“Fools have no interest in understanding; they only want to air their own opinions.”
I know that Solomon, who is believed to have penned the first 29 chapters of Proverbs including the one above at 18:12 in that book, was a wise guy. So, far be it from me to question the “wisdom of Solomon.” My pea-sized brain is nowhere near up to the task, but I think he left two words out of the above. I believe the verse ought to end “on Facebook.” I mean, come on, if the guy really was all that smart he would have seen that coming. All kidding aside I think the tenor of much of social media today would do well to heed Solomon’s sage warning i.e. take your pride in your opinion down a notch. Listen to one another.
There’s an old simile comparing opinions to a body part that I won’t go into here because of its bathroom-humor nature but opinions by their very nature, are neither concrete nor absolute. They arise out of our experience, our analysis and even our prejudice we sometimes don’t realize nor admit. Opinions, if they’re held strongly enough, dumb us down until we’re no more than the yammering fools Solomon talks about above. In some of their worst iterations they blind us to anything outside of our own take on a situation or subject. In their nastiest state they insist upon asserting themselves at the expense of the one thing Jesus said was most important, that we love one another.
When our ethereal opinion overshadows the real, animate person in front of us (or on social media even) we have devolved into a simpleton state neither God nor us intends. In this mire we lose sight of the one great command, to love your neighbor as yourself. It’s sad really. That we should hold the churning product of our own grey matter, the conclusions at which we arrive and our own tastes or takes on something above another human being. And while I understand the need to be a proponent for what is right and just, it’s not Solomon’s position this come before our fellow man. We would do well to remember that each day. In fact, we might live a lot happier and healthier life, both in person and online if we always kept that in mind.
I realize it ain’t easy to recognize our opinions for what they are, especially when someone else is so far off base! The fact remains though, if we’re followers we have to try. I need to be reminded of this every day whether I make it to some social media platform or I just interact with the other humans out there. I wish you the best of luck in this endeavor.
Every week I write about our human condition including our struggle not to pummel those with whom we disagree. If you would like to read more you can head to my blog by clicking here. If you find all this interesting I hope you’ll subscribe for free. You can do that here by clicking this or at the blog. Subscribing means you’ll get an email on Sundays with links to the week’s posts, nothing more or less. I never sell or share emails so no worries on getting a bunch of spam.
So wise!