When I was younger, there was a saying, “a penny for your thoughts.” Now it seems like everyone is quick to give you their “two cents worth.” I do not mind that everyone has a viewpoint and/or personal thoughts about all sorts of issues. Hearing what other people think has been a cornerstone of our free speech rights built into our Constitution. To hear someone else’s opinion helps foster clarity in debates by allowing the best ideas to come forth. Respect for other people’s views was foundational to free speech…or at least that is how it used to be.

I am not sure when things started changing, but it is apparent that we do not live in Kansas anymore. I am more than taken back by the flat-out rudeness of people today when it comes to opinions. This emerging rudeness seems to be taking two forms. First, if you have an opinion different from somebody else, you may get shouted down and not allowed to voice that opinion at all. Second, the opinion of some people is tendered in a fashion that would make you think that if you are not in line or accepting of it, you are insulting the person who holds that opinion. They may go so far as to consider you mentally inferior and totally stupid for having a different opinion, let alone have the gall to torture their ears with something they do not believe or want to hear. In short, we are experiencing a type of verbal bullying regarding the exchange of differing viewpoints.

So, where is this coming from? Is it the fault of the college education that our kids have been receiving for the past 3 or 4 decades? Maybe. Is it the fault of doting parents who have given their precious babies everything they ever wanted? Maybe. Is it the fault of a techno-society that has bred a generation of adolescents when it comes to knowing how to live in the real world with real people of all age groups and ethnic and cultural differences? Maybe. Regardless of the contributing factors, there can be no doubt that we are experiencing as a nation a narcissistic movement unlike anything in history. By that, I mean that the people who cannot tolerate differing opinions are rising to the level of total self-centered, self-absorbed fascination with their own opinion as being truth and gospel for not only them but everyone else as well. We are witnessing the death of free speech and the take-over of individual thought. This results in a breakdown of society and a rise of the “intolerant” over everyone else. In the end, if allowed to continue, it will lead to total chaos and the dividing of our culture into “them versus us.” It will ultimately mean the death of our country and the right of every American citizen to have an opinion and to be allowed to speak in public without verbal harassment by those who would oppose your way of thinking. Civility and respect are dying along with a glorious history that spawned our freedoms. It is sort of sad to wake up to the coming twilight of our nation. I hope for change but am bracing for the worst yet to come…when our youth have seized power to govern us with their opinions! Well, at least that is my opinion anyway.