Less Respectable Opinions

Not every opinion deserves as much respect as another.  If I ask my doctor about my blood pressure, his opinion carries a lot of weight.  He's got the education and experience, and I've known him enough years that I have confidence in his judgment.  If I ask my Senator about my blood pressure, his opinion doesn't carry much weight.  It isn't a matter of his education or station in life, it's just that he's a lawyer and not a doctor.  I have no reason to think he knows any more about blood pressure than I do -- and the only reason I'm asking about it is because I don't know enough!

Other people, though, have the appropriate knowledge and experience, but they lack trustworthiness.  You can't trust what they say.  Your doubts may arise from prior statements they made that turned out to be less than correct, or because they clearly have some motive driving them other than to be honest with you.  Or the situation may be so important that you simply can't take anyone on his word alone.

When you express your uncertainty, the response may either overcome or reinforce your doubts.  An honest person, confident in his or her understanding of the matter, would ordinarily explain how they think, the facts and assumptions underlying their opinion.  An arrogant (or really busy) person may just brush you away.  But the person who attacks you for questioning his views, who dances around the question without actually answering it, who refuses or avoids providing those facts and assumptions, that person's opinion deserves no respect at all.

It may be that they are in fact expressing a deeply- and honestly-held view, and that view may itself be solidly-grounded in fact.  But because of its source, you can't accept it.

When a person has shown himself to be a pushy advocate of a position, attacking contrary views with slander and irrelevant gossip about people holding those views, refusing to discuss the basis of his opinions or providing false or faulty assertions or analysis, and when you've clearly caught him in the act, then if you continue to listen to him you're only contributing to his delinquency.

Not a good thing!

When you have someone who accepts contrary views and addresses them fairly, carefully and intelligently, who demonstrates patience with critics and addresses their contentions rather than their connections, then you have someone whose opinions deserve respect.