. My pal and I debate all the time on friendly terms. Friends fight all the time. Tolerance simply means to tolerate the belief, and not show your negative emotions towards it. I.E I hate the Pizza my sister made, but I tolerate it.
I think tolerance is something everybody should strive for. After all, I think we all know how annoying it is to be consistently bombarded with meaningless insults. It's terrible. It embarrasses(or should embarrass) the attacker, annoys the victim, and gives the attackers belifs a bad reputation.