mandalorian2298 said:
Disclaimer: The first sentence or the post that follows it is not meant to be baiting. I am a professor of philosophy and this is a sincere statement of my feelings.
Credentialing also does not turn statements into objective truths. Now, if your experience as a philosophy professor somehow came into the realm of this topic, I wouldn't consider this to be "credentialing," but in this case... it just seems to be something meant to add illusory weight to what you've said.
However, for reasons that are entirely mysterious to me, most people believe that, if they wish it REALLY hard, their subjective opinions will MAGICALLY BECOME OBJECTIVE TRUTHS! Aalakazam!
I'm not seeing this. I'm seeing a belief that
you're apparently expressing as though it were an objective truth... but it's not, is it? That's not how you mean it, though, and I understand that.
You're expressing your belief in definite terms, because we (as intelligent beings) can already work out the idea that it's "your opinion." So you don't feel compelled to put fifteen "IMHO" or "YMMV" disclaimers in each sentence. "That's your opinion" is such a useless statement that pollutes far too many discussions (In my humble opinion; your mileage may vary!).
As for your list:
The first two are pretty basic and general. They apply to everyone, but you haven't demonstrated their specific bearing to the task at hand. Introducing unrelated premises and proving them right in order to prove the original, unrelated premise? Surely you, as a philosophy scholar, are familiar with ideas like "non sequitur" and "strawman argument." This kind of rides the line between them...
3. The fact that you find the opposing opinion offensive does not make you right, it makes you small-minded (or else every racist, homophobe or fanatic of any kind would be a moral authority by virtue of insanity).
The stance is that doing things deliberately
to be offensive is "not okay." There is no "objective" measure for "okay," so arguing that it's not an objective truth is a fruitless line of discussion. Are you saying that it's okay for someone to be deliberately offensive, but it's not okay for the offended to then retaliate?
4. Equating the act of expressing an opinion that you disagree with or using an expression that you dislike (but which in itself is not meant as an actual threat against the life or well-being of another person) with an act of aggression does not make you extra sensitive; it makes you insane. (this seems to be stupidity du jour these days. As a method of reality check, I invite all of you 'words can hurt just as bad' people to go to find a rape victim and say to him/her: "What happened to you is terrible. It is just as bad as using 'rape' as a casual synonym for defeat.")
(EXAMPLE) "You are a retarded shitwit with thin, greasy hair, and you should be raped into a coma," would not be an example of "an expression you dislike." It's an example of something I could say to someone
to offend and hurt them. That moves it beyond the bounds of simple "free speech," and into the more complicated realm of
other people's freedoms.
But you decide to go into the problem of degrees. Words don't hurt as much as rape, therefore no one can say words hurt? Fine. Rape doesn't hurt as much as being skinned alive, so no one can say rape hurts, right? The general idea is that
words can hurt a lot more than people think they can, not that words "hurt as much as rape." Strawman again.
(Also, I doubt the objective truth of your seemingly-overstated qualifications. As with any discussion, if you're not willing to provide evidence to back up a claim, it's really not admissible as any kind of support.)
