college writing... might as well make it good, huh?

[burnanddie]

ok, im writing a paper about whether its important to have a strong opinion on any given issue or not. i need some ideas. input please?

go nuts. seriously. anything you think, no matter how hair-brained it is.

why is it/is it not important to have a strong opinion or be opinionated?

Comments

[mexicorules]

I'd write a freaking dissertation on this if I had the time, but I don't.

But, EVERYONE NEEDS TO HAVE A STRONG OPINION ABOUT THINGS.. BUT IT MUST BE BASED ON FACTS, NOT ANYTHING ELSE. SCIENTIFIC FACTS PREFERABLY. DONT THINK UR OPINION IS RIGHT IF U CANT BACK IT UP WITH ACTUAL FACTS AND DATA..

yeah sorry

when you have the time...

[burnanddie]

why? why do people need to have strong opinions? im not necessarily disagreeing with you, but youve just answered the yes or no part, and then said how. but why is that important?

[gorgeyfatty]

well

[mexicorules]

Personal experience also makes your opinion a lot more BIASED.

Yeah...

[gorgeyfatty]

all opinions are biased.

feel free to prove otherwise.

[burnanddie]

this is a really good point. most people think opinions are things to have that need to be defended, and thats where all the passion springs from. thats part of what an opinion worth having is. if its something you feel strongly enough about and would do something about. like political parties. i cant say i claim to be one party or the other. i dont have a strong enough opinion of one over the other, i wouldn't defend any. i have opinions on issues, and there are different points i would defend, but not all issues. theres things that just dont concern me, so i dont care. when it starts to affect me, thats when ill expend the energy, because ill want to do something about it. if i want an opinion, a well-based opinion, of course im going to ask someone who has actually "been there. done that." its interesting to me that the people with passionate opinions rarely have actually had anything seriously to do with what theyre talking about. the people who have actually lived it don't give a single side nearly as much passion.

Because you're cute when you're angry

[perfectjester]

I really have no opinion on whether having an opinion is important. Uh, yeah. ;)

Re: Because you're cute when you're angry

[burnanddie]

um, if youre not going to comment on what we're talking about....

[maripoo6]

i think opinions are great! and having strong opinions on different topics is necessary for the functioning of our universe. however, the problem is not whether or not we have the opinions, but what we choose to do with them. what's the point of having an opinion on a matter, if we're not going to do anything about it other than argue with people who don't agree? most of us spend so much time trying to convince them to think the way we do and putting them down when we fail miserably, but very few of us ever do anything about it. much like me right now. i'm going off on how people should do something about their problems but i'm not really doing anything about mine. i'm not doing anything to make people do something. but that's not my point. my point is if someone truly believes that deeply in any given cause or in any given matter, reason dictates he should want to do something about it (beyond complaining and arguing). so if this holds true, i suppose the problem is really that people's opinions aren't strong enough. so in short, yes

[mexicorules]

Yeah but law is based on something concrete; law is concrete. (feel free to disagree if I'm wrong) I just don't like people who use non-concrete. non-fact-based opinions and try to prove your wrong with that. An opinion is strengthened and made more valid when it's backed up by something concrete and real.

[amberperez]

My compliance to give you my ideas on this depends on which college this is for (and if it's one that I might be interested in going to)! : )

Haha, by the way, this is kind of a funny question to ask. You're likely to get very strong opinions about the importance of HAVING strong opinions from those strongly opinionated, and not very much opinion or response from those who DON'T believe it's important. Haha, kind of a catch-22, eh?

[burnanddie]

Haha, its not for a college. It's for a class, called college writing. We're supposed to write a paper on an argumentative issue. Essay of argumentation, it's called. And I couldn't think of an issue I have a strong enough opinion on to write about it. I rarely do. I have opinions on a LOT of things, a lot more than I even voice, but I don't have enough desire to do anything with them to write about them. So I chose "Having an Opinion" as my topic. My teacher thinks I'm crazy, and she wouldn't let me do it until I found some research, which I did, of course :P

I realize the ridiculous nature of the question, and for that same reason, I posed the question. I want to see the strong opinions I get and filter through passion to see if they are really saying anything. So far, I've been pleasantly surprised. Mostly, I've found facets of this topic I hadn't even considered. It's making my paper more and more interesting.....

[mexicorules]

Is it not an opinion in itself whether one thinks having an opinion matters and whether it should be a strong opinion or not? You can't really draw any conclusions from the replied to your question if you don't know your own answer to the question to begin with or understand that you're asking something that's slightly redundant.

[burnanddie]

But I do have an answer to my question. I do have an opinion on it. I'm not providing my answer because I want objective answers, not scathing rebuttles of my opinion. The different facets I'm seeing are on my side. I just won't say what that side is.