Strong Opinions Are Usually Wrong
Reality is too nuanced and too complex to be described by way of a strong opinion.
When someone is describing reality in a decisive, opinionated way, take it with a grain of salt. Chances are that in order to make reality, with all of its unknowns, fit into their binary, opinionated statement, they have to reduce reality to a much simpler form, glossing over inconvenient edge case, removing details that would render their opinion less conclusive.
Does that mean we should never be opinionated? That is up to the individual. It’s a trade-off. If you’re never opinionated, then your worldview often gets bulldozed and ignored. You may also appear to be “on-the-fence”. Those who are opinionated will assume your lack of support for their opinion means that you have the opposite view. Sometime you will need to express an opinion just to distance yourself from unpopular opinions and to demonstrate broadly which side you more closely associate with.
Sometimes, in the interest of making an impact, it may be worth declaring an opinion, even if deep down you know that it’s a bit reductionist and simplistic. A decisive opinion is much more evocative and easier to follow than a nuanced, thoughtful discussion piece. The former is likely to stir up more support, the latter will be too long, and the masses won’t engage with it.
How do I decide when to make that trade-off? For me it depends on the topic. I consider it irresponsible to be overly opinionated in matters of human consequence. Things to do with culture, justice, race, world affairs etc, are too loaded, and too important. In that space I think we need less strong opinions, and more thoughtful exploration. (Others of course will hold exactly the opposite view, stating that it is precisly in matters of human consequence that we most need people to take a stand).
On matters that are less consequential or less emotionally loaded, I think a strong opinion is fine. Even if its overly simplistic, a strong opinion can be of value in so far as it gets attention and generates good discussion. This post is a good example, I chose an opinionated headline because nobody is going to get too offended if I’m not 100% right (assuming anyone even reads this). In this case I’d rather be short and simple and clear, than try to be more nuanced and accurate at the cost of being long-winded. I would be a lot more careful if I were writing about issues to do with politics, social justice etc because I care about these issues and I want to make sure that my views contribute to better discourse on these topics. I get annoyed by forceful, binary opinions on these topics (even if those opinions broadly align to my own), because I think such opinions create a space of weaker discourse in general which ultimately undermines the conversation as a whole and makes it harder for truth and justice to surface.