By Jennifer Trend, Staff Writer
The movie’s cinematography was astounding. This teacher is the worst I’ve ever had! Have you ever seen such stunning visuals? What you’re doing is a really dumb and stupid idea. That outfit looks really pretty on her. He’s a complete jerk- don’t become friends with him.
Opinions. We all have them. Some positive and uplifting while others are negative and ruinous. We live in a society where we share our thoughts and opinions on a daily basis, but shouldn’t there be a line between what should be shared and what stays personal?
Now I’m not saying that one’s freedom of speech should be restricted or that we should keep all of our thoughts and opinions just to ourselves- that would destroy almost all sense of individuality. Suppressing what we want to say, especially in the culture that we live in, would be hard.
But perhaps it would be better to evaluate what thoughts and opinions we put into the world and online. Once out there, our words may not even be ours anymore. People can quote us wrongly, repeat words in a different tone, screenshot messages or posts and nitpick at everything, creating an impression of you that may be false or hurt someone when your intentions were not to hurt them.
Your opinions can leave an impression on others and influence someone to think or act one way or another before they themselves have the chance to come to their own conclusion. You could call it the “Poisoning the well” fallacy. It’s unfair to everyone- the person you told may subconsciously side or not side with you, the person or thing that you were for or against gets put into a filtered light and the person may pass this opinion to others and continue the cycle.
Yes, you’re entitled to your own opinion, but don’t force someone else to share the same opinion as you. It’s uncomfortable and unhealthy to be in a position where it feels as if you have to agree so that the other person’s opinion of you won’t change (perhaps that fear of not wanting to seem to be against that person or unsupportive?). It’s all about opinions isn’t it?
So think before you speak- not just for the sake of yourself but for the sake of others. If you take a minute to think about how others may be impacted, then you may realize how much power your words hold.
