2006 / August 16^th/ Opinion

Opinion-less people suck. It’s true: you know who you are, and you all suck. What’s the fun in life if you don’t express your opinion? I’m sure as hell not afraid of expressing my opinion. If you ever meet me in real life, you’ll find the same. It’s an Engineer trait — get a bunch of Engineers in a room (for example, my household) and you’ll find arguments abound.

But arguments aren’t always a bad thing (in fact, I never understood why so many people take them to heart). You’ll also find that Engineers in general don’t take things personally. Just because you argue with someone about a choice of material doesn’t mean that you’re diminishing them as a person.

You’ll find that Engineers are also some of the most creative and inventive people because of this — the excessive demand for perfection and their willingness to fight for their point of view.

It’s how we advance our society: someone doesn’t think what we have is sufficient, so they argue until it’s changed. If everyone was complacent and agreed to the majority rule, we’d still be living in tribes — and wouldn’t that be a step forward.

The curious thing is that on the web it seems the paradigm is quite the opposite. Maybe it’s the text, maybe it’s the comforting sense of thinking that you’ll never meet the person on the other end (and isn’t that false). The problem I see is many conversations end up like this:

Person 1: Hey, would you mind taking a look at this design here?

Person 2: That’s some nice code there, but you really ought to think about using a few less divs

Person 1: Yeah, well why don’t you change that ugly ass green on your site? Huh? And you call yourself a graphic designer.

Person 2: Excuse me? I was just offering a suggestion. I could have said that it’s the most div-filled piece of crap ever (which it is), but I try to be fucking nice, ass.

Person 1: Like you know anything anyway. It’s not like you ever have to visit this site anyway. It’s a free internet after-all.

So, chill people. Just because someone expresses their opinion does not mean they’re saying you’re a bad person who’s going to hell. Don’t be afraid to express your opinion, and don’t be afraid to be yourself.

1. 

   Nick

   August 16^th | #

   I agree with you completely. It seems that every time I try to offer constructive criticism I end up with an exchange like above.

   It’s unfortunate, but that seems to be the way things work. Being an engineer myself, I also agree with you on that point.

   -Nick

2. 

   Joel

   August 16^th | #

   Absolutely correct on the argument vs. ‘hate’ thing.

   Although I would add that engineers will alter their thinking if the argument presented beats theirs ;)

3. 

   Jg

   August 17^th | #

   I think that it would be fun to be a social engineer. I could like go to parties and stuff and people would say, “What do you do, man?” and I would say, “I’m an engineer, man. A round for the house on me!” And people would whisper into their neighbor’s ear, “What a social engineer!” And I would turn around and say, “I think you mean ‘what a sociable engineer’, ladies,” and they would turn up their noses and from that day on every time they met an engineer all of the fires of hate in their souls would burn for that poor new acquaintance.

4. 

   Nick

   August 17^th | #

   Jg, I think the ladies can already sense an engineer from a mile away and tend to steer clear. That’s my experience at least. :)

   Not always, but most of the time.

   -Nick

5. 

   Jg

   August 18^th | #

   Man, I just read that comment again and was struck by how awesomely unfunny I am on your site, Kyle.

6. 

   Kyle

   August 18^th | #

   Yeah, well you know what that means? It means it’s on. Time for the unfunniest comment war ever.

7. 

   Mark

   August 18^th | #

   Practically everyone who’s involved in design and critique should read this work of yours.

   People who have the soaring ego to think that they’ve got the best work in the world shouldn’t really need to get their work scrutinized.

   But when they do, and they don’t hear what they want to hear, it’s just drives one to punch said species in the face.

8. 

   Travis Briggs

   August 24^th | #

   The only time it doesn’t work is in personal relationships. There, two engineers will nearly always destroy each other with arguments. I’m embroiled in a battle with my best friend right now, and with both of us thinking that we have something to literally ‘prove’, we’re losing common ground (”Hey let’s make a neat looking website” or in our case, “Let’s be best friends. It’s neat”).

   This article seems to be right on. I think the ability to just “chill the fuck out” comes with maturity (note: not age!). Also, note the irony of the term “chill the fuck out”…

   Also, I’ve found it’s very powerful to “save up” my opinions. Just because an idea/opinion is good, and especially if it’s great, I don’t have to call up everyone I know. Especially at 0500. It’s just rude, and they won’t listen to me or care. So I would also add that tact is something in short supply with young, talented engineers like myself and my friend (and clearly you – take that as a compliment?)

   Man…I don’t blog much….but when it rains it fucking pours! Also, I’m writing a movie with Samuel L Jackson, it’s called Comments On A Blog. Whaddya think?

9. 

   Ian

   August 26^th | #

   Excellent article Kyle, and I totally agree. I am a wierd mix when it comes to this kind of thing, as I studied both design & engineering at Uni, and it’s funny to see the differences between the two.

   The way I see it (being very general here), Engineers aim to complete a project using the most effective methods/materials/technologies available to them at the time. If someone presents something better or more effective, the Engineer takes this onboard in order to achieve the best possible outcome. What is important to an engineer is the end result, not the method.

   Designers how ever rely on their method and style, and that is what characterises design. Design is largely about emotional response, and every designer has his or her own way of doing things, and this is why people by ‘designer’ clothes and ‘designer’ products, as the designers’ method or style almost acts as a brand identity which people buy into.

   In my experience Designers often tend to be quite stubborn in their ways. I read one comment the other day where someone mentioned he felt that people who said they used Microsoft frontpage to design websites were insulting true ‘designers’ like himself. I assume this was because he used Dreamweaver on a Mac. In this sense what I am getting at is that Designers tend to associate themselves with certain things (tools, software, computers etc) as they feel these reinforce their status as a designer.

   Really what I am trying to say is that to channel creativity, designers rely on fixed structures that they have built up through hard graft. When you critisise a piece of their work, it is often mistaken as a direct attack at their way of doing things, their ’structure’ that has taken many years to create.

   When I studied Engineering, I was tought that I had to keep my mind open and remain flexible, because the world of science is constantly developing. It is a case of ‘evolve or get left behind’. It is this very fact that makes engineers crave constructive critisism and enjoy airing their opinions.

   Anyway, I’m with you Kyle. Lets get opinionated!

10. 

    Designers are fathers/mothers « D.a.double-r.e.n

    August 28^th | #

    [...] If you’ve ever been involved in any design process, you’ll soon learn that all designers take their work entirely too personal. It’s a side-effect of the profession, and I’m not quite sure how to put it, except to say that all designers treat their designs like children. If you happen to criticize them, or say that you don’t like them, many designers will take it personally (whether they say so or not). [...]

11. 

    Arsen

    October 6^th | #

    Opinions are personal, so when exchanging opinions it is quite easy to become too personal. And there are some people in the world you just cannot communicate with them comfortablely, they make two nagetive counter points when you make a decent suggestion.

    And people love to express their opinions though blogs and I REALLY HATE people who say “lame… this was a good blog until it got too personal with posts like this. we don’t care about this crap. “

    Above is only an example, I like this blog, really.

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