It’s been a long time since I heard the word tolerance for the first time. At first I didn’t understand it. For me, tolerating something was something like not getting angry.
Over time I saw all the meanings that the word has and I saw that the space between two pieces that fit is called tolerance.
I also saw that when an organism is able to resist a substance unrelated to it, it is also called tolerance.
Little by little I was making a great picture of the meaning of the word. And I liked it more and more.
I’m a little older, that’s why in the day I saw how it was used to raise awareness about tolerance towards people from other countries, with other beliefs, with other customs. And I learned that tolerance. Most of us learned it. And it was good.
Then I saw how they asked me for tolerance to accept homosexuals, when in the 90s, thank God, the acceptance of other forms of sexuality began. And I learned this tolerance. Most of us learned it and that’s why we are where we are.
And so it happened with more situations that we learned to tolerate, so we learned to accept others first and then to stop seeing them as something different. They was us. We are all. There is no them.
But then came the word equality. Because a world response to the inequality between men and women was necessary. It’s a difficult fight, although I came with it from home. My mother always taught me equality. In my house I lived the equality between my sister and me. But the world was not like that and it had to be claimed.
But then, equality began to devour tolerance. Because tolerating is much deeper. Love the difference. Love the others. But equality doesn’t look at anyone, it just wants everyone to be equal. It doesn’t matter how you feel: you must be the same. It doesn’t matter how you love: you have to be the same.
And that’s how equality trampled on tolerance and made us intolerant. Everything bothers us. We don’t accept different opinions. We don’t accept different people. We don’t want different feelings. Because we carry equality as a flag. And equality is a tyranny for the individual.
That’s why for this year 2023 and next I want tolerance again. I want to enrich my being with what is different from me. I want to see the streets with multicolored skins. I want to see people love above all else. Because tolerance or love has never come to anything bad for us
