Today my editorial is about the subject of honesty. It seems to me that honesty is fairly subjective. As we grow up, we are taught that we should always be honest in all that we do. It is embedded into our heads at a ripe age to never ever tell a lie, no matter how small. We are never supposed to cheat in school, card games or board games, yet as we grow older we see that there are many gray areas where being truthful is concerned. Of course, we can identify the big ones, like not embezzling money from your company, or not cheating on a spouse. (Side note: Of course those examples are practically common place in today’s society. However, we can identify that it is wrong, even if a lot of people do things along those lines.)
The gray area seems to lie with every day things. For instance, almost every man knows that if his wife asks how she looks in an outfit, the answer should always be a positive one. It doesn’t matter if she bought a pair of pants that make her butt look huge, her husband is going to say she looks good to avoid getting clocked in the head for saying she’s fat, right?
I personally have tried to be unfailingly honest throughout my life, only to find that my candor (while appreciated by a handful of people) is taken if offense and that I need to keep my mouth closed to avoid someone getting hurt or being upset with me.
So how honest should we be in our lives? Anyone playing a political game, whether it be in politics or at work or even church, can tell you that little white lies are our friends. They help people to remain tactful and build up friendships and acquaintances. Any salesperson will say whatever they think a potential customer wants to hear, not minding that it’s true or false.
But if that salesperson was completely blunt with said potential client? They would never make any sales and wouldn’t be able to have a livelihood. On the flip side, potential clients will tell a salesperson almost any lie to get out of someone pressuring them to buy a product they simply do not need.
So while we preach that honesty is the best policy, we appear to sail through these small fabrications that make life flow smoother. I suppose a term for it could be called diplomacy. We have to tolerate some people who rub us the wrong way in many circumstances, we need to always say nice things to family members in order to maintain good relationships. So lying can actually be a good thing, just so long as you are using it in a diplomatic way. With that in mind, I still think I prefer being brutally honest in most cases. Simply because that is how I’d prefer others would talk to me. But I have discovered that frankness is best received with close friends and family who are used to my sometimes abrasive personality.
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