
Radical Honesty: I Think You’re Fat (2007) - wallflower
http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a26792/honesty0707/
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Bartweiss
It's an interesting idea and an interesting story, but I'm frustrated by what
the personal narrative approach does to it. And I'm frustrated that the author
didn't take a class or otherwise push Blanton on some deeper questions than
"did I do good?"

The standard social norm is "people think some amount, and say less than
that". What's being changed is "say less", but an audience that doesn't know
that might expect "think more". The comment to the nanny isn't just weird
because it's inappropriate, it's unnerving because it raises the question of
"if he's willing to say that, what must he be _thinking_?"

So the consequences seem very different between people who are prepped to
expect radical honesty, and people who don't. The second group has far more
reason to be disturbed than thin-skinned-ness - they think they're talking to
someone who's operating way outside normal limits. I'd like to hear Blanton's
take on that, though it might well be "screw em".

And, of course, I sort of get the sense that the author was an asshole about
the whole thing. Radical honesty is radical, but honesty when things
inconvenience you is just "being a jerk". And we get... honesty about sexual
urges, honesty about wanting to flake on stories and events, honesty about
anger at an editor. There's very little that's confessional here, and quite a
lot that's demanding.

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acconrad
Radical honesty doesn't have to mean blurting out everything you are thinking.
I can tell you the truth without having to explain every way I rationalize how
I would process that sentence to you.

For example, if someone asks you "do you like this watch?" and you don't, it's
just as truthful to say "no" as it is to say "no because that brand is tacky
and it looks out of character for you." Now, if they continue to probe and ask
"why," you can answer honestly. But if a simple "no" would suffice for the
other party, I don't see how the additional information helps either party.

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michaelt
Doesn't that lead to a pretty big loophole that allows lies of omission?

After all, you could just as easily answer "do you like this watch?" with "I
like the way its blue colour matches your eyes" or some other true, positive
statement that doesn't answer the question as stated.

~~~
tpeo
In my opinion, an omission would only constitute a lie if, and only if, the
information omitted cannot be safely ignored as irrelevant. Because otherwise
the answerer would be omitting information which he personally considers
important.

Whenever a person is asked a question, they have at least some idea of both
what's relevant to the inquirer (i.e. what's being asked, implicitly or not)
as well as what they personally consider relevant (i.e. all that information
which might relate to the question). And some thoughts can be safely omitted
if they're uninformative.

For instance, it might occur to me when asked about the watch that it looks
shitty and tacky. But that thought might occur to me less like an actual
opinion and more like an intrusive thought. So it can be safely ignored as
completely uninformative to the inquirer, because whatever value it could have
to the inquirer later on would be only due to a "broken clock" effect. Because
I'd be talking out of my ass.

Now, if there's a loophole, it's only as big as people make it out to be.
Because the real difference between honest and dishonest people would remain.
And that is, that the former are willing to express their own opinions when
asked to do so, whereas the latter would attempt to manipulate their answers,
either by omitting information they personally consider relevant or, as you
suggest, by attempting to misdirect the inquirer by adding information which
they know is irrelevant, but which doesn't appear as such the inquirer.

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ajmarsh
So a guy named Blanton drinks Maker's Mark? That's messed up.

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apozem
As someone who is socially awkward and struggles with the nuances of
interpersonal communication, this has a certain appeal. I don't know if I
could go whole hog the way the coach in the story does, but removing some of
the annoying everyday white lies sounds nice.

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hopscotch
Sam Harris wrote a good short book on this topic:

[https://www.samharris.org/lying](https://www.samharris.org/lying)

~~~
m0llusk
This book changed my thinking about lying. One interesting hypothetical raised
here is what to do or say when Nazis come to your door asking about the Jews
hiding in the attic. To tell the whole truth without omission in such a
situation has serious ethical implications.

~~~
hopscotch
Ronald A. Howard has quite an interesting take on this situation in a
conversation with Harris in the appendix. They both talk about lying as self-
defence:

> ... The next level is stealing: Needless to say, if I could steal a weapon
> from someone who was about to kill me, that would be fine. And if I couldn’t
> transform the situation as some more enlightened person might—into a real
> circumstance of teaching—then I would lie. I would use the minimum
> distortion necessary to get the problem to go away.

> At one end of the spectrum, you can be super-optimistic about people. But
> let’s face it, there are people who are up to no good in all kinds of ways.
> I’m not going to abet them in violating other people’s right to be left
> alone, and I’ll do whatever is necessary to avoid that.

