Porky Pies
That's what a pork pie should look like.
“Honesty is the best policy,” my parents always said. But is it? What if it gets you into trouble or loses you the job you’re bidding on?
Ever since politics and business were invented, dishonesty has been a part of daily life. Advertisements lie, salespeople bend the truth, news broadcasts cover sound bites instead of full stories, presidents and prime ministers are evasive and vague: we accept it as a part of our civilised way of life. It comes as second nature to alter the facts – or at least interpret them in a fashion that is more useful for our goals.
Although I now work from home, I’ve always had a reputation for being honest in the workplace – to the point of being considered outspoken (or even blunt). For me, it’s always been best: it’s easier to remember what you’ve told someone if it was the truth, there’s fewer conflicting stories to retain and regardless of how things turn out, I know I’ve always been straight.
I’ve been lucky, because I’ve had managers who appreciated this trait (and one who even used it to her advantage in dealing with upper management). But I believe I’ve also been smart, because I’ve never put myself in a situation where I’ve said I can do something that I can’t. It works for me.
So, imagine a situation where you’re applying for a freelancing job and the employer asks something like this:
“Do you understand the science behind large hadron colliders and the possible consequences for humanity if CERN’s research actually produces a point singularity?”
Assuming you aren’t a world-class physicist with a complete and profound knowledge of particle accelerators, what do you do?
Do you tell the truth and possibly lose the job? Do you avoid the question? Do you research the basics quickly and try to make it up as you go along, but risk awful feedback and an unhappy client?
Go on, spill the beans.
Image from Daylesford Organic. Yum.
There are indeed some traits we share Spikester…at least I like to think I have some of those traits…I sleep well, and my heads empty a lot o’ the time…does that count?
It’s a toughy…no doubt about it. Here’s my take:
Dear Advertiser,
Have you considered the consequences for humanity of finding someone that meets these requirements and then publishing them?
Hugs & Kisses
FEMA
I’d then place an add for someone to do a story on the person that posted the original add.
Oh! You’ve already done the story…can you hire yourself…is that legal?
Cheers
Stephen G
Nice post, Spike. I prefer to tell the truth, so I can sleep straight in my bed. There may be holes in the sheets because I didn’t get the gig, but at least I sleep real straight. Thanks for popping over to our blog today; it was nice to see you there again. Best regards, P.
Let’s see if I remember this one right…
Here’s to lying, stealing, and cheating:
May you lie to save a friend.
May you steal your girl’s heart.
May you cheat death.
Most people think that they’re honest. But then they lie to themselves.
I used to be honest all the time. But I’ve aged somewhat and now know when to slip one in there. Last night, for instance, my wife writes her first short story. I told her it was a wonderful story and that I hoped she’d write 1,000 more like that. Sometimes there are consequences for honesty. So, no, I don’t believe honesty is always the best policy.
Stephen: Twisted. I love it!
Paul: Agreed. But I also agree with Steven that – sometimes – a little white lie is a better choice. You’d like an example? OK. “Does this make me look fat?”
Steven: What’s your wife’s email address? Not that I’d tell her, of course… just interested. Honest.
Agreed – sometimes the consequences are too dire to be completely, bluntly, 100% honest and a little porky is a better choice for continued survival!
G’day Spike,
Glad you liked it…but honestly, honesty is one of my pet hates…not because of what it is or isn’t, but as Steve suggests, because of how it’s used…or more accurately abused.
I’m always dubious of ‘yumans’ ( I could put a full stop there and be pretty honest ;-P ), that profess and/or claim to be ‘Honest’. To me this implies 100% consciousness ( http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/consciousness )…I don’t know of anyone or anything that is 100% conscious. Except for Paul went he’s got a grip on that blanket of his ;-P
And I’m with Paul in regard to sleeping well…that for me is the first and final analysis/benchmark/test of whether or not my honour remains intact (is that supposed to be one word? It’s in the dictionary, but it’s one of those little words just doesn’t feel right).
Can we survive whilst being as honest as we can be? Obviously not yet! But then if everyone was always honest, I reckon it would be almost as boring as being happy all the time. God! Can you imagine an honest hippy? Yuk! How boring!
You mentioned being “outspoken (or even blunt)”. One of my favourite sayings is by William Blake…he reckons that “A truth told with bad intent beats the worst lie one can invent”.
From this I interpret that what we do is not as powerful as why we do it. Intent! I reckon everything after that is special effects?
How do I know if my intent is good or not? Easy answer: Who cares! And never underestimate the power of denial. But, this works pretty well for wankas like me:
Intent is what I think I want. The outcome is what I really wanted.
Not easy, but like you’ve said somewhere else in here – “Life sucks…but that’s life.” 
Try not saying ‘Sorry’ for a month. Instead, say nothing or try find the truth of why you really wanted whatever just happened to happen. e.g. Geez! I really don’t know why I wanted to run over your cat. But I did, and I feel really:
- happy that the mangy thing is gone;
- powerful that I can take a life so easily;
- pissed off because now I have to wash my car;
- etc, etc
Oh Yes! Luckily this Planet is ‘Multiple Choice’ ey?
And here ends the sermon
Geez I can be a wanka can’t I?
Cheers
Stephen G
Whenever I see a documentary on prostitution, one of the interviewees invariably says something like: ‘Each time I go with a client, I lose a little piece of myself. A piece I’ll never get back. If I stay too long in this job, I’ll lose myself completely.’
I feel that lying is the same. Yes, we all have to do it sometimes. Yes, it puts bread on the table. But in lying, we trade a piece of our innocence and move further from the child we used to be.
Therefore, I reserve lying to extreme situations only. If an outfit doesn’t look good on my wife, I tell her. This hurts her (and sometimes me!). But when I say she looks good, she knows I’m not bullshitting. And my honest praise is worth more than a thousand flatteries.
@Paul
Nazi comes to my door, “Do you have any Jews in your house?”
Lying, I say, “No.”
I think my conscience would be fine with a lie like that. Lying is like any other skill: it has its place and it has nothing to do with what’s right or wrong. Contrarily, if I was honest and said, “Yes,” followed by the removal of a friend or even a stranger for the concentration camp? I think my conscience would be very upset with me. That’s what “Lying to save a friend” means.
Another interesting thing to think about: Truth is stranger than fiction. Sometimes it’s better to make up a simple lie than to tell a complex truth. People will sometimes believe the lie over the truth.
And lastly – most people can’t handle the truth. For example, I was trying to explain to a biology student that were more likely to come from pigs as primates. They say that human tastes like pork and that monkey has little flavour and is a red meat. Then there’s the fact that some folks are born with what looks like a pig’s tail, but no one is born with what looks like a monkey’s tail. She argued for awhile before realizing that I wouldn’t change my stance. Then there are the folks who believe in relativity. No matter how hard you try to point out to them that facts can lead to different conclusions, they still cling to their ‘truth.’
Truth: what is it? It’s a malarkey. Every time you think you’ve got it, it vanishes in your hands. Truth and honesty go hand-in-hand.
How are you? They ask. Fine. But the answer to that question is transient. Today you’re fine. Tomorrow someone dies and you’re sad. Then, you win the Loto – happy times again. All your friends demand their share of the pie – goodbye happy times.
I told my wife that her story was great because it made her happy even though I thought it wasn’t. I had no problem falling asleep. And I’m not going to make up some idea that ‘when I compliment her she’ll know I mean it,’ because, if I tell her my true feelings she’s less likely to continue with her efforts and she’s less likely to be pleased by them.
Stephen: My lady, the psychologist, could talk for hours (and frequently does) about the difference between what we want and what we think we want, the ways the conscious and subconscious compromise so that we can continue being slightly less insane and so on. It’s an interesting subject, especially since – as humans – there is no such thing as “normal” and everyone’s situation is individual.
Was it Socrates who said “Horses do not exist”? You know, the thing where they don’t exist because each one is individual: a horse exists, each horse exists, but a cover-all, non-individual generalisation of “horses” makes no sense. “People” is the same. We’re all unique. There can only be general rules and principles and there will always be exceptions. That’s why Law is such a pain in the posterior.
Paul: That’s a really interesting comparison (and one which, again, my lady would love to comment on…!) and I agree entirely. Lying definitely kills a little piece of us. It moves us one tiny pigeon-step further away from being a better person.
Steven: Agree entirely for the Nazi lie, of course. That’s the interesting situation of “good vs. evil” (as commonly defined) as well. I disagree with much of the rest of what you say there, though – not because I think you’re wrong, but because you’ve switched to talking about “truth” as opposed to “honesty”. They’re very different things.
Truth is truth; honesty is saying what you believe to be true. Very, very different.
And as for not telling your wife your true feelings… no, not going to go there. My lady would have a field day on that one, I’m sure! (And it’d probably make for a long-running romantic sit-com in the US, come to think of it.)
Hey Spike
Yep! Pretty sure it was Socrates…but I don’t think he was the first to make that observation?
The old ‘Blind men and the Elephant’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_men_and_an_elephant), thingy goes way back. It seems to have become the poster-child for Cognitive Psychology and now all of that is being poured into AI research (e.g. http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1223985), as we continued blindly (to coin the phrase), toward realising Mary Shelley’s warnings (http://bit.ly/WmJiA).
But definitely interesting stuff…I love anything that breaks brains…if I can break someones brain occasionally, I don’t feel so alone…you know what they say about misery love company? ;-P
I saw this little beauty the other day on TED. I reckon it ties in pretty well with this topic…Your ‘lady’ who until otherwise named, I will refer to as ‘The Unbeheld’ may find it worth a look to (if she hasn’t already seen it
– http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/dan_gilbert_asks_why_are_we_happy.html.
I don’t know how much longer I can keep coming back to this article mate…every time I do I get starving hungry and have to go and pretend I’m eating a nice big dead pig pie
Cheers
Stephen G
Geez! I just read my previous post…I’ll be lucky if the good ol’ Grammar Nazi doesn’t sentence me to a few months of deep-breathing exercises in a canary cage at the bottom of a coal mine
Apologies for the typos Spikester…I hope the blood-pressure doesn’t blow a gasket
Cheers
Stephen G