Is skepticism itself offensive?

I think it is offensive to be called a liar or a fool - one of which must be the case if the other person doesn't take you at your word.

But neither can we just blanketly accept everything we're told by people either. It's not an easy thing, imo.

When someone who knows me well, (and only in that case), challenges something I've said, my first question to them usually is, do you think I'm lying to you or do you think I don't know what I'm talking about? In other words, as you go to disagree with me, how do you account for the apparent fact that I believe what I am saying? That's no small challenge for people who know me well. Based on their usual response, I think the technical term for that is "prick".

If you value your idea so much that even a hint of losing it becomes grief, so you go on the offense. I don't think you can ever fully trust someone's depiction of an event. I have heard a hoard of stories, and I would guess that the conveyed details were not always what exactly what happened. Every one should know that their ideas, values, and stories....can be doubted, so I would think few actually get offended by doubt.

course not, but it can be if you are also judgemental (which a lot of these 'hard atheists/skeptics nowadays are)

the natural reaction is to go learn about it, the judgement are from the people who are too lazy (or dumb) todo that

Scepticism is the most important skill/trait of a philosophy. Understanding and empathy is the most important skill/trait of a psychologist

Egotists get offended that you don't take their word for it. But everyone must discover things for themselves. I don't give advice in RL.