So this happened like 6 years ago when I was still in high school, but I remember it like it was yesterday because it marked me. So it was in my French class (my country’s primary language) and we were preparing for like the final essay. It was an opinion essay, where basically you are given a bunch of text about a specific issue and you have to say if you are for or against it. In theory, in those kind of essay you could do a mix of both where you can say that your opinion is nuanced. The teacher said that you must be convinced in your essay and that nuanced essays will be penalized. The problem was throughout all of years I only did nuanced essays because I hate just taking only one side of a coin. There is always two sides and most always two excellent arguments on each size. So, I raised my hand to ask why, because I was sweating thinking about how I’ll have to change my ways for this one teacher. He says that having a nuanced opinion is not having an opinion, you just take the easy way by not making a choice or something. Wanting so badly to accept nuanced opinion, I wait until the end of class to discuss with him and that’s how it went approximately: « You said earlier that nuanced opinions are not opinions, but I think that considering each sides is better than having a tunnel vision about a specific issue » (I was rehearsing that bit during the class) « Yeah, but you still pick a side and try to convince people » « Shouldn’t the text about my opinion represent my opinion, which will probably not be all black or white? » « No it should be about your strong beliefs » « Well I strongly believe that what you are teaching is wrong because of that’s how you create polarized societies that only have tunnel visions about their beliefs » (I was also preparing this during the class, I was almost happy to be able to use it) « Well I’m the teacher and I decide, you are dismissed » To this day, I still don’t know what came onto me (I’m usually the teacher’s pet) and have some regrets, but I still think I was right. So was I the asshole?