This is an interesting article in response to the French massacre of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine staff.
If you read it I recommend that you also follow some of the 600 comments which it has provoked. They provide a challenge to open mindedness in that they are not uniform and illustrate how simple it can be to identify with a point of view and then shut up shop, believing that you have formed your opinion and that yours is correct.
The real importance of this article, in my mind, is one of being prepared to allow those who don't agree with the point of view expressed, to then propose alternative readings or conclusions all of which may be valid for the individuals expressing them. The hardest thing is to accept the right of those of differing views to hold them as strongly as each of us holds our own.
Dialogue around ideas and issues means that you have to receive it all - not selectively accept only those opinions which align with yours. About understanding rather than convincing.
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