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Richard Dawkins once said:

“There is an attitude in the culture that says that everybody is entitled to their opinion. You got to respect their opinion. No, you damn well haven’t got to respect their opinion.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPkmCV8wccg

I guess he distinguishes between opinions that are based on evidence and reason, and those that are based on faith, ignorance, or prejudice. He implies that we should only respect opinions that are supported by facts and logic, and that we should challenge or reject opinions that are contrary to reality or morality.

Do you agree or disagree with Dawkins’ view? Is he right to reject the idea that we should respect all opinions? Or is he being too dogmatic and intolerant?

And even a bigger question - maybe we actually do this most of the time and the phrase "respect an opinion" actually means - pretend to respect an opinion for better social interaction and fewer conflicts?

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    It seems to me that it certainly isn't correct to respect all opinions because then you'd have to respect opinions like genocide being a wonderful idea. – A-Level Student Aug 12 '23 at 23:00
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    As the last paragraph – it depends on what is meant by 'respect'. A scientist should know how to define their terms. – Weather Vane Aug 12 '23 at 23:08
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    respect the opinionated not the opinion? idk –  Aug 12 '23 at 23:11
  • I guess it's to allow people to hold views different from your own without mocking, attacking or seeking to silence them. It has nothing to do with Dawkin's science, he is just using understandable common language. Like "It's your opinion. cool, I respect it". He says - no, you don't have to be like that. –  Aug 12 '23 at 23:16
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    yeah it depends. i think we should tolerate some irrational beliefs as harmless fictions. –  Aug 12 '23 at 23:34
  • There is a big difference between somebody holding an opinion (not much we can do about that) and getting others to *respect* it. After all, disrespect is also an opinion which they'd be entitled to under the same provision, so it is self-defeating without stipulations. The original saying, which can be traced back to Baruch, was that everybody is entitled to their own opinions but not to their own facts. The second part often gets left out, and in recent times the fact/opinion distinction itself is under sustained assault. – Conifold Aug 13 '23 at 05:08
  • If Rick Dawkins is right, he knows something I don't. By the way, he's changed his tune ... ever so slightly ... perceptible, nonetheless. He'd been swept away by a strong current, no more ... good ta know. – Agent Smith Aug 13 '23 at 10:29

2 Answers2

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Dawkins is correct here.

Common use words used in their standard form do not need to be specially defined; they can be assumed to mean what they always mean. MW's definition covers it well enough:

respect

transitive verb

1a: to consider worthy of high regard, to esteem

1b: to refrain from interfering with

Respecting all opinions, if anyone actually meant that, rather than really meaning I don't want my beliefs subjected to scrutiny right now, would preclude any substantive disagreement as interference and any negative judgment of behavior as lack of esteem. Substantive disagreement is necessary for teaching and for searching cooperatively for the truth. Negative judgment of behavior is necessary living together in society and for restricting actions that cause harm.

Dawkins' conflation(1) of "everybody has a right to an opinion" and "you must respect everyone's opinion" is not such a good idea. The only way to guarantee that people won't express incorrect opinions is force - violence or the threat of violence. Whether it's a right or not, humanity's experience over the past few thousand years is that trying to extirpate differences of opinion generally ends badly for everyone. I don't respect Dawkins' opinions about anything beyond biology, but I don't want to use violence to stop him from having them, and I certainly don't want to live in a place where that is the norm.

  1. (dating to the 16th century in English, from the Latin conflatus, "blown together", making this "new made up word" about 3000 years older than Bill Nye, whom nobody should shoot even though he's wrong.)
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  • though ofc all people, even with opinions, are worthy or respect in some sense/s –  Aug 12 '23 at 23:51
  • and yeah, i'm psychotic, but chin up, you could be a billionaire! lol –  Aug 13 '23 at 01:02
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    It's ironic isn't it, given his foaming-at-the-mouth fury about what he calls vcancel culture', that Dawkins can't see his own hypocrisy here. – CriglCragl Aug 13 '23 at 16:09
  • @CriglCragl Yes. For some reason I tend to find the intolerance of the atheists more intolerable than the intolerance of the religious. Maybe because they're more doggedly blind to their own proclivity?? – Rushi Aug 14 '23 at 09:52
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I don't respect Dawkins' opinions much, usually, but must admit that 1) your last paragraph rings true: privately folks can disrespect other folks' opinions all they like, but it is often considered untoward to express this disrespect publicly, so I interpret Dawkins' rant as being about the social rule that one should show respect for others' opinions; 2) this is a form of hypocrisy, which has its rewards (peace at the dinner table) but also its costs, in allowing ridiculous opinions to go unchallenged, and in habituating society to tolerate socially irresponsible views as "fine". So I tend to agree with Dawkins on this one, that one is not required to show respect where respect is not due.

Whether one shows respect or not for a specific opinion, in a specific social context, would depend on the circumstances, eg the particular opinion being expressed, and whether one values peace in this social context more than the defense of rationality and truth as one sees them.

When my own father started to veer climatosceptic, I told him simply and calmly that climate change is true and that he was being gaslighted by an industry of lie-peddlers paid by big oil. Because I care for the mental health of my father and for the future of mankind. To me, those stakes trumped the care for peace at the dinner table.

Olivier5
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  • Thank you, my thoughts exactly. May I ask - why don;t you respect his opinions and which ones? Not to start an argument, just curious, cause I can't rly find anything specific in his speeches that I disliked badly. –  Aug 14 '23 at 08:59
  • @Whysoserious I find his materialism narrow-minded. I'm totally with Mary Midgley on this. https://amp.theguardian.com/books/2014/mar/23/mary-midgley-philosopher-soul-human-consciousness – Olivier5 Aug 14 '23 at 12:46