Characters - II

No complaining in this post - may be not much!

I've noticed a new breed of individuals, the eager-yay-sayers. They agree to everyone's point of view.Why would that not be ok? It's not bad, it's just plain uninteresting if someone were to agree to whatever you say (Ok, sometimes atleast - It's quite a different issue if someone always disagrees with everyone). But, what if this person also agrees to all those statements that are logical opposites as well? Welcome to the problem! If I were one of those folks, I would probably be yay-saying-to-everyone to just avoid confrontations (I know my opinion, why care expressing it!) or simply to please people. And the reason might well depend on the situation ( the person concerned and/or the topic,place of conversation, and/or who are all within earshot and/or whether there is something more pressing to be taken care of and/or number of other things).

On a connected note, why would you want to let everyone know that you have an opinion on a topic in the first place and secondly, bother expressing it? It seems almost a natural exercise to hold opinions and to express those at appropriate times. It seems ok not to have an opinion on all things under the sun, but there are some subsets of issues on which majority of people have opinions on. (I guess I just opened a can of worms) I can understand the implications of collective opinions, as in a democracy, which works for (or atleast meant to work for) the greatest good for the greatest number. How about individual opinions that an average person holds and/or expresses? They may help in providing feedback, for example, what is your opinion on this new book I wrote?

Opinions form an integral part of one's personality. Creating an opinion often involves analyzing an issue thoroughly, weighing the pros and cons and then taking a decision on the issue- do I support or not? What is the reasoning behind my decision?  'I dont like baseball' is an opinion which probably came after wondering 'Do I understand how this sport is played?, Do I feel happy/overjoyed when I watch the sport? etc etc'  - answers to which lead to the above mentioned 'opinion'.

Now, why do we express opinions? The answer is subjective and depends on a lot of factors - context of conversation, people and situations involved etc. In some cases it's best to express one's opinion and in some other cases, leaving it unsaid seems wiser. Expressing opinions makes it easy (again, this is subjective) for others to deal with the person. (I know you don't like policy X, I will not touch upon it or I know you are not in favor of policy X, I will talk about it more to understand why). What if they don't want to express their opinions? You're pushed to assuming a context that may not be true. Ahhh....there's more to this, may be I will revisit at some other time!