I don’t agree with everything you said, although I do agree more than starting my response that way would normally imply, but I was pleasantly surprised by the way you expressed yourself. You gave a thoughtful and well reasoned reply but more than that you were attempting to see what I was getting at without assuming ill intent on my part. I’ve grown accustomed to conversations that turn sour very quickly because, despite what the say, I don’t think most people actually like talking to people that hold different opinions than them.

This is the kind of discussion we should be having more of as a society. In fact, that was a large part of the point I was trying to make from the start. People often use labels to pre-judge how a conversation will turn out and end up ensuring it goes poorly as a result. Thank you very much for not doing that.

You have also given me some interesting ideas to consider related to labels and how people identify themselves so I thank you for that as well. I still think humans have a tendency to use labels in a negative fashion but the same could be said of a lot of behaviors that aren’t inherently negative. There’s certainly more angles I could approach this topic from and you’ve helped me see some of them a bit more clearly.