I have the somewhat questionable privilege to be (to the best of my knowledge) the only (living) person with the name “Pascal Finette”. Which is pretty awesome on one hand (I can guarantee you that I dominate the first page of Google search results when you search for my name) and it’s quite terrifying at the same time: In an age where everything you say, write, record is digital and thus indexed — there is essentially nothing I can hide in a sea of “Joe Doe” sameness. Everything is directly attributable to one person — me.
This taught me an important lesson: Always stand for what you say. This doesn’t mean that I don’t say dumb things. Or contradict myself. Or don’t swear (hell no!). It means though that I will always stand for my word. Regardless how dumb it was or how wrong I am with hindsight.
And this is what you should do too. Stand for what you say and people will respect you. They might not like you — but they will respect you for having an opinion and a backbone.