Tolerating others

Tolerance

If we live completely isolated on our own, far from anyone else, only the occasional visitor will remark upon the untidiness of your garden. When we live close to others, all bunched up, we become much more attuned to the tolerance problem. What is tolerable and what is not? We can decide to be tolerant of our neighbours when we appreciate how much lenience they give us too. Making noise from time to time is a case in point; people will accept some but will object to constant aggravation. Complaining about a party held next door is less warranted if twice a year rather than twice a week. Are we infringing on their life or are they being petty? Disputes arise. I have made the error of not listening to my own gut instinct and being influenced by seemingly respectable persons. I was soon wishing that I had stuck to my own tried and tested ways. People will use you to sort their problems and you end up in the firing line.

Your body is yours to deface, to work to death, to do what you like with. Paint your hair bright green if you feel the urge, for that is your business. It only becomes someone else's concern when you start endangering others, when our activities begin impacting upon their way of life. People go hiking in mid-winter and get into trouble. Ill equipped and inexperienced thus leading to a call upon others for a rescue. They are making use of the obligations of others to come to their aid. Your recklessness becomes someone else’s problem. This is more of a political problem than anything else. People make mistakes and we need not see them die just because we don’t want to bear the cost of getting them out of a fix. However, ignorance of the dangers is not an excuse that sits well with people that are in the line of fire.

We are the least happy when what people are doing jeopardies the safety of those not involved in that activity. In my view, under no account would it be acceptable to sacrifice a pedestrian to ensure the safety of those in a vehicle. Even if 50 are in said vehicle. They can be notified of the risks before embarking and choose to get on or not.

It will be nice to live by clear cut simple rules. One such rule might be; with tolerance in mind, don’t do anything that infringes, upsets or endangers anybody else. However, people will interpret a rule in different ways, so people will ask for clarifications and examples. Exceptions will arise too, making the wording of the rule ever larger. From one sentence it soon expands to cover hundreds of pages or more. Some will think of the saying, “all rules are there to be broken”, and we can never cater for the countless permutations of a wonderful life.