I’m right, therefore you’re wrong. Does that sound at all familiar?

Or maybe you’ve had people get up in your face, yell and curse at you because your beliefs are different from theirs?

Unfortunately, I have had the wonderful opportunity to experience this abuse firsthand. In the days leading up to and following the election, people who claimed to be open-minded verbally attacked some of my friends and myself when we professed our views.

It was almost funny (if you discount the anger and hate that were directed at us) how fast their proclaimed open-mindedness disappeared when confronted with our differing beliefs.

Either we were confronted with a frosty silence and pointedly ignored, or we were angrily lambasted about how stupid we were. It got to the point where I couldn’t even say who I wanted for president because a fight might ensue. There were five or six angry so-called liberal-minded people, and there was no way I could win just by my little lonesome self.

I am so sick and tired of these obviously closed-minded people who believe in the right to free speech just as long as it only applies to them. These so-called liberal thinkers are no better than bigots.

Don’t tell me that I am wrong. Don’t curse at me for what I believe. I have the right to think and form my own opinions just as everyone else does.

Though this superiority of beliefs phenomenon, which I designate the Right Complex, has shown its colors in this very hotly contested election, it most definitely is not limited to it.

In fact, this Right Complex phenomenon has been hitting me since the beginning of the quarter. For instance, in some of my classes, my teaching assistants make their views known in such a way that if there is a contrary opinion, the student will be trounced and made a spectacle in class.

Or better yet, in a political science class, two guys told me that I was “”full of shit”” over and over when I good-naturedly attempted to point out that there was another way to look at a particular issue. The hateful views of my two fellow students stunned me. What right did they have to verbally harass me just because I didn’t share their ideology?

I won’t stand for these people’s hypocrisy anymore. I have the right to my opinion, period. And in return, I must respect everyone’s opinion. I don’t have the right to verbally attack someone because of a differing belief. I don’t have the right to make someone so uncomfortable that they won’t even open their mouth for fear of being verbally harassed.

It’s actually a very simple concept. It’s about respecting others even though you might not agree with them. I have the right to my opinion as long as I don’t infringe upon another’s freedom to have a different view.

If everyone were meant to think all the same way, then we would have all been made exactly the same. But we have all grown up with different experiences and those experiences are what have shaped and molded the beliefs we hold today. So who is to judge one’s experiences and beliefs are more valid than others?

My question to those who stand in judgment of others is this: Who appointed you God? What gives you the right to sit on your mighty throne and look down upon and verbally attack those who do not agree with you? What makes your opinions automatically right and all those who disagree wrong?

I have come to realize that our society is not one that accepts differing viewpoints. Instead, it is a cutthroat, cruel society that takes pleasure in hating and attacking people who have diverse beliefs. And to think that I was naive enough to expect college students to be more accepting than the general population! Well, my eyes are certainly opened now.

It will be a great day indeed when these bigots finally realized how hypocritical they are. In the mean time, the only way I see to safeguard my right to have my opinions is if I grow skin thick as armor, so the hatred and cursing of those bigots will not be able to silence my just-as-valid beliefs.