The Paradox of Tolerance

Tolerance contains a trap. Karl Popper named it in 1945, writing in the shadow of a war that killed sixty million people:

"If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them... for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols."^[1]

Any system that permits its own destruction will eventually be destroyed.

Weimar Germany is the textbook case. A democracy so committed to openness that it allowed its destroyers to organize legally, campaign freely, and seize power through constitutional procedure.

The Nazi Party used every protection the Weimar Constitution offered. Article 123 guaranteed peaceful assembly without special permission. Article 124 protected the right to form associations. The SA organized openly under these provisions, growing from a Munich beer hall gang in 1921 to three million members by 1934.^[2]

Proportional representation gave them a path to power. The system awarded one Reichstag seat per 60,000 votes with no minimum threshold. In September 1930, the Nazis jumped from 12 seats to 107. By July 1932, they were the largest party in parliament with 230 seats.^[3]

Hitler became Chancellor on January 30, 1933 through entirely legal means. Article 53 gave President Hindenburg sole authority to appoint the position. No coup. No revolution. The constitution's own mechanisms handed power to a man who had openly promised to destroy the system.

Within two months, democracy was functionally dead. The Reichstag Fire Decree suspended civil liberties indefinitely. The Enabling Act passed 444 to 94, granting Hitler's cabinet power to enact laws without parliamentary approval.^[4] Every step followed constitutional forms until they had enough power to abolish the constitution entirely.

Tolerance works as a social contract. I tolerate you, you tolerate me. We don't have to agree. We don't have to like each other. We accept boundaries that let different viewpoints coexist.

The contract breaks when one party refuses to sign it. A movement that advocates eliminating other groups has rejected the premise of mutual tolerance. They demand the contract's protections while refusing its obligations. A player who won't follow the rules doesn't get to keep playing the game. Ejecting them isn't unfair. Letting them stay would be.

The Weimar Republic extended constitutional protections to a movement that openly intended to abolish constitutional protections. The result was predictable.

The playbook hasn't changed. Demand protection for speech aimed at removing others' rights. Claim victimhood when facing consequences for breaking the agreement. Position any boundary as proof of hypocrisy: "You claim to be tolerant, but you won't tolerate us!"

The trap works because it sounds like a logical contradiction. Refusing to tolerate those who reject tolerance is the requirement for tolerance to survive. The alternative is waiting politely while someone dismantles the system that permits dissent.

January 6, 2021 showed the playbook in action. A movement that spent years claiming election fraud without evidence, that answered arguments with fists when legal challenges failed, then demanded free speech protections when platforms finally enforced their terms of service. The pattern Popper identified played out on livestream.

We didn't learn the lesson. We're still debating whether to tolerate movements openly working to end toleration.

Any community that wants to survive has to grapple with this, including this one. The social contract we ask members to sign exists because unlimited tolerance loses. Boundaries are the prerequisite for freedom, not its opposite.

A society that cannot distinguish between good-faith disagreement and bad-faith destruction will not remain free for long.

The Weimar Republic offered every freedom to people who intended to abolish freedom. Ninety years later, we're running the same experiment and expecting different results.