Most of us have felt offended at a remark made by a close friend or a random comment on our social media. Even worse, the chances are that we have experienced the shock of hearing that others were offended by our comments—despite the fact that we had no intention of hurting them.
While no one can deny that certain words and actions can be offensive, the taking of offense is more complicated than that. As research findings in linguistics demonstrate, people aren’t necessarily offended by rude language, and they get offended for a range of different reasons.
