I’m Just Sayin’

"He's cute and all, I'm just surprised you actually went out with him… I'm just sayin'."

"Could you stand that band last night? I know they're your friends… I mean… I'm just sayin'."

Somehow, this phrase is making powerful inroads in many contemporary American (at least Midwestern) conversations. This phrase could be terribly old, but I feel that it has increased in usage over the last few years and I hope to understand why. A handful of weeks ago as I was listening to NPR (don't remember which show or host), I heard a brief, yet brilliant exposition about these three words. To play all my cards at once, I, like the host of the radio show, don't enjoy the way these words are usually employed, and here's why. As in the examples above, when we say "I'm just sayin'" it is to take an objective stance on something very subjective. They are generally used when one is being critical; critical of another person's dress, a person's opinion, etc. We can be critical, but as long as we qualify our criticism with "I'm just sayin'" we should not be held responsible. This gives us freedom to express our opinion without ramifications. We could be potentially offensive without having to worry about damaging any relationship. It somehow distances ourselves from the words just spoken, as if they do not belong to us.

That is more, when one employs this phrase they are giving their words an ontological existence apart from themselves. We treat our words as if they did not come from our lips. Some critical phrase just happened to be produced ex nihilo for which we should not be held responsible. I find this problematic because if it is possible to say something yet not be held responsible for it, could this same principle be held for things less critical, even complimentary. "You look really nice tonight! …I'm just sayin'." (Which might happen when one is accidentally vulnerable and attempts to cover that vulnerability.) "I love you, I'm just sayin'." In this case, the "just sayin'" wall we are trying to hide behind actually has potential to harm. That which could have been used for good is now employed for harm.

As I study people like Michael Polanyi (check him out!), I am realizing that the objective and subjective walls are coming down and what is more important in our 'knowing' (epistemology) is the distinction between personal and impersonal. For example, I have a personal relationship with my chair, I 'know' my chair, but my chair does not have a personal relationship with me, it does not 'know' me. All 'knowing' must be personal. (No two impersonal objects have 'knowledge' of one another. Even though my desk and the floor may have a relationship, they do not 'know' one another.) So, I am subjective, the chair is objective. When talking to another person, however, both parties are personal, and therefore subjective. Both parties interact and react in ways that do not happen when one party is objective. While I sit in my chair, my actions manipulate the chair's reactions. When I dialogue with my fiancé, I do not determine her reactions, but am often surprised.

So when we say "I'm just sayin'," we understand that the other party we are in relationship with is personal, yet try to speak as if we are objective members of the relationship, which is impossible as personal beings.

As we move from modernity to post-modernity, perhaps we are not yet ready to throw out the objective dimension (that which modernity held with a death grip) of relationships and 'knowing,' therefore, while acknowledging the other member as personal, we are left with no other option than to make ourselves the objective party. We do so by saying, "I'm just sayin'." Or, perhaps we just find this to be a more polite, and incredibly less imaginative, way of expressing an opinion that has potential to offend; therefore we hide behind these three words. Maybe it is some combination of these… I'm just sayin'.

 

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