Entitlement to an opinion

Back in 2020, I wrote a post on this blog titled "Objectively good". That post was a bit of a peeved response to something that someone I knew at the time said. This post is a bit of a sequel to that one. In this post, I want to discuss a phrase which has grown to be another pet peeve of mine. You have probably heard it before. Sometimes, when debating a particular topic, one person will say something along the lines of the following: "I'm entitled to my opinion." What exactly does that mean?

My first thought is the freedom of speech. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibits Congress from passing any law "abridging the freedom of speech", and the Fourteenth Amendment has been held to extend this prohibition to state governments as well—see Gitlow v. New York,  268 U.S. 652 (1925). The result is that all persons subject to U.S. jurisdiction have the right to express themselves freely without fear of retaliation from the government. Notice, however, that the First Amendment only limits what the government can do. It does not limit what ordinary people can do.

In other words, freedom of speech does not shield you from the social consequences of unpopular speech (the only thing that can do that reliably is anonymity). This is how social media companies like Facebook and Twitter can ban you from their platforms for expressing certain views on their websites (e.g. hate speech, which, believe it or not, is constitutionally protected speech in the United States—see Snyder v. Phelps, 562 U.S. 443 (2011)), something that I wrote a brief blog post about in 2014, back when I was a freshman in high school. Friendships, relationships, and even careers have ended because of the open expression of opinions that people have a legal right to express. That's just the way life works: two people can disagree on something so vehemently that they can't be friends as a result. Just because they disagree does not mean that they believe the other person does not have the right to express themselves; rather, both persons exercised their right to free expression, and their expressed opinions happened to be different. Importantly, just because you disagree with someone does not mean you do not respect what they have to say—see my old post titled "I respectfully dissent"—but it also does not mean you have to be friends with them either.

The main problem I have with the phrase, "I'm entitled to my opinion," is that people often say it when asked to justify their position on a controversial topic. In that context, a literal interpretation would cause the statement to mean, "I believe I am right because I have a right to believe what I believe," which is a logical fallacy. This line of thinking is so ridiculous that there is no way this literal interpretation is what people actually intend to say. I suspect the usual intent is actually to say, "I am entitled to express my opinion without it being attacked and without me being treated differently for it." But as I have discussed above, you may be entitled to express your opinion without government retaliation, but you are never immune from the risk of ordinary people treating you differently as a result of your freely expressed opinion. Additionally, if you are entitled to express your opinion, then so must other people too—there is no world where you can be entitled to express an opinion without someone else being entitled to express one that attacks yours.

There is, however, one context where entitlement to an opinion might make sense, and it has to do with my old "Objectively good" post. As I stated in that blog post (and in several posts that came before it), there is no such thing as right or wrong when it comes to whether a creative work is good or bad. That is because one's experience of a creative work is inherently subjective: it is good if you enjoyed it. Just because you enjoyed a particular movie, for example, does not mean everyone will, and just because everyone seems to enjoy a particular movie does not mean you are somehow wrong for not enjoying it with them. As I stated back then, "In an ideal world, the term 'guilty pleasure' would not exist because we would never be pretentious enough to shame someone for enjoying something that most of us do not." Indeed, with respect to creative works like movies, books, songs, and drawings, my view is that you are entitled to express an opinion without fear of social retaliation, unless your reasons for liking a particular work are immoral or illegal.

With that being said, even if I am trying to defend why I like a particular creative work, I would still never use the specific phrase, "I am entitled to my opinion." The statement often has the effect of cutting off further discussion of the topic. It is sort of like saying, "Let's agree to disagree," but in a more defensive, self-important manner. If the intent is to move on from a topic where disagreement is causing you discomfort, then just say that: "Let's agree to disagree." If others are challenging a controversial view that you expressed, but you find yourself struggling to justify that view, then consider simply being humble and introspective, admitting that you may not have had all the details and agreeing to withdraw your opinion while you do more research. That is an entirely natural part of being human: sometimes we say things without thinking about them carefully, and if you admit that, you will likely be forgiven. However, whenever people say that they are entitled to their opinions, it just leaves a sour taste in my mouth because it feels like they are refusing to explain themselves and viewing any attacks on their opinion as unfair to them. Everyone may be entitled to express an opinion, but every opinion could have a consequence.