Exercising Tolerance and Respect on Social Media

The tragic events that unfolded in San Bernardino on Dec. 2 were a horrible reminder that we live in a very difficult and complex world. We must not only contend with wars in the Middle East that are wholly different from anything previous generations would have experienced, but also the ever-present specter of tragedy in our own midst from people that, quite frankly, might have been shopping next to us in the grocery store the day before, or might have been our own neighbors.

Much as we like to simplify and categorize, the face of evil has no particular look or ethnicity or belief system. Those despicable people who think nothing of taking innocent lives in movie theaters, schools, churches and places of business have no single face. They look like James Holmes in Aurora, Seung-Hui-Cho at Virginia Tech, Dylan Roof in Charleston, Adam Lanza in Sandy Hook, Aaron Alexis in D.C., Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold at Columbine, and Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik in San Bernardino.

While the debate will rage on about how to stop these lunatics, what there can surely be no debating is the level of incivility and, all too frequently, vitriol that is unleashed by people about guns and gun violence after each one of these terrible events.

This column on National Jeweler is clearly not the place to offer opinions or perspectives on that topic, but it is worth reminding everyone that we ought to be able to engage in reasoned and respectful discussion on this and other sensitive topics without descending into attacks via social media against anyone who dares to weigh in with a viewpoint that differs from ours.

Here’s a newsflash: Your customers don’t agree with you on all sensitive matters. It is probably fair to speculate that about half of your customers will hold opposing views to you on many matters of sensitivity, be it politics, guns, religion, abortion or equality in marriage.

I’ll refrain from suggesting that we ought to celebrate our differences on these and other equally sensitive topics. Forget that--I’m not interested in celebrating a viewpoint with which I fundamentally disagree.

What we should do, however, is afford each other the common courtesy and the respect not to resort to petty name-calling or labeling because you disagree with someone’s position on an issue. We should not ascend the stairs