Some of my friends and I were watching Pixar's movie "Finding Nemo". It was the first time that I'd seen it since it was in the theatres, and at the end, I very innocently remarked that I liked it better than when I had watched it the first time. In this case, when I say "very innocently", I mean that I really was making an innocuous remark, as opposed to making mischief while trying to appear innocent. One of my friends asked me why I didn't like it as much the first time. Now, at this point, warning bells should have been going off in my head. I should have pled the 5th ammendment, and stopped right there.

Now, I never said that I did not like the movie at all the first time. But I was shocked by the scene at the beginning where Nemo's mother and siblings all get eaten by that nasty fish. So I brought that up, and how Disney always seems to make movies about broken families, how they have very few original stories, etc etc etc. And two of my friends argued with me over every point. (The other ones had learned by this point that sitting back and saying nothing is a better policy.) I finally ended the argument by saying that I agreed that everyone has different opinions on what is suitable for young children, that it is the parents' responsibility to pre-view and pre-approve of movies before taking their kids to see them, but that it was my opinion that while Disney does make good movies, I think that they could be better.

But we probably wasted 30 minutes arguing over my opinion, over something that isn't even that important. We've had worse, and just as useless arguments, over more serious issues. The way that they argue makes it seem like my oppossing opinions are personal affronts to them, or that they're questioning my intelligence, or ethics, or whatever. It's gotten so that we have to be very careful what we bring up, because none of us have the discipline to step back and say, "This isn't going anywhere and it's just creating bad feelings, so let's just let it drop." So yes, I admit that I am as much at fault as my friends because I can't ever step back from that kind of argument. Hopefully, I will next time, because it's not worth damaging our friendship.