The people you struggle to tolerate may look surprisingly like you

Scott Alexander distinguishes a group someone merely does not belong to from a group they experience as a social threat. Those categories are easily confused when people describe themselves as tolerant.

A distant culture can be easy to admire. A neighboring political or religious group may provoke much stronger hostility because it competes for status, institutions and influence in the same social world. Small differences can become intensely important at that boundary.

Alexander also reflects on how thoroughly his own social circle excludes some large parts of American society. Physical proximity, a shared country and access to a huge online platform do not guarantee meaningful contact with people whose assumptions differ.

Written in the setting of US politics in 2014, this is an interpretive essay rather than a representative social-science study. Its central challenge is to examine where tolerance becomes personally difficult, instead of measuring it only by warmth toward groups one already likes.