Liberal vs. Tolerant vs. Compassionate

I had a court appointment recently who, I learned during a meeting at the jail, was a member of the Aryan Brotherhood (a white supremacist group). It wasn't a secret. He had the tattoos to prove it. You know, my "liberal" mindset wasn't to storm out of the room while yelling what a racist he was. Instead, it was to sit and talk with him while thinking "how in the world did you end up with those attitudes?" He couldn't possibly have been born that way. People fascinate me.