Anecdotally, I’ve had friends who explicitly asked for an honest answer to these kinds of questions, and if given a positive answer would tell me “but you’d tell me if it was negative, right?”… and still, when given a negative answer, would absolutely take it as a personal attack and get angry.
Obviously those friendships were hard to maintain.
Often when people say they want an honest answer, what they mean is “I want you to say something positive and also mean it”, they’re not asking for something actionable.
Anecdotally, I’ve had friends who explicitly asked for an honest answer to these kinds of questions, and if given a positive answer would tell me “but you’d tell me if it was negative, right?”… and still, when given a negative answer, would absolutely take it as a personal attack and get angry.
Obviously those friendships were hard to maintain.
Often when people say they want an honest answer, what they mean is “I want you to say something positive and also mean it”, they’re not asking for something actionable.