On Being Silent

I am not, by nature an apologist in the ancient and early sense of the word, a defender of a viewpoint or subject.  This has bothered me from time to time as I feel like I should be a better one than I am for any of the ideas or philosophies I hold, whether, religious, political, or even why I do what I do.  It is not as if I am smart enough (I think I am) nor that I cannot learn enough about something in order to make a cogent argument (I have picked up any number of things from scratch and learned a great deal about them).  So why is it?

One, I think, is that I am simply an introvert and on the whole do not enjoy that amount of exposure to people.  A second is I do not necessarily have that competitive drive to win - I do have a competitive drive to not be wrong and will go to great extents to prove my points, but only if I think I have not been quoted correctly or have been misconstrued.

A third - and perhaps most telling - is that most of what passes for apologetics in any field is not so much cogent arguments and responses but anger and yelling, often with a large dollop of sneering or criticism if not belittling and intimidation.  I really do not like conflict between people, especially if it involves yelling and treatment of the other party and their opinion as having lesser or no value.  It makes me uncomfortable, uncomfortable to the point that I will leave the situation if I have a chance or just mentally and physically shut down if I cannot get away.

Why am I writing this today?  I do not have a definitive answer for that, except (I suppose) to voice my own reasoning for why I often do not seem to have an opinion on a lot of things.  It may not be that I do not have an opinion but rather that expressing that opinion will not do what it is supposed to do, either defend a point or engage in a conversation.  Instead, it will unleash a torrent which I am neither mentally nor spiritually willing or able to discuss or handle.  It is one reason that this blog is what it is, where I discuss neither politics nor philosophy nor religion (except my own personal struggles) but rather issues in my life and what I am trying (often brokenly and haphazardly)  to build:  when you are discussing yourself as the subject of the issues, I have found nothing but support.

I sometimes wonder if in fact more people are like me than what most people realize - individuals that have opinions (perhaps strong ones) but simply do not engage in arguments or even defense because the conversation becomes to uncomfortable, not by reason of the subject or the challenge but rather but rather by the treatment and the conflict. I long ago learned that just because someone does not speak on a matter does not mean that they do not have an opinion and that the stillest waters sometimes hide the deepest, most profound pools of wisdom and opinion.