We can’t scroll through any social media platform anymore without being exposed to whatever controversial concept is being talked about at that moment. For many people, it’s just an irritating nuisance, and for others (admittedly including myself), it’s a lure into a battlefield. We’re currently seeing a constant battle represented by tags such as #LiberalismIsAMentalDisorder, #ANITFA, #MAGA, #NoRacistsAllowed, #FactsDontCareAboutYourFeelings, etc... which are meant to attack anyone that fits an assumed ideology as if these tags actually were significant or accurate. It seems that everyone is losing sight of the actual goal we all share… to find the truth.

I questioned why we’re so divided, why we’re having such a hard time being decent to each other, why we say the things we do, why we develop opinions and evidence for those opinions the way we do, and how we can find the real truth out of all of this chaos. My interest in how we interact with our opinions was initially triggered by my own mistakes and regrets I’ve gained in my experience taking part in online debates. I’ve had good and bad experiences in discussing controversial topics with others, but I’ve recently been having more bad instances than good. In this three part article series, I hope to find a resolution to the problem that I share with a lot of other educated and opinionated individuals. My goal is to do this through three parts: I. the value of an opinion, II. why the current expression of opinions is bad for us, and III. how we should be expressing our opinions.

Part I: The Value Of An Opinion

I’ll start by saying that contrary to popular belief, it is beneficial to debate and converse about our differing opinions, especially in politics. From a philosophical view as presented by John Stuart Mill, freedom of speech is necessary to us and society. According to Mill, the freedom to share our opinions allows us to form more informed opinions, create stronger arguments, and become more educated about the concept itself. Mill’s defense for free speech can be backed by studies showing that extremely diverse groups are more successful in finding solutions to dilemmas than groups that are less diverse.

A question I have regarding the above was if diverse opinions help us uncover the truth, why haven’t we found it yet? Today, it’s hard to tell what opinions are even worth considering in depth. We try to weigh and measure the legitimacy of an opinion typically on how the opinion is said to be based. Currently, there is a large assumption that people who base their opinions on facts have a better opinion than those who base their opinions on emotions. There’s a small problem with that which many people seem to overlook.

If we want to accurately determine the value of an opinion, we need to consider the fact that we form opinions based on our natural intuitions first and then use factual evidence to defend that opinion. Because our opinions are emotionally based, we feel personally attacked when anyone suggests an alternative perspective. They act as a form of information processing regarding our memories and experiences. We aggressively defend our opinions because they represent our personal values, are directly linked to our emotions and serves as a way for us to understand our experiences as to learn from them.

Jonathan Haidt describes this phenomenon among many others in his book called The "Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided By Politics And Religion". Haidt cites multiple studies and uses a perfect analogy to sum up the way we form opinions. While I do highly recommend this book for everyone regardless of how concerned they are with religion or politics, you don’t need to read it to understand that it is because our opinions are emotionally based that we get so defensive when anyone tries to disagree with us and that this may interfere with our ability to communicate in a constructive way.

To us, the best way to defend whatever stance we take is to use ‘factual’ evidence or testimony even when that evidence may be clearly biased, lacking factual basis, or just plain wrong. The tendency to involuntarily believe and then use any information that coincides with our opinion or expectation as ‘factual evidence’ is called the confirmation bias. Confirmation bias serves as an incredibly powerful barrier in debates that contributes (in addition to our natural emotional responses) to the prevention of us uncovering and accepting the truth.

It is for this reason that I find it amusing when individuals use the argument ‘facts don’t care about your feelings’ because the personal choice to consider any kind of information as fact can be largely attributed to… guess what… our feelings. Even when utilize scientifically proven, indisputable facts in our argument, we are still acting in defense of what our emotions lead us to believe. This makes our opinions feel legitimate, accurate, and correct as opposed to other opinions. It’s inherent and it’s natural, and to say that we are always immune or above this phenomenon is to be unrealistic and ignorant. Ironically, even highly opinionated people that pride themselves on being solely fact-based are among those who are most guilty of confirmation bias and emotional investment in their opinion. We can especially observe this today on both sides of the bipartisan political system.

For example, Ben Shapiro is a notorious ‘fact-based’ conservative and is considered credible because of his impressive academic achievement. However, Shapiro, a Harvard alum, has continuously stated his intolerance on transgender individuals despite the plethora of evidence discrediting his claim. It appears that Shapiro is more than happy to reap the benefits of having the status as a Harvard alum, yet he refuses to acknowledge his own school’s article that supports the idea that transgender individuals are not simply “mentally ill”. This along with the elementary definition of what constitutes a psychological abnormality shows that transgender individuals are not suffering from a mental illness.

It is also well known by many licensed and esteemed doctors that there are in fact more than two genders that occur in nature; therefore discrediting Shapiro’s argument that there are only two genders and that transgender individuals are not abiding by the laws of natural biology. Because Shapiro so readily fails to recognize this evidence, many may assume that his opinion is largely based on a traditional value he holds which is expressed emotionally when he refuses to consider disagreeing evidence and is strongly devoted to his initial stance. His ‘fact base’ most likely serves as an attempt to make his opinion legitimate as to avoid any internal realization that he might be in the wrong.

Now, clearly one could argue that the links I’ve provided are slanted or inaccurate. They could counteract my example with articles and studies just a reputable as mine. If I were to ignore that response or discredit the evidence without any legitimate reason, I would be just as hypocritical and ignorant as Shapiro. I won’t deny that there may be bias present in my argument, but I will stand by the fact that I formed my opinion after considering the counter arguments and after looking from Shapiro’s perspective; because yes, if it was still the 1950’s and society still did not accept trans individuals as ‘normal’ like we do today, they may qualify for a mental disorder. Thankfully, it is known that gender dysphoria is about to be declassified as a mental illness (well in Denmark). However, I used my knowledge on how psychological abnormalities are defined to determine that this particular argument is inaccurate regarding today’s society.

Even though the power of emotional devotion and confirmation bias is strong, we are still capable of forming our opinions using facts. The way that we can do this is by first becoming less opinionated and more open-minded. Studies show that individuals who honestly view and analyze a situation from multiple perspectives are more likely to make intelligent decisions. This can be incredibly difficult because unlike the concept of multiple genders, attempting to be unbiased in the perspectives we use is unnatural.

To go against our inherent emotional response to a situation (our opinion) is to go against how we naturally function. We are all implicitly (and sometimes explicitly) biased against something based on our own backgrounds. Generally speaking, it is impossible to be completely unbiased. However, we can actively prevent our biases from interfering in forming accurate opinions by working hard to consider all indisputable evidence as well as the multiple perspectives on that particular subject. The results of actively working in this way may be the key to resolving conflicts that divide us all.

So, to answer my own question on how we determine the value of an opinion, we should be analyzing all of the evidence presents through multiple perspectives. We should be encouraging open discussion about topics with people who have different opinions than us. What we shouldn’t be doing is acting closed minded or valuing an opinion over another simply because it is claimed to be ‘fact-based’. We need to fact check each claim and consider all claims even when they are equally reputable but contradict each other. We need to actively think beyond our initial response and really try to involve ourselves in someone else’s view. Some issues may include limitless perspectives and evidence, but an opinion still based on only one side of the line is shallow regardless of how ‘fact-based’ it is.

Note: If you’d like to learn more about the topic on how we form opinions and why they mean so much to us, I, again, would highly recommend Jonathan Haidt’s book which references many scientific studies and is much better resource than my unprofessional article regarding why we actually think the way we do. This isn’t sponsored at all, it’s just a very informative, well-written, insightful read that I think everyone should experience regardless on how opinionated or involved they are.

I have also included links throughout the article where you can check out more information on the corresponding topic. Some of the links do not provide the study itself, but rather articles that describe the premise of the studies. Many of these studies are cited in Haidt's book.