Tolerance works by showing it works

Irish and European history offer far too many examples of atrocities inflicted in the name of a god, imagined interpretations of a god’s wishes, or evolving social and political beliefs.

Anyone with even a passing curiosity about the world around them cannot but be horrified — and mystified — at the scale of carnage inflicted by man upon another because they think, believe, or look differently. That genocide can be, and more often than not is, carried out by societies that otherwise seem civilised, sophisticated, functioning, and even progressive just deepens the mystery about the lethal power of beliefs and the destructive intolerance they can unleash.

This intolerance can be so murderous that it suggests that the creeds, religious or political, we hold so dear may just be a veneer for a darker, more atavistic being ready to use their particular beliefs as an excuse to assert dominance over others. And though contemporary sensibilities would recoil from the suggestion that the carnage of the Second World War could be repeated it would be worse than naïve to believe that humanity has changed enough in 67 years to make it impossible. Sadly, it is not hard to see the kind of hatred and ignorance that made that war inevitable in action in today’s world.