When faced with groups they do not like, are citizens more willing to restrict democratic values in order to gain politically? This is a question that political scientists and scholars have been debating for many years. In some ways, one could compare it to whether or not people perceive certain attitudes as Christian or not.
Most research has worked on the assumption that when policy considerations conflict with democratic values, most people usually choose the policy they either favor or oppose over democratic values. However, a new study posits that what we actually do is to rationalize what we perceive as democratic or undemocratic.
It’s really like rationalizing what we consider to be “Christian” or “un-Christian.” The bloody wars of religion were fought over just that issue and this new study argues that if democracy is to survive, we must confront our own biases in determining what we think is “democratic.” Let’s hope that we don’t need bloody wars to determine that the best social policy is tolerance.
Prayer for the Day
Give us grace, we pray, to recognize the limits of our knowledge,
For we know none of us is all-knowing and infallible;
Give us imagination, we pray, to look beyond the boundaries we set,
Convinced that our answers are always the right ones.
Give us strength, we pray, to live each day with humility and modesty,
Knowing that we always look through a glass darkly
We ask this in the name of the One who always asked questions,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
On the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom. - Michel de Montaigne, from The Complete Essays (1533-1562)
Release me from the idea that I must straighten out other peoples' affairs. With my immense treasure of experience and wisdom, it seems a pity not to let everybody partake of it.
- From Prayer of an anonymous abbess (found in a 14th century manuscript)
When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought like a child. But when I became an adult, I put away childish things. For now, we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face. Now I know only in part, but then I shall know even as I am known.
Paul, Letter to the Corinthians 13: 11-12