Hello shoppers, once again I'm here to deal with an oft thought through and rather done topic, but hey, give me a break. I'm new at this whole thinking thing. But seriously, recently I've been a pondering and I've realised, sadly, that honesty is not practicable in today's society. This leads on almost directly from my last post, because just as it's impossible to completely shun social trends (The whole "No-Man-Is-An Island" thing, you know), it's also impossible to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
I mean, when you stop telling white lies, you get slapped. When I was in one of my more adventurous and curious moods (Possibly with my stomach plastered in a layer of chardonnay and bourbon) I decided to stop telling people what they wanted to hear. This, my friends, was quite difficult, because I'm a natural born "agree-er". Even if what you say is completely against my morals, rubbing against every grain of self-respect I hold, I'll probably say one phrase which every social survivalist lives by: "yeah man." Why do we say this!? Seriously, it would be so much easier if we just told a self-serving creep to shove a lemon up his bottom to sweeten his bullshit, and if we did so there would invariably be LESS assholes in the world today because they didn't get away with it. However, humanity lives on sociability, which lives on the concept of the "white lie". When you stop dispensing the white lies and bring in "The Honesty Policy", things get ugly. One night I said everything I thought. For instance: a man was wearing a "God Loves Everyone" badge, and against my better judgment, I made a comment. All I said was, "Well...not really, otherwise, you know, hell wouldn't exist or at least no-one would be down there." Bad plan. VERY bad plan.
But why is this bad? I was being honest, I didn't say anything hurtful or personal, I was just pointing out a flaw I saw in the badge. However, other people view this as an attack because that kind of blunt honesty is not really used except by the pariahs of the community. Everything holds a lie in society now, or at the very least an untruth. When you return faulty equipment to a store, they say "We're so sorry" and "Thank you for bring this to our attention" when really all they want is their paycheck and to get out of there, and probably to scowl at you when you're not looking. When you get a bag of assorted fast food and they say "Enjoy your meal" they honestly couldn't care less. When you ask your friend what they think of that shirt and they say "...Yeah it's kinda cool, but this would be better " they're just avoiding saying "Man that's shit, go for other stuff...now!"
Niceties in culture today are reaching extremities I feel, because, even when we know someone is being insincere in their apologies, greetings, advice, thanking and wishes we still view it on a similar level to those who are sincere. IT MAKES NO SENSE. Someone who honestly wishes that you have a good day and one who says they wish you a good day but actually wants to see your eyes extracted via corkscrews and your testes removed on hooks should NOT be viewed on equal level. It's honestly (hehe) just a tad wrong!
So, to end another short burst of consciousness with no real substance nor structured thoughts, I'll end with a slogan for you: "Tell the Truth on an Occasional Basis when you think it will end in a Funny or Deciding Nature".
Thanks, This has been Shady.
I quite enjoyed this but I do have one complaint. I honestly (hehe see I can do it too) think that this could have been much longer. I would have loved to read more about your thoughts on honesty. Perhaps I will think of another idea on the subject and my next post will be a counter post to your post. POST (just thought I should say it one more time).
ReplyDeleteWow, this is great. I completely agree, people base their interactions on sociability, you can't just be frank about everything. But honesty is so repressed that people are really failing to notice some very obvious flaws. I mean, this' getting to the stage where we just brutally alienate ourselves from other people's plights. It's not assisted by the fact people find it easier to ignore the fact that in purchasing some goods you're fuelling some mega company's annihilation of small countries or resources, that sort of thing. We definitely need to hear the truth more often, but not all the time
ReplyDeletecrucible I'm glad you think so! Yeah, well peoples aversion to the truth is buried in layers of guilt, more often than not commercial guilt...wonderful stuff really :P
ReplyDelete@renji...i was working on one hours sleep when i did this. i might have a good 'ol fashioned hate rant later :D