To those who say liberals are intolerant...

[MyshkinCommaPrince]

7. I agree with what you're stating...

I agree, but it seems like there's a tricky bit in there. How should we proceed to try educate or convince those who display true intolerance? Neither side listens to the other, so much of the time, and some of our strongest voices for change seem to have hair-trigger tempers. The culture of snark and soundbites works against clarity and seems to help foster intolerance. I think we can see the problem even in the infighting on this board. Passionate progressives who basically agree with one another fight viciously over various points, and some topics may be dangerous to discuss at all. If we can't even convey our ideas and their value to a generally sympathetic audience without a fight, it doesn't seem surprising that those who disagree with us think we're a bunch of jerks.

So how do we move forward, increase understanding of and support for our positions, while not getting into fights up front, making the other party feel stupid or inhuman, or otherwise falling prey to the harshness of the entrenched political divide in our culture? (Umm. Kind of feeling like I need to re-read Lackoff now, to answer my own questions....)

I guess I'm thinking, won't a truly intolerant person to whom one presents the reasoning in the OP just end up feeling like we've descended into name-calling? "I'm not intolerant - you are!" That seems to be the trick that's been worked on the concept now. A double-flip around sort of a thing.