opinion brown cardigan boy everything in life has too many angles. knee jerk, we're full of them. i can't just say, but each turn we take steps on some one else's toes, i think about america and everything is a contradiction to itself and other things. i can't stand not knowing which way to turn, everyone seems to have a valid opinion, but remember this, if you're going to have an opinion you had better have reasons to back it up. next, i was talking to one of my friends this weekend on the matter of gays. you see one of my other friends came out last month. anyway, he didn't know it, [the one i was with this weekend] and i told him. it really made him think because he is not for gay relationships. i can see the viewpoint he takes but the matter is all the same, and that is the ability to love even the ones you hate. i told him he should accept but not condone if his conscience didn't permit him to. anyway, i think has too many things to offer us, i can't form one specific opinion until i know it all. then and only then, after i've learned, can i finally make a choice. 010312 ... nr i asked a few people their opinions on the same issue. the first group was more forgiving, more passive, less direct. the second group was less forgiving, more forthright, expecting answers and direct communication. i noticed that the first group was canadian and the second group was american. i also noticed that i tended to side with the american group. it doesn't necessarily mean anything, and could obviously be coincidence, but i found it interesting. i have definitely become more forthright and communicative after having spent a lot of time in america. it's pretty satisfying in a lot of ways. 160516 ... epitome of incomprehensibility Where's the country where people are more forgiving AND direct? I want to go there! It's Norway, isn't it? It must be Norway. Everything good happens in Norway. But seriously, that's an interesting observation. Now, it doesn't quite match what I've experienced myself - when I've noticed differences and similarities in ways of talking, they seem more regional than national, and then differences in attitudes more cultural, age-based, etc., but there could definitely be something to it. The Dark Side of the Canadian Politeness Stereotype... I want that to sound like a Buzzfeed article title but it doesn't. Not quite. But it'd be clickbait - you'd want to know what the dark side was - and then you'd find it was being too indirect and unclear. And that'd be a fair point. Personality also is a factor, and field of study may be too. I admire my friend's writing because it's concise and relaxed and funny; she's a computer programmer. She thinks I write better - and I think I do too in some areas, vain as I am - but I'd give up half of my lifetime allotment of semicolons to get that concise and conversational feel. 160517 ... tender_square "do you hold your own opinion, or are you opinionated?" "what's the difference?" "to be opinionated is to take the views of others without being clear on where you stand." "i would say that i am opinionated but struggling to learn how hold my own opinion." 230509 what's it to you? who go blather from