Is Honesty Becoming Passé?
“The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.”—Flannery O’Connor
“Honesty is such a lonely word," Billy Joel wrote in 1978. Has it always been that way? Or was there a time when honesty was held in higher regard? When I was young I heard the stories of “Honest Abe” and was inspired by the fable of George Washington chopping down the cherry tree in which he supposedly told his father, “I cannot tell a lie.”
It’s a nice story, but our respect for truth should be more than fable.
When I was young I had trouble telling lies. Not because I didn’t want to; I was simply a bad liar. When confronted with an accusation that I didn’t want to admit, I lowered my eyes and began to stutter. Even now I have trouble fibbing with a straight face. Poker opponents love me.
But straight face or not, I have lied. I have knowingly and sometimes unknowingly repeated the lies of others. I have suppressed and ignored the truth. But even when I’ve gotten away with these actions or tried to justify them by claiming either necessity or ignorance, I’ve learned that one dishonest act tends to breed another, and it’s a sure and slippery slope from deliberate dishonesty, to rationalizing it, then to habitually and unrepentantly being indifferent to the truth.
Nowhere is that more prevalent than in the political arena. Politicians have learned that power is often more advantageous than truth, and if telling their colleagues and constituents whatever they want to hear helps them retain their power, then what’s wrong with a little “spin” to keep them in office? We may decry their methods, but then we vote for them because ironically, their dishonesty often helps our cause.
One might anticipate that the more out in the open the dishonesty is, the less it would be tolerated, but the opposite has proven true. It seems the more overt and flagrant the untruths, the more acceptable they become to some of us. That’s because as humans we grow accustomed to something that is repeated over and over, especially from those who espouse what we hope is true, or what others on “our side” say is true, or what our myopic experience makes us think is true. Unfortunately that opens us up to trusting in a message that is overly broad-brushed and simplified, one in which nuance is ignored. And if we can’t stomach what one news source tells us, it’s easy to find another that feeds us a dish more to our liking and thus reinforces our biases. Often the smug feeling of “knowing something others don’t” kicks in, adding the vanity of false expertise to the trap of untruth. That lures us into not only believing the lie, but proudly sharing our “discovery” with like-minded friends, until it is echoed back so often that we are astonished when those outside our bubble can’t accept it too. This echo chamber has been a barrier to truth-seeking for years, and its recent employment by extremists to its full extent has reaped violent and destructive results.
That grieves me even more than secretive deceit. It means that not only those on the fringe, but also smart, otherwise respectable persons of any ideological stripe can be either completely unaware or completely uncaring about what might be true. It means that otherwise good and friendly people, the kind we like to hang around with, can unconsciously yet unflinchingly define "right" as what satisfies their own cravings or what they can get away with or what will make them look good, feel good, or help elect their candidate. They are like the fabled little boy who shoots his arrow into a tree and then draws the target around it so the point is in the bullseye. They start with a premise and then search for evidence to support it, dismissing any other evidence that doesn’t conform to their position. And what bothers me most is the certainty that when such mindsets and methods are presented as the norm, they are subtly but assuredly passed on to other friends, to family, and then to future generations.
Am I making too big a deal out of this? I hope so. But I can't wipe the Orwellian connotations from my mind, because I can see how easily and imperceptibly "doublethink" has seeped into our culture. We’re okay with honesty as an ideal, until suppressing the truth can get us a better deal. Right now we may tend to think of dishonesty as something “those other people” do; that it certainly could not be part of our own personalities. That’s one of the chief characteristics of dishonesty; it usually denies its own existence. That enables it to surreptitiously slink into our everyday habits, and as it does, what's to prevent honesty, in another few decades or sooner, from becoming meaningless? Has that already happened? Is there any truth that is still self-evident? If we don't want honesty to disappear from our list of virtues, from our expectations and goals, what are we going to do about it? I'm asking my readers, and I'm asking myself.
Is it possible that, like me, those who are reading this also feel the increasing tug toward deception? Or has it become so habitual that we’re completely blind to it? For example, how often do we share information without even thinking to check its veracity? How quick are we to negatively judge a person or event because of a single twenty-second video clip or casual comment that might be out of context? Do we even care what facts might be omitted or bent? Have we stopped to consider when we encounter the phrase “You won’t see this reported anywhere else” that there may be a good reason for that? Are we among that growing number of meme-sharing pawns who think, “If it makes my side look good (or the other side look bad), what does it matter if it’s a little exaggerated?” Are we prone to deflecting blame for something that is at least partially our fault? Have we tried to justify something “our side” has done, yet we would never put up with it from the “other side?” Do we believe “our side” has the monopoly on truth simply because we doubt something the “other side” has said? And honestly, do we actually come any closer to truth by identifying with any “side?”
I confess. I am guilty of some of these offenses. What’s worse, I’m guilty of thinking it doesn’t really matter. But I have also been wronged by those guilty of the same. Most of us have. So we know it does matter. A lot. That’s why we need to seek truth, even if what we find is uncomfortable, or lays fault at our feet, or reflects negatively on our party, our candidate, or our beliefs.
Simply pointing fingers and blaming others for misinformation denies the depth of the problem. We need to also look in the mirror. We need to ask ourselves if we are truly willing to give to others what we ourselves desire. Are we brave enough to ask, “If I can’t tolerate dishonesty in others, why should I tolerate it in me?” Again, I’m asking myself as much as anyone else.
I applaud those who have apparently asked and answered that question, humbly eating words and making public apologies. I commend the decisions of some of my friends who, sincerely searching for what is good and right and true, have altered some of their attitudes and habits. Like them, I have altered some of my own, recognizing that truth exists apart from our desires, experience, opinions and wavering loyalties. To find truth requires much more time and effort than many people are willing to devote, and even more, it requires discernment, empathy and the humility to admit we aren’t always right. But isn’t it worth it? I believe that with those attributes at work, we will find truth when we seek it, but only when we seek the entire truth, not selectively for the sake of defending our dogmas or feeding our fears.
Billy Joel's song goes on: “Honesty is such a lonely word / Everyone is so untrue / Honesty is hardly ever heard / But mostly what I need from you.”
I would like to believe that honesty and truth will still be heard more often than what Joel implies, not only because it’s the right thing to do, but because, as he states so clearly, it's mostly what we need from one another.
© Nick Walker 2021
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