Truthiness
It’s something I’ve had on my mind a lot lately, honesty. I’m not “ranting” about this because of any particular incident, I’m simply trying to collect my thoughts on the subject here. Reading several different bits of literature on the subject over the day, I’ve come to agree with the first sentence and paragraph of the Wikipedia article (zomg, inorite?).
Specifically the following snippet of the article:
Honesty, at times, has the ability to cause misfortune to the person who displays it. Honesty can also mean fairness, and truthfulness, and the avoidance of misleading people.
This is, of course, without discrediting the preceding sentences. It’s hard to come across something on the internet that is profound and accurate, especially on a site that’s content is literally controlled by one person at a time (as far as each article is concerned, citation needed).
Let me point out that I’m not exactly a nice person, but I follow a very strict personal code of honesty. This means I don’t want to lie about anything, obviously, be it tiny or large. Since I consider omission of truth a lie I tend to speak my mind even when I really needn’t. I say what I feel or what I think if I feel I need to, and it doesn’t matter who that is to or what it’s about. That’s not to say I never lie, but the times I do are EXTREMELY rare and always for a good reason. But the point I’m trying to make is that being honest and truthful is one of the firmest tenets of who I am.
Honesty is something I value highly in others, too. It doesn’t matter what it’s about, if I’m lied to (through actions or words) I lose a very large deal of respect for a person. I don’t care if it’s about something trivial or important, a lie is a lie is a lie. If someone lies about something insignificant, would they really have a problem being dishonest when it matters? Nothing feels quite so disrespectful as being lied to, and that’s part of the reason I want to be completely honest myself: I don’t want to subject anyone else to that, intentional or not. If you don’t agree with me on something or if you don’t like the same things I do I promise I won’t care. A deeper discussion may come from differing viewpoints, but I promise that I’ll have more respect for you if you’re simply honest with me about it.
If you aren’t honest with others about yourself, especially how you feel, what are you? I believe a person’s worth can be (not solely) measured by how honest they are with others and themselves. I really could care less if you’re being dishonest due to insecurities, lack of material or some deeper compulsion. I couldn’t give two tugs about the reasons people lie, any reason you can come up with for a lie can easily be dismissed as a failure in some way. (Before you nitpickers dig into me about it, that applies to my few lies as well so shove off.) So really I measure how much you’re worth by how honest you are to me, and I hold myself to that same standard.
I’m seen as “not very fun” by some people, “too serious” by some and “mean” to others. I don’t really care. I live my life in relative solitude because the rampant dishonesty in people (among other disgusting, filthy things that people tend to do) really leaves me with no desire to communicate with the majority of the human race. I really feel that if everyone was simply as honest as they wanted people to be to them the world would be much more palatable. Screw that “ignorance is bliss” idea, blissful ignorance is ignorant.
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Comments
I would much rather have someone mad at me for telling them the truth, then for them to find out I built some awful story and lied to them for months.
Also, truthiness FTW!
I was brought up a “southern lady” in many respects of the word; and as such one is careful what they say to whom, and how, My mother called these little white lies, said to avoid hurting someone’s feelings (ie; “that dress is a most becoming color on you dear” or “of course you’re not too heavy!”).
I began to feel these “white lies” were not good for me. I felt bad saying them and wondered if I couldn’t say something truthful and nice as well. Baring that, just being tactfully truthful. It took practice but was doable and after a while, easy. Especially in my spirit . . . where I have to live with myself.
Harder was becoming tactfully truthful. Try telling someone that a joke is offensive to you when everyone else is laughing. Well it can be done with practice and once people know where you stand they become respectful of that.
So, go for it. Respect is worth it. Respecting ourselves, moreso.
Lies damage the liar and their relationship with whomever they’ve lied to.Be it a parent, boss, spouse, etc..
People usually lie to “stay out of trouble”. If someone is doing this, they aren’t assuming responsibility for their actions. I have seen this habit stay with a person into adulthood with little chance of having true friends, rather, most people try to stay away from them (”you can never believe a thing he says” is usually whispered behind their back).
The opportunity for personal growth is lost and the person never fully matures when they incorporate lying into their personality.
It’s funny, I don’t mean in the humorous sense, more like the sad and pathetic one. Whenever someone is just honest and blunt about what they think and feel, they’re deemed ‘mean,’ ‘too serious’ or ‘not fun.’
To me lying is something that causes physical anguish. When I lie it actually makes me feel nauseous, unless I’m ‘lying’ to have fun and ‘act’ out some skit or something I’m doing with friends while walking around.
Anyone that tries to rationalize a lie is just making excuses, and excuses are just lies in my opinion. Let’s lie about lying then. heh.
I do also like the fact that truly honest people tend to congregate; it makes it much easier to be a person that likes to tell the truth.