It's always irked me when someone raises the stakes in an argument and says "you've offended me!" I understand that some things are just plain offensive–filthy sexual jokes, shirts with senseless hateful messages on them, tasteless halloween costumes–but it seems to me that the widely held belief is that these things are wrong because they are offensive. This, I believe, is dangerously false.
The above list of things are not wrong because they are offensive; they are offensive because they are wrong.
This is an important distinction. Stating it this way makes it clear that "offending" someone in and of itself is amoral. It alone is neither right nor wrong; it is just the result of their reaction to your words or actions. That being said, context and care for how someone will receive something is always in good order and is an ever-essential part of Christian charity.
But I want to talk about those things which we say to or do in front of our peers and friends which are not wrong, and therefore not offensive, and therefore put us in a pickle when our peers and friends find them offensive. What I've found irks me about these situations can be summarized in something I think of as the distribution of responsibility:
The responsibility of the SPEAKER: In every willingly entered into civil conversation, there should be an unspoken agreement to communicate responsibly. What I mean by this can be clearly seen in the responsibility I described above in Christian charity; to find the time, place, and words that will find the listener the most disposed to understand. This is a responsibility we take very seriously. In fact, I would say we think of the speaker as having the majority of the burden of responsibility–if not all of the responsibility–placed on him in a conversation.
But wait, doesn't Christian charity often mean just listening and being there and showing love sometimes? Is that not the better part of it rather than offering reproof and self-righteous direction or correction to someone? Yes, indeed. And that also happens to be the perfect description of the other half of the distribution of responsibility–
The responsibility of the HEARER: The burden of responsibility which is always forgotten is that which is (equally) shared on the part of the hearer. This is how most of us would like to think we listen; it's active listening. It involves hearing what the person is saying, thinking about what we believe they are trying to say and why they are saying it, and giving them the benefit of the doubt that they are trying to tell us something valuable rather than just "being offensive". It requires clarifying questions and an open exchange of thoughts. It's harder than what we normally do–assume no responsibility to hear and expect to have things presented to us in a completely comfortable, flattering, and agreeable form–but it has the possibility of being good and enlightening our minds to truth.
The practical point of this is simple: being a responsible hearer improves your life immensely. The situational demands of Christian charity can become very complicated, but the end goal of it is always to liberate, to set free, to bring hearts and minds to the Truth and therefor to lead them out of darkness. True charity then–that is, love–should always be ultimately aimed at helping others to be set free; to know, to understand, and to be enabled to hear. You have never done anyone a favor by abetting them in shirking their responsibility.
The above list of things are not wrong because they are offensive; they are offensive because they are wrong.
This is an important distinction. Stating it this way makes it clear that "offending" someone in and of itself is amoral. It alone is neither right nor wrong; it is just the result of their reaction to your words or actions. That being said, context and care for how someone will receive something is always in good order and is an ever-essential part of Christian charity.
But I want to talk about those things which we say to or do in front of our peers and friends which are not wrong, and therefore not offensive, and therefore put us in a pickle when our peers and friends find them offensive. What I've found irks me about these situations can be summarized in something I think of as the distribution of responsibility:
The responsibility of the SPEAKER: In every willingly entered into civil conversation, there should be an unspoken agreement to communicate responsibly. What I mean by this can be clearly seen in the responsibility I described above in Christian charity; to find the time, place, and words that will find the listener the most disposed to understand. This is a responsibility we take very seriously. In fact, I would say we think of the speaker as having the majority of the burden of responsibility–if not all of the responsibility–placed on him in a conversation.
But wait, doesn't Christian charity often mean just listening and being there and showing love sometimes? Is that not the better part of it rather than offering reproof and self-righteous direction or correction to someone? Yes, indeed. And that also happens to be the perfect description of the other half of the distribution of responsibility–
The responsibility of the HEARER: The burden of responsibility which is always forgotten is that which is (equally) shared on the part of the hearer. This is how most of us would like to think we listen; it's active listening. It involves hearing what the person is saying, thinking about what we believe they are trying to say and why they are saying it, and giving them the benefit of the doubt that they are trying to tell us something valuable rather than just "being offensive". It requires clarifying questions and an open exchange of thoughts. It's harder than what we normally do–assume no responsibility to hear and expect to have things presented to us in a completely comfortable, flattering, and agreeable form–but it has the possibility of being good and enlightening our minds to truth.
The practical point of this is simple: being a responsible hearer improves your life immensely. The situational demands of Christian charity can become very complicated, but the end goal of it is always to liberate, to set free, to bring hearts and minds to the Truth and therefor to lead them out of darkness. True charity then–that is, love–should always be ultimately aimed at helping others to be set free; to know, to understand, and to be enabled to hear. You have never done anyone a favor by abetting them in shirking their responsibility.
Comments
Post a Comment