Thursday, May 24, 2007

Sound Advice on Being Offended

How are often are you offended by something, or someone?  Do you learn anything from the offensive experience?

Wendy McElroy has a piece up titled The Value of Being Offended, which is definitely worth a read.  From the piece.

Hysteria surrounds the modern quest to never be offended and to never give offense to anyone on any grounds: gender, sexual preference, race, disability, religion, nationality, ethnicity, ad nauseum. (Of course, if you are deemed to be ‘dominant’ in one of those categories – male, heterosexual, white, etc.—then you are often considered impossible to offend. Presumably, your dominance constitutes an offense in-and-of itself.)

In this politically correct atmosphere, no one considers the possibility that being offended can be valuable in much the same manner that making a mistake can be valuable. All knowledge and skills are acquired through a process of committing errors. That’s what learning from your mistakes means; try learning math without the benefit of that process. Thus, parents who shield their children from reversible mistakes are shutting those children off from the real-world process by which they mature into experienced and responsible adults.

Being offended has comparable benefits.

Posted by John Venlet on 05/24 at 02:49 PM
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