Public service announcement

[tim]

Dear world:

Please stop using the phrase "I'm sorry if I offended you."

If I'm calling you on your bullshit, your error wasn't to hurt my feelings. If I were actually hurt, I probably wouldn't have the energy to confront you about it, unless you were someone I knew well.

Rather, your error was to say something that made you look like an ignorant clown.

So why are you apologizing to me for that?

Love,
tim

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Another way of saying it (in re discussion in comments here) is that there is something to learn from any criticism. If "Alice" thinks something you said makes you seem like an ignorant clown, then there's probably something in either what you said, or how you said it, or both, that's worth examining. Unless, that is, you have no respect for "Alice" whatsoever. If "I'm sorry if I offended you" connotes "I have no respect for you whatsoever", is it really a polite thing to say?

Comments

[tim]

Doesn't that just return to my original point, which is the false elevation of the perspectives of people who lack a personal stake in the situation being discussed?

[hitchhiker]

yes. that's what i'm getting at. it may be false, but it's inductive rather than out of thin air.