Old but Gold

In a society that confuses (sometimes on purpose) criticism with insults and insults with criticism there will be inevitable break downs in communication.

Disagree. Situation: Senior exec offers intern feedback on deliverable. Intern uses social nicety to make feedback stop. Exec cannot change that intern is beeeg hotshot in own mind, so remains quiet. Either intern will succeed or intern will fail, but can’t spoon feed a closed mouth.