Photo/Illutration House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tears up her copy of President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address after he delivered it to a joint session of Congress on Capitol Hill in Washington on Feb. 4. Vice President Mike Pence is at left. (AP Photo)

In a tolerant society, everybody agrees to disagree, and no one is ostracized.

Kazuo Watanabe (1901-1975), a scholar of French literature, left this famous maxim for anyone who values such a society: "Being intolerant of intolerance would defeat the spirit of tolerance itself."

Even though ancient Rome was by nature a tolerant society, Watanabe argued, it chose to suppress early Christianity because the latter was excessively intolerant of any other faith.

But, Watanabe continued, the suppression served only to enrage and harden the Christians, thereby perpetuating a chain reaction of intolerance.

I recalled Watanabe's words from video footage of U.S. President Donald Trump's State of the Union address on Feb. 4.

The moment Trump concluded his address, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, stood up from her seat behind the president and ripped a copy of his speech in half.

Right before Trump began his address, Pelosi had extended her hand to Trump for a handshake, but Trump appeared to have snubbed her.

Did Pelosi rip up the copy as a payback for Trump's rudeness, or with the intention just to mimic the wanton intolerance with which the president habitually vilifies his political enemies, herself included?

Here in Japan's Diet, too, Jun Azumi, chairman of the Diet Affairs Committee of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP), has done something incredibly churlish.

On a wall that is visible from a hallway in the Diet building, he pinned newspaper clips of political news, and scribbled cheap comments such as "trash" and the "writer ought to be banned (from the Diet building)" on those that he didn't like.

Did he think he could intimidate reporters in this manner? Has the ugly spirit of political intolerance in Japan come to poison even opposition party lawmakers?

In Japan as well as in the United States, there are instances of politicians displaying such utter lack of dignity or common decency that are enough to drive us to despair.

And I don't think it's a coincidence that they are happening in both countries.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Feb. 6

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Vox Populi, Vox Dei is a popular daily column that takes up a wide range of topics, including culture, arts and social trends and developments. Written by veteran Asahi Shimbun writers, the column provides useful perspectives on and insights into contemporary Japan and its culture.

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