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My mom has this anecdote she tells me whenever she needs to explain why I’m so argumentative. She says that as I took my first screaming breaths in the hospital on my birth day, the nurse heard me and said, “Ooh, she has an opinion!” From that declaration, my mom says, I never strayed. My entire life, it has always been a safe bet that if there is something to discuss, I’ve taken a stance. Whether it’s picking a favorite of two seemingly indistinguishable things or observing major conflicts through multiple lenses and picking the solution I most align with, there is no hill on which I wouldn’t die, or at least stand proudly.
I’ve had to work with a lot of people who like to be known for their ambivalence. I have always been confused by this characteristic. In a world of choices to be constantly made, where is the joy in picking nothing? Especially in a collaborative, project-based environment, there is great value in the type of person who will have an opinion and express it. Things get done that way, or at the very least discussions are had. Seemingly inconsequential decisions—ones that just as effectively could be decided by the flip of a coin—are the ones that I find deadlock productivity the most. In a world of people who choose not to decide in these instances, it is those quick and confident enough to pick an option and stick with it who keep the ball rolling, even if they’ve made the decision at random.
I am an art history student; with that comes a great love of looking at art. I believe art is anything that evokes an emotional reaction of any sort, which includes love and awe as well as contempt and disgust. When I look at a piece of art and I feel something, I know the art has worked. Whether the opinion I develop is positive or negative, I am grateful for the experience I have just had looking at the piece. When anyone has an opinion about a particular work of art, it means they have been affected, made to feel something. Opinions about art, made more-or-less by art, put us in touch with what it means to be a thinking, feeling, emotional and opinionated human being. To look at a piece and have no feelings, be moved to no statements about its quality or its impact, is for the art to have failed. To have no opinion is to have no strong feelings, and it is to be less in touch with what makes one human.
I am occasionally argumentative for fun. I am passionate about things that don’t matter to anyone but me. Sometimes, I am annoying at parties. But I believe that my proclivity for strong opinions is indicative of my great love for being alive. I am allowed to choose what I think about, what I wear and listen to and eat, because there are so many options available in this universe. I can pick my very favorite of every type of thing and concept, and I can claim it in my head as a defining characteristic of myself, and with that, integrate myself into this world.