Is honesty subjective?

We hear people often using the phrases "honestly, I believed it was true," or "honestly, I did not think it would hurt anyone," and things like that. Does it mean that honesty is subjective? Does it also mean that just because we honestly think something is okay we are not subject to harsh criticisms that may follow our actions following that honest perception? These are interesting questions to ponder, especially in the current age of social media where almost everyone is either expressing their opinion or getting influenced by someone's opinion.

The concept of honesty is often perceived as a fundamental principle that transcends individual beliefs and cultural norms. It seems that honesty is objective and can be verified or evaluated based on independent criteria. However, upon closer examination, one finds that honesty can be subjective, and influenced by various factors such as personal values, social and cultural norms, and situational contexts. At its core, honesty entails truthfulness, sincerity, and transparency in communication and actions. It involves adhering to verified facts and expressing oneself in a genuine and straightforward manner. While these principles may seem universal and straightforward, the interpretations and applications are not that simple, and they vary from one person to another. While truthfulness is easy, people can believe in wrong things and still claim to be honest, and there is a difference between honesty and accuracy. Whereas truthfulness is easy, sincerity and transparency are two aspects that require some work. Whenever we say or do something based on the information received without verifying that information or fact-checking with independent sources, we are not being completely honest. Just believing something to be true without verifying it and not disclosing the source of it does not make our actions honest as we are not being sincere and transparent. Sincerity is not just a mental state, it also requires some actions on our part, we must critically evaluate and verify all information on which we base our actions. Without sincerity and transparency, every rumor and conspiracy theory spreader will claim that they are being honest.

One reason for the subjectivity of honesty lies in the diversity of human experiences and perspectives. Each one of us carries a unique set of values, beliefs, and life experiences that shape our understanding. They shape our understanding of truth and falsehood. Diversity of human experiences creates a diversity of opinions, which is a healthy sign of any progressive society, at the same time, it also creates situations where what one person considers honest may not necessarily align with another's perspective, leading to differences in interpretation. Similarly, what may be considered acceptable or truthful in one culture or community may be viewed differently in another. Believing in wrong things stems from various factors such as misinformation, personal biases, cognitive distortions, or incomplete understanding of complex issues. However, in today's internet era, most of us who consume and share information have access to resources to verify and fact check, therefore, we are not being honest when we share blatantly false information and claim to be honestly believing it to be true.  

Honesty should reflect our integrity and sincerity in communication, it should reflect our commitment to be genuine and transparent in our communications. Yes, it cannot guarantee factual correctness, but it cannot be an excuse for sloppiness or a method to create alternate facts. In the end, despite the subjectivity surrounding honesty, it still remains a foundational principle in fostering trust, integrity, and meaningful relationships. While interpretations of honesty may vary, the underlying intention to uphold truthfulness, sincerity, and transparency is paramount. Recognizing the subjectivity in honesty allows for a deeper understanding of its complexities, it helps us to be empathetic and kind to each other. Striving to be honest, even in the face of conflicting perspectives or challenging circumstances, can ultimately lead to a greater understanding, respect, and authenticity in our actions with others.  

Thank you for reading and please share your views on this topic.

© Vinay Thakur, All rights reserved, Vinay can be reached at thevinay2022@gmail.com 

Seven years!

Today is the seventh anniversary of the blog. Seven amazing years of learning and sharing through this unique platform. The journey so far has been really rewarding for me and I value a lot what I learned in this process. Like any journey, there are ups and downs in this journey also, some mistakes are made, and many lessons are learned. There is no doubt that this is helping me to become a better human being and I thank all readers for their help in making this possible, especially the ones who share their views in the comments section, via emails, or on other social media platforms. 

The frequency of posts has reduced, but that's a natural consequence of many other things going on side by side. I don't intend to increase the frequency of posts but do plan to continue to write once in a while as new ideas come to my mind or if I find something worth sharing on this platform. Once again a big thank you to my all readers and please keep on sharing your views.

Are we getting too political on social media?

There is no doubt that social media has changed the way we communicate in today's world. I don't think anytime in the history of humans, there was a time when so much of our communication was in a written form rather than in a spoken form. The easy availability of the internet and smartphones has made social media accessible to many, and this has revolutionized the way we share our views with each other. A vast number of people are connected with each other via the internet than any other medium before. This number is huge compared to what telephone or radio managed to connect when they were at their peak. Various social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram have made instant broadcasting of information very easy. Today, we can broadcast any event of our life if we want to do so, and there is an audience for it from all over the world. I also notice that people are more eager than ever to share with the world what's going on in their lives, and the concept of privacy is not the same as it was just a decade ago. Many gigabytes of data about our textual, audio, or video are generated every moment and stored in various places in the cloud. We don't even know where are our footprints on the internet, it is impossible to track them. This is all a recent phenomenon, we still don't know the pros and cons of this. Eventually, we should be able to figure this out in the coming years, but for the time being, we all are witnessing this explosion of data generation and sharing.

Another thing that I noticed is how much people discuss politics on social media. I see that many friends from my Facebook friend post only something related to politics on their personal walls. No doubt, politics is an important part of our lives as it affects all of us. It is also important to share our political opinions and voice our views on various political and social matters. But, if all we share is our political opinion and nothing else, then that conversation becomes extremely monotonous and boring, and nothing remains surprising in our posts as most people know what are our political views and what are we going to post based on our political leanings. Such postings might help in initiating some fierce political discussions or arguments, but definitely, they don't help to expand our social circle or to have some meaningful conversations on social media. Such repeated political postings make our social media account look like an unofficial mouthpiece of some political party or leader. It seems that for many people there is nothing worthwhile to discuss apart from politics on social media. This trend really bothers me a lot, this is one of the reasons why I reduced my presence on Facebook. 

I do recognize the relevance and use of social media in keeping in touch with friends and relatives with whom it is impossible to interact in person. This is why I joined all these platforms and I am still active on most of them. Social media is of great help to bridge the distance gap and makes it possible to interact with people who are miles apart from us. I wish people use it to discuss various other things apart from politics. I want to have meaningful conversations about other issues as well, I want people to be less political and more social on social media. Let politicians discuss only politics, it is their profession and they have a job to do. We are not professional politicians and our social media posts should show this diversity. We need to be conscious about not becoming the unofficial spokesperson of any political party. This might also help to reduce the spread of fake news and rumors through social media. The increasing political nature of social media makes it possible for some people to use it to spread fake news and disturb social harmony. Only vigilant and alert social media users can stop such misuse, let's be more social and less political.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.