Are We Too Easily Offended?

At home in Fort Worth...

The restrictions to Sandy's and my travel caused by upcoming surgeries give me time to ponder certain things, whatever good or ill that brings.  We have only three trips scheduled for Phannie through November--all of short distance and duration, so I will have plenty of time to fill blogging space with something other than my usual blather about our travels.  This 'something' will include, of necessity, a greater reliance upon philosophizing.  (Don't laugh; my philosophy is worth every nickel you pay for it.)


This has its risks, however, as philosophizing, by its nature, requires its practitioner to offer opinions, some of which may differ from those held by readers.  Mindful of the risks, I am very careful to avoid issues known to be polarizing, such as religion and politics, although I have strong views on both.


Why take any risk at all, one may ask.  Well, for the same reason a newspaper editorial column is more interesting to me than the stock price page.  As stated in a recent post about blogging, I find a writer's thoughts and impressions about a subject likely to be more captivating than the the subject itself.  As long as the opinions I express do not include negative personal comments, there shouldn't be any problem.  Or so I thought.


I recently learned that a respected blogger whom I follow (and who followed me) was offended by something I wrote in my post, "Getting on the Blogging Tips Bandwagon" and unsubscribed from my blog in a huff.  I was mystified as to what had set him off, but I later found out that he didn't like my opinion about the kinds of posts I find interesting.   Mind you, I carefully avoided mentioning any blog or author by name in my post, but he must have thought I was writing about him.  (I wasn't; his blog is very well done and one of my favorites, about which I've left only positive comments.)


Instead of leaving, I wish he had left a comment with a differing opinion as others, like Rick, occasionally do.  I covet these as an intellectual exchange in which I may learn something.  But just to high tail it because I expressed an opinion--I don't get it.



Please excuse the rant, but have we reached a point where we are too easily offended?  Perhaps we have, and I think it might be attributed to our national obsession with political correctness.  In many cases, it is modeled to us via television that disagreeing with someone is impermissible if that person is of a certain color, orientation, origin, politic, religion, etc., etc.  Must we now be careful with bloggers, too?  I guess my erstwhile blogger friend didn't zero in on the premise that my post was merely an 
O-P-I-N-I-O-N!  As far as I know, I'm still allowed to have one and to express it.


I certainly wish the offended blogger had hung around because I was proud to have him as a subscriber; I still read his posts and will continue to do so.  But then, I'm not easily offended.