I grew up in rural Oklahoma, in the “buckle of the Bible Belt”, where anti-intellectualism ran rampant. I was radically honest then (not in the literal sense of “radical honesty”, but in the sense of what Alicorn seems to be advocating), and it didn’t make me very popular, being an atheist, a consequentialist, a transhumanist, and increasingly a libertarian. It didn’t make me very popular—but lying would have been much, much worse. Telling the truth merely made those people dislike me, but lying would have made me compromise my integrity.
“Those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.”
Which totally misses the point of the comment you’re responding to. This isn’t about whether we are radically honest. It’s about whether we insist on everyone we associate with also being radically honest as a condition of our association with them.
That’s a good point. I personally require people I associated with to be honest (except when their lives or livelihoods are at stake), as I hate being lied to. How people respond to this is up to them.
I grew up in rural Oklahoma, in the “buckle of the Bible Belt”, where anti-intellectualism ran rampant. I was radically honest then (not in the literal sense of “radical honesty”, but in the sense of what Alicorn seems to be advocating), and it didn’t make me very popular, being an atheist, a consequentialist, a transhumanist, and increasingly a libertarian. It didn’t make me very popular—but lying would have been much, much worse. Telling the truth merely made those people dislike me, but lying would have made me compromise my integrity.
“Those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.”
Which totally misses the point of the comment you’re responding to. This isn’t about whether we are radically honest. It’s about whether we insist on everyone we associate with also being radically honest as a condition of our association with them.
That’s a good point. I personally require people I associated with to be honest (except when their lives or livelihoods are at stake), as I hate being lied to. How people respond to this is up to them.