No Virtue Without Honesty

[Verv]

It is said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. I am a firm believer -- the Fascists were trying to save their countries from depression and re-empower them; the Communists were trying to make us equal in wealth and give dignity to the workers and to the peasants.

Most manifestations in evil come from the fact that the person feels themselves to be the only one pure and right. Osama Bin Laden does not kill people because he broods over how evil he is -- he kills them because he broods over how evil he thinks they are.

It is impossible to be virtuous, to be ethical, to be a truly good person if you are not honest about how you feel and the way that you are.

Dishonesty out of self interest, hiding of one's true emotions, is vile -- it shows something generally immoral concerning your intent. Anyone who is dishonest and conceals something is manipulative, by and large...

Other than lying to serve a greater, utilitarian good... I really think this is one of the pinnacles of being unethical and immoral.

If I see that someone is in the habit of lying I am immediately turned off and think less of them...

And another note:

Honesty is not just telling the truth, it is also not concealing the truth. Some people act like everything is okay... I remember a few instances where people had issues with me that caused them to dislike me, yet they never confronte dme over it so how was I supposed to know and react to it? It was an unfair event for myself and largely unproductive.

Honest conversation solves most problems.

 

[Eudaimonist]

It is impossible to be virtuous, to be ethical, to be a truly good person if you are not honest about how you feel and the way that you are.

Do you mean being honest with yourself, or do you mean being honest with others?


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[The Nihilist]

I agree with Eudaimonist: what is meant by honesty?

 

[CSmrw]

I would imagine, honest or dishonest with anyone else, virtue without critical self examination of your ideals and their consequences on society as a whole is meaningless.

 

[levi501]

It is said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I've never liked this proverb and have always believed it false especially in the most literal sense.
Good intentions requires that you be honest with yourself and not negligent in your actions.(what csmrw said)

 

[Verv]

Do you mean being honest with yourself, or do you mean being honest with others?


eudaimonia,

Mark

I am speaking of honesty with others.

On a more profound and deeper philosophical level, you have a duty to yourself to be honest in that fashion, but in another sense it does not have that much to do with virtue. Being that I do not feel wronged if you are not honest with yourself, you should feel wrong about your mistreatment of yourself.

All I want is for people to level with me personally.

I would imagine, honest or dishonest with anyone else, virtue without critical self examination of your ideals and their consequences on society as a whole is meaningless.

Virtue requires examination of your ideals and their consequences to a larger degree... But to err is human. One cannot say that someone has a lack of virtue if they try to do the right thing but it turns out wrongly.

 

[CSmrw]

I am speaking of honesty with others.

On a more profound and deeper philosophical level, you have a duty to yourself to be honest in that fashion, but in another sense it does not have that much to do with virtue. Being that I do not feel wronged if you are not honest with yourself, you should feel wrong about your mistreatment of yourself.

All I want is for people to level with me personally.



Virtue requires examination of your ideals and their consequences to a larger degree... But to err is human. One cannot say that someone has a lack of virtue if they try to do the right thing but it turns out wrongly.

I didn't say that. I said it's meaningless. If you can't see your actions being negative then your virtue is irrelevant. The results are what matters.

 

[Voegelin]

It is said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. I am a firm believer -- the Fascists were trying to save their countries from depression and re-empower them; the Communists were trying to make us equal in wealth and give dignity to the workers and to the peasants.

I have to disagree. I firmly believe the Bolsheviks were criminals, motivated by greed and a lust for power. "Bread, Land, Peace" was a lie. Trotsky was a member of a criminal gang on the lower East Side of New York City before Schiff shipped him to Russia with a few hundred of his fellow criminals. A great deal of money was made in the west from the plundering of the Russian people. Armand Hammer made millions fencing stolen Russian property in the USA. The top people in the CPUSA lived very nice lives, ran all kinds of lucrative businesses and did nothing for their true believing underlings. The Italian fascists were a variation of that theme (Mussolini had been a socialist, his mentor, Angelica Balabanoff, was an associate of the most crazed and vicious of the Bolsheviks--Zinoviev). German National Socialism was a reaction to the attempted coup by communist in Berlin in 1919 and the sucessful, for a time, establishment of a Bavarian Soviet the same year. Both were directed by Radek and his circle in Moscow. The NSDAP was also, of course, a criminal regime. Supporters of Nazism adopted the criminal tactics of international socialism to, they said, fight it. They also adopted the looting communism is based upon.

If the motivation were pure, if the Russian revolution was idealistic at heart, after the repression of the Kronstadt rebellion in 1921, the communist party would have received no support in the west or in Russia. But it did. Why? Because of the lure of money and power.

 

[Steezie]

Honesty is not always the best policy.

They say "The truth shall set you free"

In the words of Calvin, "The truth shall set your TEETH free"

 

[Verv]

I didn't say that. I said it's meaningless. If you can't see your actions being negative then your virtue is irrelevant. The results are what matters.

But we cannot control the results.

There are people that try to do heroic things to save people's lives but end up making things worse. People sometimes dig their own holes when they are trying to do something right.

Examples are various... A large stampede that killed dozens of people happened in an Airport in the 80s (I think in Latin America) when someone tried to alert the people that a package that was beeping was a bomb... The person tried to save everyone by warning them that the package was going to explode, but in reality it was just a clock... They acted out of pure intentions and literally dozens died.

There have been people with the intention of giving something to someone, giving food to the Jews, but giving them chocolate literally caused several to die due to the chocolate.

And there are others who believe they are fighting a just war, a war of liberation, but it only results in more death and destruction than previously imaginable.

I have to disagree. I firmly believe the Bolsheviks were criminals, motivated by greed and a lust for power. "Bread, Land, Peace" was a lie. Trotsky was a member of a criminal gang on the lower East Side of New York City before Schiff shipped him to Russia with a few hundred of his fellow criminals. A great deal of money was made in the west from the plundering of the Russian people. Armand Hammer made millions fencing stolen Russian property in the USA. The top people in the CPUSA lived very nice lives, ran all kinds of lucrative businesses and did nothing for their true believing underlings. The Italian fascists were a variation of that theme (Mussolini had been a socialist, his mentor, Angelica Balabanoff, was an associate of the most crazed and vicious of the Bolsheviks--Zinoviev). German National Socialism was a reaction to the attempted coup by communist in Berlin in 1919 and the sucessful, for a time, establishment of a Bavarian Soviet the same year. Both were directed by Radek and his circle in Moscow. The NSDAP was also, of course, a criminal regime. Supporters of Nazism adopted the criminal tactics of international socialism to, they said, fight it. They also adopted the looting communism is based upon.

If the motivation were pure, if the Russian revolution was idealistic at heart, after the repression of the Kronstadt rebellion in 1921, the communist party would have received no support in the west or in Russia. But it did. Why? Because of the lure of money and power.

You bring up a decent point here concerning the corruption of the Communists, but certainly there were once people amongst them with pure intentions, and the original ideas, the ideas that motivated the core of the people, were ideas concerning equality and opportunity.

I dislike Communism as much as the next person but I do not feel that they were all motivated out of greed. Perhaps some of the leadership, of course.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

The same pattern can be found in every attempt at changing the world via a radical revolution.

-> people fight against/kill/exile the corrupt leadership that used to exploit and oppress them. (The Tsar, the French aristocracy, the bishop of Münster)
-> a power vacuum forms
-> circumstances favour the most ruthless and opportunistic individuals, who can rise to the top because all institutions and balances that would have hindered their ascendancy have been overthrown
-> the ideals that led to the uprising become twisted in order to support the new rulers, while the bloodshed intensifies and finally serves but one purpose: consolidating and securing the position of the new tyrants.

That's one of the reasons why communism will always fail: the very system that it seeks to erect collapses upon itself because it inevitably favours the kind of structure that will bring the most ruthless and greedy tyrants to the top.

Jan Beukels, Robespierre, Stalin: history repeats itself over and over again.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

If communism is motivated by greed, what is capitalism motivated by?

I'm not a communist, for reasons that include - but are not limited to - those listed in the post above. But I think that our current economical ideology is just as fatally wrong as the leftist utopia, and point to the state of our world as a whole as confirmation for it. A completely unregulated market invariably creates conditions that are similar to the ones that produced the tyrants named above, only on the economical rather than the political stage, and the exploitation of the many at the hands of the few. It has happened before, and it is happening again. Laissez-faire capitalism is a monstrosity.

 

[CSmrw]

But we cannot control the results.

There are people that try to do heroic things to save people's lives but end up making things worse. People sometimes dig their own holes when they are trying to do something right.

Examples are various... A large stampede that killed dozens of people happened in an Airport in the 80s (I think in Latin America) when someone tried to alert the people that a package that was beeping was a bomb... The person tried to save everyone by warning them that the package was going to explode, but in reality it was just a clock... They acted out of pure intentions and literally dozens died.

There have been people with the intention of giving something to someone, giving food to the Jews, but giving them chocolate literally caused several to die due to the chocolate.

And there are others who believe they are fighting a just war, a war of liberation, but it only results in more death and destruction than previously imaginable.



You bring up a decent point here concerning the corruption of the Communists, but certainly there were once people amongst them with pure intentions, and the original ideas, the ideas that motivated the core of the people, were ideas concerning equality and opportunity.

I dislike Communism as much as the next person but I do not feel that they were all motivated out of greed. Perhaps some of the leadership, of course.

Then they are virtuous and their virtue is meaningless because it is harmful. I would rather have a craven liar that improved the world than a virtous saint who harmed it.

 

[levi501]

I didn't say that. I said it's meaningless. If you can't see your actions being negative then your virtue is irrelevant. The results are what matters.

I agree that critical self-examination is necessary as it must be done to determine the true intent behind your actions. With that said being woefully ignorant to the consequences of your actions and thus negligent isn't acting with moral intent. True intent while hard to measure is the metric to judge an action as moral or immoral.

For Christians this same line of thinking is conveyed in the new testament when Jesus commands you to act out of love. If the true intent behind an action is love then an act is moral.

 

[Daisy321]

Originally posted by jmverville
Honesty is not just telling the truth, it is also not concealing the truth. Some people act like everything is okay... I remember a few instances where people had issues with me that caused them to dislike me, yet they never confronte dme over it so how was I supposed to know and react to it? It was an unfair event for myself and largely unproductive.

Honest conversation solves most problems.

I agree. Honesty is always the step we must take to resolve our problems and failure to be honest solves nothing.

With that being said, I at times have kept silent about issues with others to keep the peace or to avoid heated arguments. Not always right on my part and not always wrong. They say"some things are better left alone",
I think sometimes it is better just to let things pass by and get over them.

Of course, as in your example to not say something to someone and linger with bad feelings or dislike it would be better to have an honest talk in the open.

 

[CSmrw]

I agree that critical self-examination is necessary as it must be done to determine the true intent behind your actions. With that said being woefully ignorant to the consequences of your actions and thus negligent isn't acting with moral intent. True intent while hard to measure is the metric to judge an action as moral or immoral.

For Christians this same line of thinking is conveyed in the new testament when Jesus commands you to act out of love. If the true intent behind an action is love then an act is moral.

And what if "love" includes teaching contraception is wrong during an AIDS crisis? You may be morally correct according to your beliefs but you are causing harm and we must judge your results, not your heart.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

"Love" is not as good a measuring stick as one might think. In fact, it is pretty much identical with "good intentions" in that regard.

 

[levi501]

And what if "love" includes teaching contraception is wrong during an AIDS crisis? You may be morally correct according to your beliefs but you are causing harm and we must judge your results, not your heart.

This falls under being intentionally negligent as to the consequences of your "good" intentions and thus ISN'T acting out of love.

 

[CSmrw]

This falls under being intentionally negligent as to the consequences of your "good" intentions and thus ISN'T acting out of love.

They would absolutely dissagree. And I would agree with them. They would be acting out of their bizarre, twisted notions of love, their faith demanding it. Their love is damaging to others, though, and I would not prefer it to hatred that saved lives.

 

[levi501]

They would absolutely dissagree. And I would agree with them. They would be acting out of their bizarre, twisted notions of love, their faith demanding it. Their love is damaging to others, though, and I would not prefer it to hatred that saved lives.

Perhaps, but then it would be my opinion that they're delusional and incapable of introspection in this regard as their actions aren't consistent with their professed belief system.