What is honesty?
On the surface, honesty is a fairly simple thing: the accurate reprentation of the way the world is, at least from your perspective. This is easy enough to comprehend when you’re stating a fact: “the sky is blue” is either true or fal; honesty means saying the true thing. It’s slightly less clear when talking about opinions: “the Baba Ganoush is tasty” is not true or fal in any absolute n – it is only true in relation to the taste of the person reporting on it. In this ca, honesty means declaring your actual opinion – even though to another person, it might be wrong.
法律解释方法But beyond the dictionary n of what the word itlf means, there’s the way that being honest acts in the world. Honesty isn’t just a word, it’s a characteristic of an act, behavior, or personality. It’s the difference, for example, between an “honest living” and a dishonest one – the criminal might not tell a single lie in the cour of his or her day, but we wouldn’t necessarily call him or her “honest”.
As a way of being and doing in the world, honesty is about trust – it’s about convincing othe
春乏秋困rs that we are to be trusted, and it’s about trusting others to be able to deal with the truth as we report it. Consider some of the situations that might lead us to be dishonest:
* We want something from someone, and have nothing to offer in return.
* We are afraid we’ll be punished for something.
* We are afraid we’ll hurt someone’s feelings.
* We don’t want someone to think badly of us.
怀孕能吃雪糕吗* We don’t want someone to do better than us.
锅盔* We are protecting someone.
* We are protecting ourlves.
* We are protecting other people’s image of ourlves.鲜猪肉
* We are protecting our own image of ourlves.
处女座和天秤座光明正大* We dislike someone.
The are all purpoly vague, and possibly overlapping depending on particular situations. The point isn’t to catalogue every possible reason for lying, but to demonstrate that most often, dishonesty is provoked by fear and danger.
莹莹Thus, the salesperson lies becau he is afraid of losing a sale. The significant other lies becau she is afraid of hurting his or her partner’s feelings (and thus possibly losing the partner himlf). The employee lies becau she is afraid of getting fired, or of getting arrested. The spou lies becau he is afraid of breaking up his marriage. The student lies becau she is afraid of failing a class. The criminal lies becau he is afraid of being arrested, or of calling down revenge on himlf. The doctor lies becau she is afraid the patient will sue her (and she could possibly lo her licen). The politician lies becau he dislikes everyone – and becau he is afraid of losing the next election.
Think of all the times you might have been dishonest, even just a little, even just by telling a little white lie? What were you afraid of?
How does it feel to live in fear? How does it feel to give in to it?
