Having your opinion changed

[Noah Pinder]

Have you ever held a belief or opinion so strongly that you would fight to the end to defend it, only to be convinced of the opposite? How did you feel afterwards?

For me it would have to be Che Guevara. I adored him and his work to liberate the people of Cuba and he inspired me to fight for what I believe in. Then looking more in depth into his philosophy I realised he fought for the eradication of individuality and the miss treatment of prisoners. Slowly I grew to see him as just another revolutionary.

What are some examples you guys have of this happening?

 

[Zhukov]

When I was younger I had some intensely patriotic beliefs, particularly in regards to the military.

Now I really, really don't. To the point where my old mindset is downright embarrassing to remember and I'm infinitely glad that I was never all that vocal about it.

Hard to say exactly when and how those beliefs changed though. Actually meeting a large numbers of soldiers was a big part of it. I guess the rest was just down to learning more of the world and its workings, as one does as one gets older.

 

[Queen Michael]

I used to be a huge Christian, but then I learned that the Bible contradicted itself at times and it felt illogical to defend it.

 

[Dalek Caan]

I used to be one of those fanboys you see everywhere who would defend their platform to death and not recognise any valid points about the others. After a while I did start to listen and I am now a more enlightened being. I think it was talking to my cousin that knocked some sense into me.

 

[IOwnTheSpire]

While I can't think of any instances where I changed a strongly-held opinion (I may later), I do see certain people who often react negatively when someone else's opinion changes.

For example, a comedian makes an off-colour remark, some people tell him it was in bad taste, and he decides that yes, it was in bad taste and takes it back, and suddenly people decry him for 'self-censorship', as though people can't (or shouldn't) change their opinions or attitudes about anything.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Well I used to be a Nintendo Fanboy until I owned an Wii.

Nintendo pander in those cheap 3rd party casual games leaving those who want REAL games in the dust and suffer the drought of proper games while Playstation and Xbox keep on getting good games all year round!

 

[BytByte]

In seventh grade I stumbled upon an objectivist comic and dug it so much, as brats like myself are wont to do. It actually took a few years to completely realize how it more or less is "It's okay to be selfish" written across hundreds of pages about trains. I do not miss that time.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I used to think the Kill Bill movies and Pulp Fiction were really good, really deep and edgy and smart movies. After re-watching them, they are so annoying and predictable and 1-dimensional and cliche.
I guess we're not as smart as we think we are when we're 15.

 

[Arshaq13]

I used to be a strict muslim, y'know, pray 5 times a day, don't drink, no relationships, fast during Ramadan and all that.

Then as I learned a lot more it just stopped making sense to me. But I never did become an anti-theist atheist, find them pretty annoying.

 

[TakerFoxx]

Hmmm, that applies to nearly every political, social, and even religious belief I held in high school and early college, which at the time I stalwartly defended almost daily. The political ones I'm mostly apathetic about losing, as I was never really politically invested in the first place. The social ones I'm glad I lost and am now ashamed I ever held. As for the religious ones, well, let's just say I'm currently going through a bit of a crisis of faith and really miss the rock-hard certainty I once had. It made things simpler.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

That would be religion. Used to be Christian and argued online. I would now be terribly embarrassed if I were to scour the Internet to find old posts. Though at least that's what got me to consider things. Opposing arguments and how terrible other arguments in support were made me consider things a bit more.

 

[KissingSunlight]

It may surprise people. I have never had an opinion that I fought to the death for. I have never been arrogant enough to believe that my opinions were above reproach.

I have always been open to other people take on the issues regardless of how unpopular it was. Some of them included: Moon landing was fake, women should not have the right to vote, and various racist diatribes. I don't agree with them. I felt listening to them did help me better understand people who have opinions that most people don't agree with.

 

[WonkyWarmaiden]

I changed how I think as a feminist. I was naive and used to think that just because someone said they were speaking for feminism that I should agree with everything they said. Then I started to realize how much bullshit people were saying that I was trying to conform to because that's what I thought I should think.

One day I figured out that the people I was listening to were wrong. They were terribly biased jerks with their heads up their own asses and they weren't speaking for all feminists, they were just being petty dicks that lashed out at everyone who tried to challenge their idea of feminism. Because God forbid they try to see it from another perspective.

So I stopped going to certain websites, deleted several bookmarks and moved on from those people. It was a very rewarding experience.

 

[Vault101]

I feel like a lot of views I held "then" as opposed to "now" were just opinions I absorbed from various sources and regurgitated back to the world (as children and young adults are wont to do) general stuff like "the system" being inherently fair and its peoples own fault they suffer or casual racism, the PC police are terrible ect ect

or videogames in general, Consoles are terrible, filthy casuals are terrible, the injustices we suffer as the 'con-su-mer' are terrible, mainstream media is terrible, gamez are super serious business

and now I don't really care

when we get so wrapped up in things we draw lines in the sand and declare ourselves better [I/]over the most insignificant shit[/I] like weather or not someone likes Mobile games or the r/atheism brand of circle jerking when really all were doing is getting a buzz over our own righteous anger, we all saw this with GamerGate. Hell it seems to be a thing with geeks, an obsession with acquiring [I/]stuff[/I] as though when we look at it we can say "this is who I am" I mean I was in ZING pop-culture the other say and I saw this giant hideous Joker-bust statue I thought "who the hell would want that?" because without context its just an ugly clown., but then I'm hardly immune to this..I wanted a FO4 pipboy edition [I/]probably[/I] only because it sold out

of coarse I can't fully accept the Buddhist idea of identity and everything being meaningless...I mean sure it IS essentially meaningless, everything is meaningless if you spin it that way but I still find identity important...personally , perhaps its a matter of priorities, to be many things and not just one

 

[Creator002]

I was a "Christian" (I believed, but that's all) until I was 14. I was a hardcore Christian from then until about 18. From then until now, I've gone from Agnostic to Atheist.

That would be religion. Used to be Christian and argued online. I would now be terribly embarrassed if I were to scour the Internet to find old posts

I did this too and feel the same.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

I feel like a lot of views I held "then" as opposed to "now" were just opinions I absorbed from various sources and regurgitated back to the world (as children and young adults are wont to do) general stuff like "the system" being inherently fair and its peoples own fault they suffer or casual racism, the PC police are terrible ect ect

or videogames in general, Consoles are terrible, filthy casuals are terrible, the injustices we suffer as the 'con-su-mer' are terrible, mainstream media is terrible, gamez are super serious business

and now I don't really care

when we get so wrapped up in things we draw lines in the sand and declare ourselves better [I/]over the most insignificant shit[/I] like weather or not someone likes Mobile games or the r/atheism brand of circle jerking when really all were doing is getting a buzz over our own righteous anger, we all saw this with GamerGate. Hell it seems to be a thing with geeks, an obsession with acquiring [I/]stuff[/I] as though when we look at it we can say "this is who I am" I mean I was in ZING pop-culture the other say and I saw this giant hideous Joker-bust statue I thought "who the hell would want that?" because without context its just an ugly clown., but then I'm hardly immune to this..I wanted a FO4 pipboy edition [I/]probably[/I] only because it sold out

of coarse I can't fully accept the Buddhist idea of identity and everything being meaningless...I mean sure it IS essentially meaningless, everything is meaningless if you spin it that way but I still find identity important...personally , perhaps its a matter of priorities, to be many things and not just one

A Pip-Boy would be awesome. It's an intrinsic good. A friend of mine is getting that edition and I'm so jealous even if it seems like a waste of money...

And yeah, things may be meaningless but if you personally feel something is important I think that's good enough for you. In a sea of meaninglessness you really don't need more justification than that, I think

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

I was a "Christian" (I believed, but that's all) until I was 14. I was a hardcore Christian from then until about 18. From then until now, I've gone from Agnostic to Atheist.

That would be religion. Used to be Christian and argued online. I would now be terribly embarrassed if I were to scour the Internet to find old posts

I did this too and feel the same.

The pain of remembering it... I wasn't a creationist or anything but I was stubborn and I could pick at every ultimately meaningless mistake someone might make...