Download the-right-to-your-opinion-summary

Legge 1
Emily Legge
Professor Jason Corner
Focused Inquiry II
2 September 2016
Summary of “The Right to Your Opinion”
“The Right to Your Opinion” is an excerpt from Jamie Whyte’s first book, Crimes
Against Logic. In this chapter, he discusses the invalidity and weak logic behind the commonly
used cliché of being entitled to one’s opinion.
Throughout the passage, Whyte repeatedly implies that the phrase “I am entitled to my
opinion” is only used as a way to justify a viewpoint that is unsupported by factual evidence.
Generally, it is a stubborn person’s last resort, considering that “they do so at just that point in an
argument when they would otherwise be forced to admit error,” because it is a pointless
statement which completely changes the subject of the entire argument (Whyte 414).
Additionally, the statement does not logically make sense, because the term “entitlement” has
two different meanings. In the context of law or politics, a person is “entitled,” because nothing
can legally prevent a person from thinking a certain way. In the context of a generic argument,
however, a person is only entitled to their opinion if it is backed by logic and facts (Whyte 412).
Whyte also explains that the right to one’s opinion, if it existed, is a right that would be
impossible to protect because there are no duties associated with it, as there are with other rights.
In order for the right of an individual to be protected, there are certain things that others must do
as well that prevent that right from being violated. However, as Whyte points out multiple times,
nobody is required to do anything in response to an individual’s opinion, and therefore it is
Legge 2
unable to be viewed as an actual right; the act of disagreeing with an opinion does not actively
oppress the person whom that opinion belongs to.
The phrase “I have a right to my opinion” is an invalid argument because it is not backed
by facts and contributes nothing to an argument. As Whyte explains in this passage, it is hardly a
“right” at all.
Legge 3
Works Cited
Whyte, Jamie. “The Right to Your Opinion.” Focused Inquiry Reader. Edited by Focused
Inquiry Textbook Committee. Plymouth: Macmillan, 2016. 411-415. Print.