Honesty...the Best Policy?

by onacruse 28 Replies latest jw friends

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  onacruse

  "No such thing as a man willing to be honest---that would be like a blind man willing to see."
  F. Scott Fitzgerald

  I very strongly tend to be totally open and honest about how I feel and what I think. No hiding. Heart on sleeve. WYSIWYG.

  Got me into trouble with the WTS more than once, and quite frankly, I don't regret it. My brother has several times said "Craig, you just don't know when to keep your mouth shut."

  imho, I'd rather run the risks of such honesty, as compared to the diminishment of my soul by doing otherwise.

  What do you think?

  Craig
• 

  DakotaRed

  Total and complete honesty, I don't think anyone actually practices that. But, I do tend to call a spade a spade.

  Lew W
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  searcher

  I agree, being honest is the only way to go.

  Just ask yourself "How do I feel when I find out that a person is not being honest with me ?"

  I, for one, will not make a person feel that way, and I will not conpromise my good name by being dishonest.

  If I think myanswer may be hurtful in some way, I decline to answer unless 'pushed' then the onus is on the other person to take my answer as it stands.

  Now ya got me being serious Craig...........are you out to blast my rep. ??????

  searcher.
• 

  Satanus

  For myself, i work at being totally honest. However, i see some well meaning, kind hearted persons, who have helped out numerous people when they were really down and out. Some of these people use lies or misdirection as a policy to protect themselves or others. Maybe that's a trait of the irish. Anyway, i don't know if one should condemn those lies.

  SS
• 

  onacruse

  Lew: "a spade is a spade" is good enough for me, as long as I know I'm being dealt from a full deck.

  searcher: "How do I feel when I find out that a person is not being honest with me ?"

  "Nothing astonishes men so much as common sense and plain dealing."
  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Craig (of the quoting mood tonight class)
• 

  Farkel

  : very strongly tend to be totally open and honest about how I feel and what I think. No hiding. Heart on sleeve. WYSIWYG.

  Then shut up, you big dipfuck. Lie! Most people don't care about the truth, so LIE!

  This is all Bible-Based(tm).

  Farkel
• 

  onacruse

  SaintSatan: That reminds me of the couple years I was in AA. If we thought (suspected) that someone else might also be a member, we'd ask "Are you a friend of Bill?" A selective deception that served a purpose. Your point well taken.

  Farkel: "Most people don't care about the truth, so LIE!"

  So true, so sadly true. Nevertheless:

  "It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and to see ships tost upon the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below: but no pleasure is comparable to standing upon the vantage ground of truth . . . and to see the errors, and wanderings, and mists, and tempests, in the vale below."
  Francis Bacon

  Craig
• 

  UnDisfellowshipped

  I try my very best to always be completely honest. I haven't always done this real good.

  I think TRUTH is one of the most important things there is, along with LOVE and JUSTICE.
• 

  onacruse

  UnDisfellowshipped: The way you juxtaposed "truth" and "honest" made me stop and think.

  Hayakawa comments that "the Old English and Latin words for true, are close synonyms that mean habitually telling or disposed to tell the truth...honest means not given to lying..." (emph added)

  So, then, perhaps a person can be honest, but not compulsively a truthsayer?

  Craig
• 

  UnDisfellowshipped

  Interesting, OnACruse,

  I don't mean you have to be brutally honest.

  Here's what the Webster Dictionary says about what Truth means:

  1a: archaic: FIDELITY, CONSTANCY

  1b: sincerity in action, character, and utterance

  2a (1): the state of being the case: FACT

  2a (2): the body of real things, events, and facts: ACTUALITY

  2a (3): often capitalized: a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality

  2b: a judgment, proposition, or idea that is true or accepted as true

  2c: the body of true statements and propositions

  3a: the property (as of a statement) of being in accord with fact or reality

  3b: chiefly British: TRUE

  3c: fidelity to an original or to a standard

  And this is what "Honest" means:

  1a: free from fraud or deception: LEGITIMATE, TRUTHFUL

  1b: GENUINE, REAL

  1c: HUMBLE, PLAIN

  2a: REPUTABLE, RESPECTABLE

  2b: chiefly British: GOOD, WORTHY

  3: CREDITABLE, PRAISEWORTHY

  4a: marked by integrity

  4b: marked by free, forthright, and sincere expression: FRANK

  4c: INNOCENT, SIMPLE

  Synonym: see UPRIGHT

  That's what I meant when I said "TRUTH".