Bernard Williams was an English moral philosopher and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Cambridge and University of California, Berkeley. Williams was critical on the conclusion of tolerance based on the ideas of moral relativism.
For context,
Relativism: What is morally right or wrong can be coherently understood as relative to the accepted moral code of a society.
Toleration: It is wrong for people in one society to condemn or interfere with another society.
Bernard coins the term "Vulgar relativism"as a way to describe the combination of relativism and and toleration.
Vulgar relativism has three points:
‘Right’ means ‘right for a given society.’
‘Right for a given society’ is to be understood in functionalist terms.
Therefore, it is wrong for the members of one society to condemn or interfere with the values of another society.
This vulgar relativism is commonly used when critiquing the ethics, traditions, and values of a certain society. However, there is an obvious logical inconsistency in the premise and the moral conclusion. Can you see it?
Williams claims you cannot have both,as relativism in itself is relative but toleration is supposed to be a non-relative principle. Is the violation of tolerance wrong? If it is wrong, is it wrong for everyone everywhere? If so then toleration is a universal principle. Then there is at least one non-relative moral truth and then relativism can no longer be true. One can argue that toleration is itself a relative principle, but then this just diminishes the power of toleration in the first place. If toleration is relative, then there is no argument to be made.
Willams:
*"The central confusion of relativism is to try and conjure out of the fact that societies have differing attitudes and values an a priori nonrelative principle to determine the attitude of one society to another; this is impossible..."*
*"...If we are going to say that there are ultimate moral disagreements between societies, we must also include in the matters they can disagree about, their attitudes to other moral outlooks"*
If we believe that societies can have totally different moral beliefs, we must also accept that they can disagree on how they should view other societies' morals. Unless you're an absolutist and believe that moral values apply and are maintained at all times, at any place, and to all social frameworks, which in that case you'd have to explain WHY toleration is true and then you continue to dig yourself a deeper hole which in my opinion is impossible to get out of.
William points out that relativism can't logically create a universal rule for how societies should interact based on their differences, and we must accept that societies can disagree on the validity of each other's moral beliefs.