# What are your most unpopular opinions? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 14, 2013, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645 "2013-04-14T00:24:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 21
**Author:** ![panaccione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/94ad74/32.png) [@panaccione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panaccione)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/401 "2013-04-24T06:37:43Z")
Oh, and everyone claiming that The Beatles are overrated can piss off. You don’t know shit. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/402 "2013-04-24T08:58:29Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > This’ll be crazy unpopular here; I think people who choose not to have children will end up disappointed, unhappy, and lonely, and won’t really get nearly enough out of life that it has to offer. the only people I hear this from are miserable parents who feel that everyone should have to be as miserable as they are. life offers me whatever I want from it, if that means I don’t want the same things as you, fucking deal with it. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/403 "2013-04-24T09:50:11Z")
> [@Dung\_Beetle](#): > > I can’t help feeling a bit sorry for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. He’s right between my kids in age, which automatically classifies him in my eyes as just a little boy. I bet he idolized his big brother and followed him right along this terrible path. I’m sure his mother would never have let this happen if she’d been around. > > Now, at the same time, I don’t deny that a person of his age can be a total irredeemable shitbag. There’s video of him placing the bomb next to the little boy he killed (and that boy’s sister and mother, who he maimed and seriously injured)., and of him strolling calmly away from the carnage after the blast. Later he showed no anxiety, or remorse for what he’d done, instead making cryptic Tweets and socializing normally with his friends. I’m going to have to go with ‘irredeemable shitbag’ here. A normal human being with any capability for empathy might get to the last few steps of such a horrible thing, but to be so cold in the carrying out and aftermath.. really disgusting. Not that I don’t think that it’s a tragic waste of a young life, to be a murderous shitbag and spend the rest of his life in prison. Nor do I want to see him (or anyone, no matter how heinous their crimes) tortured ---
**Author:** ![Cestrian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Cestrian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cestrian)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/404 "2013-04-24T13:53:37Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > Addiction, period, is a disease, and it’s turning out to be way more complex than just “Stop drinking” or whatever. One of my friends has worked in substance abuse treatment for many years, and she says it’s not unusual for people to stop drinking or using drugs, and they will become religious fanatics, hypersexual, gamble compulsively (more common in men), develop eating disorders (more common in women), etc. and likewise, people who give up addiction to the above things not uncommonly start drinking, using drugs, hoarding, etc. This is dangerously close to saying that being human is a disease. My unpopular opinion: Addiction is a weakness of will. ---
**Author:** ![ArrMatey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/arrmatey/32/3522_2.png) [@ArrMatey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ArrMatey)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/405 "2013-04-24T14:33:57Z")
This is one that I’ve been hesitant to post, mainly because I know a lot of people who feel quite strongly in the opposite direction. I believe that by ‘supporting the troops’, you’re tacitly supporting the wars those troops are in. I believe that the meme ‘you can support the troops and not support the war’ is largely a propaganda piece used to sell the war to the populous, and to make sure more young men and women feel like they’ll be heroes if they march out into the front lines. I think the whole thing is a recruitment tactic for an unpopular war, and it often makes me angry how the public is pushed to fetishize soldier-dom. ---
**Author:** ![perfectparanoia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a5b964/32.png) [@perfectparanoia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/perfectparanoia)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/406 "2013-04-24T15:19:58Z")
I am a communist. That should be pretty unpopular. I think we should all have the same privileges, opportunities and wealth. Though, I am unsure how we can actually accomplish it since we are biologically driven to be greedy bastards. ---
**Author:** ![purple\_cow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b487fb/32.png) [@purple\_cow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purple_cow)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/407 "2013-04-24T15:24:25Z")
Funny, \*\*ArrMatey \*\*I think of it similarly but very differently at the same time. Supporting our troops has been a thing for a while now, but it really cranked up in 2002-3. It wasn’t a tactic to sell the war to the populace, it was a tactic to suppress opposition. Iraq quickly became a quagmire and Afghanistan wasn’t much better and speaking out against the war was ramping up. So the administration just started blocking criticism of the wars by complaining that opponents weren’t supporting the troops. A nice blanket answer to all objections and a tactic that has been used for thousands of years. If you’re not 100% behind us, you might as well be the enemy. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/408 "2013-04-24T16:02:14Z")
> [@Agent\_Foxtrot](#): > > If we as a society weren’t so prudish about educating kids about sex, 13-year-olds wouldn’t be getting pregnant or STD’s. I know an awful lot of grown-ass adults who while they manage to feed and clothe themselves, can’t manage safe sex, and have had unplanned pregnancies and gotten STDs at 30+ after years and years of being sexually active. You can tell people how to do it right until you’re blue in the face, but a lot of people just don’t care. Or are dumb. Or both. Or, someone takes advantage of them - happens a lot to young girls. I believe in early childhood sex ed and in not demonizing young teens being sexually active, btw. I also believe that better attitudes and more education would be VERY helpful in reducing rates of pregnancy, etc in young teens.st strongly disagreed with the totality of your statement. ---
**Author:** ![Sateryn76](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e4f/32.png) [@Sateryn76](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sateryn76)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/409 "2013-04-24T16:28:51Z")
I believe there should be a lot more abortions. I too am tired of hearing about the troops, and seeing a parade of motorcycles every time one comes home, and the constant fellating of anyone, anytime, who’s ever been affiliated with the armed services. Almost none of these people are heroes, and a lot of them are assholes. Two Facebook specific ones - tired of seeing pics and stories about retarded/disabled people and animals. There’s some weirdness about the constant flogging of these horses, and I can’t seem to put my finger on why its so off-putting to me. Either way, on a general basis, I give no shits for either random retarded people or pets. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/410 "2013-04-24T17:08:37Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#): > > As many problems as Africa had in the 16th-19th centuries, you just didn’t see many choosing to emigrate to the Americas to be slaves. POST OF THE DAY! And let’s face it, slavery existed in Africa at that time and still does. I didn’t know until recently that 95% of the slave trade was not to the United States! It was to the Caribbean and the equatorial Americas, for people who could work in the sugar cane fields, and no, the sugar was not made into candy and baked goodies. It was made into rum. Most of these slaves were men, because women had this pesky habit of getting pregnant and they couldn’t extract as much work out of them as the men, and in addition the slaves died faster than they could be replaced by this method. I’m very interested in medical history and recently read a book that in its day was a huge best-seller. It was “Shadow on the Land” by Dr. Thomas Parran, and is about syphilis. When I read the chapter about the prevalence and treatment of syphilis in southern blacks, it gave me plenty of insight as to why the book is long out of print. The emphasis on treating them was not to make and keep them healthy for their own sake; it was so they could continue to work for the plantation owners! :eek: :mad: I was horrified. And this book was published in 1937. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/411 "2013-04-24T17:12:09Z")
> [@DaisyOlive](#): > > Another unpopular opinion at least in real life, I think alcohol makes parties and social situations worse. I know when I’m having a good time I personally think “This would be so much better with booze!”. :rolleyes: I don’t drink, but I don’t mind if people have “adult beverages” at a party or restaurant. If they NEED them to have a good time, that’s another story, and any drug other than weed? Never attended a party where there was, that I know of, but if there was, I’d be outta there. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/412 "2013-04-24T17:44:33Z")
> [@rhubarbarin](#): > > There’s video of him placing the bomb next to the little boy he killed (and that boy’s sister and mother, who he maimed and seriously injured)., and of him strolling calmly away from the carnage after the blast. Later he showed no anxiety, or remorse for what he’d done, instead making cryptic Tweets and socializing normally with his friends. I’m going to have to go with ‘irredeemable shitbag’ here. A normal human being with any capability for empathy might get to the last few steps of such a horrible thing, but to be so cold in the carrying out and aftermath.. really disgusting. Yeah, I’m afraid you’re right. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/413 "2013-04-24T18:04:28Z")
> [@perfectparanoia](#): > > I am a communist. That should be pretty unpopular. I think we should all have the same privileges, opportunities and wealth. > > Though, I am unsure how we can actually accomplish it since we are biologically driven to be greedy bastards. I am not onboard with the whole “greed is the natural human condition” premise. Money/wealth is about power more than stuff and survival, the people with emotional problems use the greed-is-good argument to justify their behavior, most of us are OK with just having enough. ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/414 "2013-04-24T18:15:04Z")
> [@ArrMatey](#): > > This is one that I’ve been hesitant to post, mainly because I know a lot of people who feel quite strongly in the opposite direction. > I believe that by ‘supporting the troops’, you’re tacitly supporting the wars those troops are in. I believe that the meme ‘you can support the troops and not support the war’ is largely a propaganda piece used to sell the war to the populous, and to make sure more young men and women feel like they’ll be heroes if they march out into the front lines. I think the whole thing is a recruitment tactic for an unpopular war, and it often makes me angry how the public is pushed to fetishize soldier-dom. That’s an unpopular position in the general population, but I don’t think you’ll find a lot of resistance here. I agree with your general point, but disagree that it was foisted on the population to sell the war. Or if it was, it was ineffectual. The common refrain at the height of the wars was “I support the troops, but I don’t support the war!” Claiming to support the troops didn’t dampen anyone’s outspoken opposition to the war itself. ---
**Author:** ![pbbth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f9ae1b/32.png) [@pbbth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pbbth)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/415 "2013-04-24T18:21:23Z")
I just watched the documentary [Bully](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1682181/?ref_=sr_1) the other day and found myself supremely pissed off with the parents of every single one of those kids. I feel like those parents are just as much to blame for the damage done to their kids as the bullies at the schools. In the end my husband had to tell me to calm down as I as yelling at the tv, “Really? Your kid is getting punched, stabbed, and strangled on the bus and all you do is cry because the principal can’t stop it? Did it never occur to you to have him put on a different bus or rearrange your schedule and drive him to school your damn self?” Every one of those parents who knew about the bullying and didn’t do everything in their power to stop it, even if that involved moving their kids to a different school, taking their kids off the bus, finding a way to home school, etc., was just as much at fault as the kids beating up their children. ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/416 "2013-04-24T18:22:03Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I think that, practically speaking, homosexuality is frequently a choice. Please note that, in this context, I’m not using the word to refer to which sex one is primarily attracted to, but rather which sex one chooses to be romantically or sexually active with. Put another way, I’d say that a lot of ostensible gays & lesbians are actually bisexuals who simply made a commitment to a person of their own sex rather than someone of the other sex. > > I also don’t think it matters whether homosexuality is a choice. It’s nobody’s business whom others choose as bed partners as long as its voluntary on all sides and nobody’s cheating. If you’re still reading this thread, I’d be curious to hear an elaboration on this. What would make you think most gay people are actually significantly bisexual? ---
**Author:** ![panaccione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/94ad74/32.png) [@panaccione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panaccione)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/417 "2013-04-24T18:34:29Z")
> [@ArrMatey](#): > > This is one that I’ve been hesitant to post, mainly because I know a lot of people who feel quite strongly in the opposite direction. > I believe that by ‘supporting the troops’, you’re tacitly supporting the wars those troops are in. I believe that the meme ‘you can support the troops and not support the war’ is largely a propaganda piece used to sell the war to the populous, and to make sure more young men and women feel like they’ll be heroes if they march out into the front lines. I think the whole thing is a recruitment tactic for an unpopular war, and it often makes me angry how the public is pushed to fetishize soldier-dom. I think this [image](http://apeshits.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/tumblr_m5jlmftbgl1qcpjxgo1_500.jpg?w=950) illustrates the concept quite well. ---
**Author:** ![panaccione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/94ad74/32.png) [@panaccione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panaccione)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/418 "2013-04-24T18:43:44Z")
> [@Dung\_Beetle](#): > > I can’t help feeling a bit sorry for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. He’s right between my kids in age, which automatically classifies him in my eyes as just a little boy. I bet he idolized his big brother and followed him right along this terrible path. I’m sure his mother would never have let this happen if she’d been around. > > Now, at the same time, I don’t deny that a person of his age can be a total irredeemable shitbag. Actually **Dung Beetle** , I think you’re opinion is commendable. It is easy to be outraged at what the kid did and it is justified as well. However, it takes courage to point that this kid likely suffered as well. It’s too bad more people don’t see it like you. It reminds me of Kahlil Gibran’s passage in The Prophet: [Oftentimes have I heard you speak of one who commits a wrong as though he were not one of you, but a stranger unto you and an intruder upon your world. But I say that even as the holy and the righteous cannot rise beyond the highest which is in each one of you, So the wicked and the weak cannot fall lower than the lowest which is in you also. And as a single leaf turns not yellow but with the silent knowledge of the whole tree, So the wrong-doer cannot do wrong without the hidden will of you all.](http://www.katsandogz.com/oncrime.html) ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/419 "2013-04-24T18:44:54Z")
> [@pbbth](#): > > I just watched the documentary [Bully](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1682181/?ref_=sr_1) the other day and found myself supremely pissed off with the parents of every single one of those kids. I feel like those parents are just as much to blame for the damage done to their kids as the bullies at the schools. In the end my husband had to tell me to calm down as I as yelling at the tv, “Really? Your kid is getting punched, stabbed, and strangled on the bus and all you do is cry because the principal can’t stop it? Did it never occur to you to have him put on a different bus or rearrange your schedule and drive him to school your damn self?” Every one of those parents who knew about the bullying and didn’t do everything in their power to stop it, even if that involved moving their kids to a different school, taking their kids off the bus, finding a way to home school, etc., was just as much at fault as the kids beating up their children. I’m never going to watch that movie, because it was my life. As for my parents, all they cared about was that having a child like me was embarrassing to them, and my mother in particular accused me of doing whatever I did to make the other kids treat me this way to make her look bad. And they wonder why I don’t visit much. I recently found out that one of the worst of mine runs an anti-bullying program. That, to me, would be like a rapist doing an anti-sexual assault program, and unless she’s genuinely changed (trust me, most other kids didn’t like her either), either she’s jumped onto some entrepreneurial bandwagon, or karma bit her in the rear end WRT her own kids, if she has any. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645/420 "2013-04-24T20:52:12Z")
> [@Rodgers01](#): > > If you’re still reading this thread, I’d be curious to hear an elaboration on this. What would make you think most gay people are actually significantly bisexual? Did **Skald** say “most”? Is “a lot” a synonym for “most”? I suspect that sexuality is kind of complicated. Not even the Kinsey Scale is sufficient to cover it. There are some people who are unequivocally monosexual, who are wholly unable to function outside their own perceived preference, but it appears to me likely that they are in the minority. Cultural and social influences and pressures may drive individuals into a monosexual mindset when they are actually nominally or absolutely bi. And some gays may well be bisexuals who are somewhat or largely attracted to their own in part because the “gay lifestyle” allows them to feel more comfortable. But **Skald the Rhymer** ’s key point is, suppose it is a matter of choice? So fucking what? Who are ‘you’ to decide that my choice is wrong? The whole biology-vs-choice debate is pointless unless you are some kind of uptight religious freak – and really, why should we be coddling their neuroses? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645.md?page=20) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-your-most-unpopular-opinions/655645.md?page=22)