Tolerance is accepted as an essential part of developing a harmonious community, but tolerance and censorship are not quite the same thing. While tolerance is defined by the OED as “the disposition to be patient or lenient toward the opinions or practices of others; the absence of bigotry or excessive severity in judging the conduct of others,” and involves a personal decision to accept the differences of others. , censorship is defined as “supervision; official control” by the OED which removes personal responsibility and places it on an entity other than oneself. Too often it is simply accepted that the successful implementation of tolerance also requires the existence of censorship, and while this may be true in some cases, such as self-censorship of racist slurs, when it comes to religion, censorship is dangerous. . Religious censorship suppresses free speech and is obviously responsible for creating dangerous divisions within society. While respecting the religious beliefs of others is important, it is also necessary to realize that by creating a society that is highly censored in matters of religion, censorship actually perpetuates the concept of otherness, which ultimately is detrimental to the goals of creating a harmonious society. The censorship that exists in the information provided and in the actions of the media and government helps shape dangerous ideas about otherness among those who do not share the same religious beliefs. Even works of art are suppressed when they explore topics that could be considered “offensive.” Misconceptions about other religions, particularly Islam, create divisions within society and set up an “us versus them” scenario. Many misrepresentations of religious groups are mixed in...... middle of article ......tainment/4281958.stm>Hendon, David W. and Charles McDaniel. “Notes on Affairs between Church and State.” Journal of Church and State. 51.2 (October 19, 2009): 382-389. EBSCO host. Accessed March 22, 2010. Ho, Christina and Tanja Dreher. “Not Another Row of Hijabs: New Conversations on Gender, Race, Religion, and Community Building.” International Feminist Journal of Politics. 11.1 (March 2009): 114-125. EBSCO host. Accessed March 22, 2010. Julius, Anthony. "Comment." Material religion. 2.2 (2000): 237-239. EBSCO host. Accessed March 22, 2010 Manzoor, Sarfraz. “You will not offend.” Index on censorship. 2 (2005): 112-116. EBSCO host. Accessed March 22, 2010. Owen, Ursula. “Problem or solution? » Index on censorship. 3 (2006): 1. EBSCOhost. Accessed March 22, 2010. Tripathi, Salil. “Draw a line.” Index on censorship. 2 (2005): 162-168. EBSCO host. Accessed in March 22, 2010.