THE DEATH OF HONESTY?

The cardinal virtue of my upbringing was honesty. In school, we were taught about George Washington's childhood vandalism of a cherry tree. We were taught about Honest Abe (Lincoln). The bottom line: Honesty is the best policy. And punishment was distributed proportionately. If you were honest about doing something that was wrong or damaging to property or people, the punishment was much less severe than it would be if you lied.

It wasn't easy as a young boy who knew he was different. But my father trusted my honesty when I explained that I really disliked team sports and locker rooms. Later, after I had led a double life for several years as a sexually active homosexual, part of my father's violent rage at me, when I finally came out, was based in his hatred for my dishonesty in concealing my sexuality. 

My friends unanimously rejected me when I came out as gay after graduation from our Catholic university. Every one of them used the excuse that they felt betrayed by my dishonesty in not telling them sooner. And that stung me as much as the realization that they were homophobic as well.

Coming out as a gay man at 20 was a return to the habit of honesty that I had been taught in my earlier life. It was such a great relief. I felt integrated after several years of living compartmentalized lives. My family and friends had all rejected me, but I felt truly free and at peace with myself. 

The power of that freedom and personal integrity helped me overcome my fears of loneliness and poverty. I had to rebuild my goals and pathways to them from scratch. Somehow it was so much easier without bearing the burden of the expectations of others. 

That was fifty years ago. 

Today I am surrounded by a world where honest people have been replaced by sellable profiles. The virtual social world is far removed from the honesty of the neighborhood gay bar of my youth, where the older gay man or blunt lesbian would help me keep a check on my vanity in an instant. They were real people with real opinions on the real me in front of them which they did not hesitate to offer. I loved it and flourished in that culture, not as a star, but as a happy participant. 

Now gay men select sexual partners from the equivalent of miniature billboards on phone screens. It boggles my mind. Going home with someone after a real conversation in a real bar was tricky enough. Meeting the real person after seeing a fabricated projection of them as they stand at your doorway must be a leap. 

Perhaps that explains the appetite for gay marriage. The boredom of monogamy may seem preferable to the repeated terror of meeting the actual people behind smartphone profiles, built on insecurity, superficiality and fabrication.

We are all inundated currently by insincerity and manipulation by major media, our politicians and activists, as they ply the deceit of digital media to their advantage. Trump's refusal to take responsibility for losing reelection by being personally obnoxious and a bad tactician in 2020. Biden as Unifier. Pelosi as Benign Granny of the Nation. AOC as Self-Appointed National Conscience. Black Lives Matter as anti-racist activism. Antifa as defending us against something impossibly worse than they themselves. Epidemiologists and plastic surgeons as incorruptible scientists. 

Honesty as a standard of personal ethics is never easy. Unsolicited candor is not a good habit in all interpersonal relationships. In fact, some people who are dishonest about themselves use unsolicited candor in criticizing others as a powerful weapon. Honesty, as I see it, simply means being genuine and vulnerable when engaging with other human beings who are not aggressive or hostile. 

The world of streaming videos has allowed many young people to envision themselves as celebrities. I speculate that those who are most committed to this form of self-presentation have a need to feel accepted and valued that compensates for a lack of positive attention in their actual lives. Nothing wrong with that. However, if everyone tries to meet their emotional needs by acting in front of a digital camera, we will no longer live in a mutually satisfactory interactive society in reality. 

Living dishonestly is a form of depersonalizing oneself. The loss of the real person behind the deceit is inevitable. A thorough examination of the actual personal lives of many professional actors and politicians would tend to support that hypothesis. When a huge swath of society indulges in dishonesty on a personal level, the loss of Shared Truths is inevitable. Unity and cooperation become impossible. Fragmentation and narcissism become dominant. 

Personal honesty begins with an acceptance of oneself as a whole person: That person each of us speaks to when we are naked and alone in front of the bathroom mirror. Bringing that self into the world takes courage. However, the responses to that self are the world's greatest lessons for personal growth.