“Death is a certainty for all of us, both you and me.” Does this offend you???
how about this “you b***** mo***, I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE YOU DEAD.” This does hurt.
So, Is right to offend an indispensable part of the freedom of expression and speech? I would gladly say NO.
Let’s start with the major stakeholders, the offender and the offended. It’s not natural for us to step out of our comfort zone and hurt someone else. Then why do we do so? The answer is psychological…
Its the repressed emotions of anger, jealousy and pride that seek expression inform of hate-speech, misinformation and condescending remarks. Thus every example of offence is a sign of spreading emotional malice in the society.
If you have ever been on the side of the offended,(given the rates of cyber-bullying, you are under threat), our body initiates a defence mechanism every time we are offended. That could be resistance or denial. Resistance is when we reciprocate offence with another offence and needless to say this is what begets violence. But the dangers of denial are no less. Every time we laugh off at a relatable meme or joke, we do realise the unhappiness and incompleteness. This way we keep destroying a part of our self-image. And this scenario is troublesome.
Also, we do live in a society, where minorities exist, and given the right to offend, the majority by the sheer power of their number marginalise them. And this has been the starting point of all homicides.
Coming to the subjectivity of offence, and our inability to draw a line between what is offending and what is not. We are at a crossroad with two options ahead. One to do away with drawing lines forever, unleashing a beast in the social structures. The other is to continually improve from our experience and keep drawing better lines. Creating room for unintended offences and allowing the society to evolve.
Here the concept of the social contract becomes pivotal. We need to give up individual rights when they trample into the rights of others. We must not force a person to bear the brunt of someone’s actions, that he did not approve of at the first place.
Finally, I would like to point out that this stand transfers the burden of morality from the community to the individual which I say is both unrealistic and unfair. Unrealistic because we are expecting people to be rational and thoughtful before every action when we know people are emotional and guided by circumstances. Unfair because if a community can not stand to its morals, expecting individuals to do so…..
“If you have to offend someone to prove a logical/rational view; then either it is not a nice point, or you need to work on your communication.”