2020 was an interesting year. So many things had happened, from COVID to US presidential election. Just like many people, I spent a lot of time at home (due to social distancing and lockdown) which means I had a little bit more time to think about stuff in general. So I want to share some of my thoughts about “opinions”.
A couple months ago, Elon Musk (a pretty famous guy, people say he’s the real-life Iron Man) twitted about how he got a rapid test for COVID-19.
The reaction from public was really ambiguous. Majority of public (which on the internet for sure) criticized his tweet and started to make random conclusion. Something like: “Apparently Elon is not as smart as we think”, or “You don’t have to become smart to lead a tech company”, and many more. I guess, I’m a bit confused why people drew conclusions like that. Just because you don’t agree with him, it doesn’t mean that he is “stupid”. I think he merely made an observation about the testing results, and just stated the facts. I understand that with the amount of influence he has, making such statements could lead some people to believe otherwise (which I guess catergorized as spreading false information?). But again, it is his opinion that based on an observation. I don’t see anything wrong with it, especially when you live in the US with that “freedom of speech” thingy.
Nowdays, it seems that we can’t even have different opinions. If somebody doesn’t like my opinion, then I’ll be judged and criticized. It is really sensitive to have a debate, or disagree with some “common” views. Moreover, with more separation of political views today people can’t even admit if something doesn’t look right with their political views. Their opinions are always biased towards their view.
I think having different opinions is actually good. The effect of “opposition” or “feedback” keeps the society in check and not going towards the extremes. I’ll talk about this in another blog post. Thats why I feel kind of sad in seeing the situation we are in. As humans (social beings), we can’t even have a healthy conversation without being toxic anymore. I’m not sure if this happen because of COVID stress, or because the presidential election. But it happens and I don’t think it is a good thing.
However, I’m hopeful still. I think overtime people can start value opinions again and have a good constructive conversation, even if it means there will be a healthy debate or difference in opinions.
So, can we really have different opinions? I hope we can.