"If you speak the truth, have a foot in the stirrup."
-Turkish proverb, quoted in Civilization IV
It is often socially unacceptable to say what you genuinely think or feel. For all the lip-service we pay to honesty, our culture is in a certain sense dependent on lies. If you say what you think, someone will eventually take offense at it and request that you refrain from voicing your opinion further. Free Speech usually gives you the right to continue if you want, but you have to weigh the tradeoff between expressing your opinion and burning any bridges that might be present.
The less you rely on others, the more honest you can be without repercussions. On the other hand, networking is the easiest and possibly most potent way to gain influence and power (power in this context meaning the ability to do what you want to do), so honesty can have a high price if you are indiscriminate with it. This is why politicians have to be habitual liars, because nearly all their power is based on their connections with a wide variety of people with different conflicting opinions. If they tell the truth, they slough off large portions of their base.
I think this is unfortunate. There are reasons to get offended at some disagreements, but I think people extend this tendency to issues where it's unnecessary, and now we have a society where we try as hard as possible to avoid conflicting viewpoints. I think this is part of why on the internet, suddenly relieved of the pressure against self-censorship, many people tend to go way off the other end with it and actively try to offend those who disagree with them.
But this is the culture we have, and it's not going to change quickly. I hope that the internet and the contact between viewpoints that it encourages causes a gradual change towards acceptance of different opinions, but it'll take time. I myself frequently fall into the traps mentioned above even though doing so runs counter to what I hope for, so it'll take some work.
