What a great way to excuse idiocy, ignorance, and bullshit. All we have to do is speak the magic words, “That’s just his opinion, ” or, “Everyone has a right to their opinion,” or, “We have to respect his opinion,”.
No. Just no…
Yes, you have a right to your opinion – even if that opinion is born of ignorance and stupidity. You should not have the expectation that the rest of us will just shrug off your opinion. One of my Facebook friends posted this:
…I want to be able to express my beliefs without fear of retaliation – physical, financial, etc – I want…everyone else to enjoy that right.
Sorry, you don’t have that “right”. You have the right to free speech, but that only means that there are strict guards in place to prevent the government from restricting your speech. There is no right or guarantee that your speech will not incur a negative reaction. When expressing opinions – especially opinions that are controversial, shocking, or just stupid – retaliation of one sort or another is always a possibility.
Here’s an opinion, “..the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew.” Do we defer to the speaker and give him a pass for his opinion? Do we channel the Dude and passively roll over? No! We challenge that opinion. We rebut. If this opinion were said by an employee of any American company while at work, the person may be fired or certainly “written up”.
You have the right to your opinion. You do not have a right to be sheltered from that opinion being challenged or even ridiculed.
0
