this has been kicking around im my head for weeks, so i am gonna put it out there.
opinions are really just like assholes, everybody has one and alot of times they are full of shit.
many times, i have decided not to reply to a post on the topic of mental health or addiction because those are my areas of expertise...academically, professionally, and of course informed by my personal life. so because of my evolving boundaries, i don't comment. i am not here to school anybody, contrary to what one or two members may accuse me of.
anyway, so i have an educated and experienced opinion on those things. but it is still an opinion, cause for every phd that maintains that addiction is behavioral there is one that thinks it is chemical. see what i mean? my opinion is much more evolved but it is still an opinion.
i think that my opinions are "right", or i wouldn't have them. like etta said, there are varying levels of attachment to how "right" we are. i think my pro-choice opinions are "right", noble even. i just have to satnd for it, because there are alot of people who think my opinions are "wrong", sinful even. they just have to stand for that.
i think there is very little point in debating or arguing about it. don't get me wrong, political protest is another thing entirely. i am the first one waving a sign and marching when LAWS are being fucked with that i think are "right" or "wrong". but i am done protesting people's personal choices. know what i mean? i would no sooner stand outside a church on a random sunday and hold a sign that says "christianity is evil" (although i do think that) because...why? "it's just my opinion, i am entitled to it"?????? no. and i wish the people that stand outside abortion clinics for hours and days and weeks and months and years on end would go home, adopt a child and watch sesame street with them, teach them their abc's, whatever, rather than presuming to tell me what to do. and wasting, in my "opinion" their time shouting at women who have already made a decision. they may or may not think they are "right".
so when you say, "this is just my opinion, so don't fuck with me", that is passive aggressive and just stupid. everything we say is just our opinion. the people that stand outside of funerals of gay people with signs that say "aids kills fags dead" are expressing their opinion, which is repellent to me but so what? my time could be spent counter protesting, offering free mental health services to the grieving family inside, writing to my congress person about changing the laws so that they aren't allowed to turn funerals into demonstrations, the possibliltites are as varies as the responses.
i guess what i am trying to say, to echo strangequark, is that just because there is a discalimer on something does not absolve you. i smoke even though there is a disclamier on the box, i think people that sue the tobacco companies are beyond demented. is ther NO accountability?
critical thinking is not something that we learn, unfortuntately, unless you go to school beyond a certain level. i didn't have a course in critical thinking until grad school, i think that is pretty common. there are better ways to think than others, i do believe that, process wise. i also think that content can be judged using certain criteria...those criteria are different for all. and they are complez, and much more interesting to discuss, in my "opinion", than "opinions" themselves. maybe that is why i am a therapist and not a politician. i think that the how and the why are almost always far more interesting than the what.
but i digress. you know the npr series "this i believe"? i was thinking about undertaking that myself, just to see if i could distill one of my beliefs into something cogent and brief. anybody want to do that with me? we could help each other by discussing our beliefs, but also the how and the why of it, to help us in that fine tuning process? maybe that should be a seperate post.
anyway, everything we say is an opinion, and if my opinion posted in a public forum provokes a reaction to it, then my opinion has taken on a life of it's own. like art, once it is outside the artists head it no longer belongs to the artist, people can see it and may or may not get it, may think they get it but don't get what i meant, well, they still got something, right? and it isn't up to me to say, no, you got my painting/poem/song/opinion WRONG. if you don't like people's reactions to your opinions, asking why it bothers you may be much more productive than launching an attack on the other's stance.
can we talk about that instead? cause the "i know more than you about this and you are wrong" is tiring me out as much as the "i think what i think and you can all fuck off" is wearing me out.
let the wild rumpus begin.