One of my dear friends posted a random image on the Facebook page about something she strongly felt about, an opinion which was reflexive and evident of the image. It was followed by several likes and comments, some of which were nice and the rest not so nice. Those likes and comments too, reflected an opinion or an ideology, or perhaps an understanding that they had in common or uncommon. This was followed by a huge debate on who thought what on what grounds, each hell-bent to prove his wordsworth (worth by means of words), much to the amusement of the onlookers who liked random comments and boosted and crushed several egos in the process.
But, we all know, it’s a tough thing to put down. It will raise its ugly head every now and then as a matter of pride and satisfaction in being ugly. Now, to have several of those egos crashing down on each other’s posts as if their intelligence would be determined by the vile comments they made and the ostentatious ‘likes’ they garnered.
Ultimately, the cold war would end with a severely hurt, emotionally drained fellow who acts as if he has been publicly defamed, just as if he has been raped by the ugly crowd that had just gathered ‘by the wall’ in a span of few minutes, the ordeal for which could run into the depression for several days. Not one to forget, the subconscious mind would smartly store this insult to captivate your thoughts for major part of days.
Of course, we all know the famous John Milton quote, “A good opinion is but, a knowledge in the making.” But, why is it so necessary to put them into the public domain every now and then? Let’s analyze the reason.
Perhaps, because one is not afraid of voicing out his opinion and thereby wishes to proclaim it with as much passion as he believes in it. Or perhaps, he wishes to display a part of his personality in the social circle which one could call it as an attention seeking phenomena. Though, I am afraid, both could be assimilated in every way as a person who is brave would anyways put them up. But then, what if the person just tries to make one believe, and by that one I mean the entire totem who is tagged or is closely following him/her that he is brave although in all certainty, he might turn out to be that only dud, he refuses to accept himself as.
Also, if the person has a strong opinion on something, why should he be afraid of reasoning out and unearthing the truth for which there would be no two reasons to it! If he is sincerely in the pursuit of subject with a strong opinion, he must be intelligent enough to change them for it is rightly said,
“Fight for your opinions, but do not believe that they contain the whole truth, or the only truth.” Charles A. Dana (1819 – 1897)
It might lead us, though, to think that changing opinions are not a good sign of a person’s character. Then, to that the best argument which occurs to me is why do we form just one thought as an opinion without proper introspection from all the angles which further leads us to believe that we are in a hurry to build our castles in order to prove a point to the people, whether it be of sand or stone would scarcely matter to us. We live for the people and not for us!
Maybe, it’s the attention that people get by proclaiming opinions which incites people to do the same. After all, it is rightly said by Swami Vivekananda, “80% of the people are ruled by the other 20%.”
We are not governed by what we think, in fact a great thinker goes a little further to note that, “Even our opinion are not ours!” Hence there is a little proof that our actions are our own.
We console ourselves, in the process, that we are different, going by the way of the smartness with which we put up a good act in the public circles, yet we are all, part of the same herd when it comes to the actions that we display. The veil of hypocrisy continues to allude and measure the success only in terms of money and fame.
It’s hard to accept somebody’s argument even though you consciously know it to be right. To follow-up against the argument for the sake of a follow-up has drawn many followers, which is quite disheartening.
Rarely would you come across individuals who would actually be smart enough to accept silence for it is worth, observe a lot more before framing their opinions and do not use the power of confidence and knowledge with the view of showing their prowess to the ignorant, who are rarely looking for the truth in the first place.
Instead even the individuals that would indulge in proving others wrong, however right they may be, would be wrong for it’s not the expertise or an argument they ever asked for; rather it is your obsession to boast about yourself that has been proved.
