The subject of one being "closed-minded" or "open-minded" seems to come up frequently on boards such as these for the soul reason that everyone wishes to have their own personal views understood. In order to make it understood to other people they may resort to many tactics (which are completely visible on the board) such as scare ("You're going to Hell!") or name-calling or merely a simple "This is what I believe statement." Upon making such comments the poster is then faced with a delimna - people who do not understand. This is when the "be open-minded" comments start to fly.
My proposition is that everyone is indeed closed-minded. It is impossible not to be. We all have something that if we look hard enough in ourselves we can say "I will not budge on my belief in this" or "I would NEVER ever consider that." Now, this is not to say that you are any less of a person truly, for we are all like this.
There are degreeing levels of closed-mindedness (as Bug pointed out to me one day). The most dangerous is the level that says "I am open-minded." The person who believes that they are open-minded about things is the one who is probably, in my opinion, the most closed-minded about even his own self.
An example. One is dreaming. A person who doesn't realize that they are even dreaming or asleep is probably in the greatest deep of the dream. To realize that one is dreaming is to no longer be perfectly alseep. Thus, to make a comparison. The man who thinks he is "open-minded" is indeed himself in the deepest level of closed-mindedness -- the ignorance of even being in a dream. The man who realizes that he is closed-minded (or dreaming) has already taken a step to being not-so-closed-minded (or in waking up).
My point: By saying to someone "You're so closed-minded" or "Just be open-minded about the subject -- like me!" is only in effect admitting your own level of closed-mindedness.
Application: To this board I can honestly say there are people on here who shock me with the shroad they have covering my eyes and who, on the other hand, astonish me with their breadth of knowledge and understanding. To those who believe whatever they do, whether thiest or athiest, I believe it IMPOSSIBLE to hold a belief without knowing what the other options are to believe (This is what bugs me the most about modern-Christianity). The thing is, even the more knowledgable you are, the more you read and the more you study, you may gain superiority to people on here, but that does not constitute a higher level of open-mindness on the broader scale. For there is always something more to learn and to study. We can NEVER exhaust ourselves in learning about other people's beliefs. This does not mean that we give up what we believe while searching for other's ideas. What this means is that we don't put blinders on our eyes and say "I am RIGHT!" instead we cling with one hand to what we believe and with the other search through the jungle of what everyone else believes. We will never become open-minded, but, through searching at the honest truths of what other people hold through faith we become a little less closed-minded.