Take a stand, or several:
Jr, David R Carlin
OF SEVERAL HINDS David R. Carlin, Jr. TAKE A STAND, OR SEVERAL ON NOT BEING NONJUDGMENTAL Years ago I discovered what countless other teachers have discovered-a cheap and easy trick for...
...First, drop this description, not only because it is inaccurate, but even more because it sets a bad example for the young, who often listen to what we say without observing that our actions don't always suit our words...
...for since skeptics themselves have no beliefs, it makes no difference to them what others believe, all beliefs being equally invalid...
...But nowadays "I believe X" is a statement about myself, about one of my preferences...
...I would simply say something calculated to outrage their beliefs and values...
...I have yet to come across a self-confessed nonjudgmentalist who was not full of judgments- aboutmorals, manners, clothing, automobiles, furniture, architecture, books, movies, etc...
...I have, in my judgmental way, three suggestions for middle-aged people who have fallen into the bad habit of describing themselves (erroneously) as nonjudgmental...
...it is people living in accordance with certain shared beliefs and values...
...Tolerance is much easier to achieve for the skeptic...
...Calling things by their right names is, next to fear of the Lord, the beginning of wisdom...
...The nonjudgmentalist does not regard her nonjudgmentalism as being a mere fact about herself, like a birthmark or a phobia...
...For human beings the point is not to avoid judgments, which would be an absurd ideal...
...Call it tolerance or sympathy or broad-mindedness or liberalism: anything but nonjudgmentalism...
...This is not an easy kind of tolerance to achieve...
...She regards it as a moral ideal that she has attained and that others ought to attain...
...But for the truly nonjudgmental person, even nonjudgmentalism is not a virtue...
...so we're both right, and there's nothing to argue about...
...Finally, increase and multiply your judgments indefinitely...
...At a minimum, every non-judgmentalist judges that being "nonjudgmental" is a good thing, being "judgmental," bad...
...It derives from "the public thing"-as opposed to private things: the public interest as opposed to private interests...
...Middle-aged people who talk about being nonjudgmental really aren't...
...If I suggest, for instance, that there is something to be said on behalf of cannibalism, provided it is practiced in moderation, or that Hitler has been given a bad rap, my students, while they are not likely to agree with me, are not willing to get into an argument with me, either...
...But they don't hold their beliefs as propositions that are objectively valid...
...and the more of these latter, the better...
...Second, find a more accurate name for the virtue you have hitherto called "nonjudgmentalism...
...Why should they talk about it...
...There are two kinds of tolerance: the tolerance of the believer and that of the skeptic...
...Society, after all, is not simply a collection of people in the same neighborhood...
...the point is to avoid bad judgments and to achieve sound ones...
...TAKE A STAND, OR SEVERAL ON NOT BEING NONJUDGMENTAL Years ago I discovered what countless other teachers have discovered-a cheap and easy trick for stimulating discussion among my college students...
...But the great disadvantage, at least in the long run, is that this skepticism erodes the very basis of social life...
...it requires a lively conviction of the dignity and autonomy of the other...
...instead, they hold them as a set of mere personal preferences...
...When a person describes herself as nonjudgmental, she doesn't think of her nonjudgmentalism as being on the same plane as her other attributes: 5'4", or forty-six years old, or American...
...For to talk about it is to boast about it, as though it were a virtue...
...The tolerance of my current students is the easy tolerance of the skeptic, not the difficult tolerance of the believer...
...The true nonjudgmentalists are to be found among the young, who don't talk about it...
...and if we don't want other people telling us what we should believe, then we shouldn't stick our noses into other people's business and tell them what to believe...
...Every so often I run into someone a generation or so older than today's college students, who describes himself or herself (more frequently herself, since women seem more inclined toward this self-description than men) as "nonjudg-mental...
...The advantage of skeptical tolerance is, of course, that it makes it easy for people to live together in a pluralistic, individualistic society...
...it is just a fact...
...If I wish to hold weird opinions, well, that's my business...
...But exist it must...
...it encourages them in their antisocial attitude of skepticism...
...Recently, I have found that this cheap trick no longer works well...
...We are not the keepers of the beliefs and values of our brothers and sisters...
...no one, after all, can live devoid of beliefs...
...It isn't exactly that these students have no beliefs...
...In a modern society, consensus does not have to be terribly specific and detailed...
...But the public interest cannot be sustained without publicly shared beliefs and values...
...and if you say, "I believe Y," that only means you have a different preference...
...Skepticism and republicanism are enemies of one another...
...These latter descriptions are simply facts about the person, and in reciting them no reproach is implied against someone who is, say, 6'1", thirty-five years old, and Canadian...
...We can all march to different drummers and no one gets confused, for no one pays any attention to any drummer but his or her own...
...Recall the etymology of the word "republic...
...and to the degree they don't, they are imperfect...
...and if you said, "I believe Y," then one of us at least must be wrong...
...I never fail to be irritated, if only mildly, by this self-description, for such folks are not the least bit nonjudgmental...
...and a lively classroom discussion was under way...
...Yet the existence of even a very abstract consensus is undermined and eventually destroyed by the spread of skepticism-or by the spread of an attitude that holds all beliefs and values to be mere preferences, rather than objectively valid propositions...
...Little wonder that the growth of skepticism in recent times coincides with a serious decline in voter participation in the U.S...
...it can exist at a high level of abstraction...
...This is America, after all, and everyone is entitled to his or her own views, no matter how peculiar they may be...
...for only such a conviction can sustain a willingness to put up with what the believer earnestly believes to be an erroneous and potentially harmful position...
...In the old days the statement, "I believe X," was a statement about the world...
...The tolerant believer is prepared to put up with views that he or she seriously believes to be mistaken, perhaps even dangerous...
...Students have become more tolerant of views that differ from their own...
...they would protest...
Vol. 116 • September 1989 • No. 15
