Harsh Truths
“It’s a dangerous thing to mistake speaking without thought for speaking the truth.” — Benoit Blanc from Knives Out
The internet is designed to make us feel good and to give us what we want. At a certain point, scrolling through hundreds of videos a day begins to desensitize us to the people behind the screen. Online, you become the sole spectator in your own enclosed world. It’s for this reason that it’s easy to be “brutally honest” online and criticize anyone you see as if the world revolves around your interests.
It’s understandable why people like me, who grew up with the internet, feel the way they do. We grew up in the age of illusions with the rise of things like photoshop and misleading ads being shoved down our metaphorical throats. As a result, people increasingly believe “brutal honesty” to be the counter to the perceived inauthenticity of their peers. But is being blunt and brutal really an indicator of authenticity?
The answer is no. We as humans all have our impulses and our desires. Sometimes both these things can coincide with each other, but following the wants of our higher selves isn’t inauthentic. You aren’t being fake by choosing to comply with your deeper desires when they don’t comply or take precedence over your impulses. Those who defend the right to be brutal online may argue this by saying, “you just can’t handle the truth!”. However, these people seem to assume that the truth must always be hurtful. You don’t have to be negative to be real (and I hope no one needs an explanation on why this isn’t true).
Rather than thinking that the truth is hurtful, we must be more aware of how we share the truth to others. To have a constructive and proper conversation, a person must match rationality with rationality, or emotion with emotion. This means that we can’t comment “you suck” on a person’s professional work when they ask for advice, or break down in painfully descriptive detail why a person’s performance sucked right after they had just finished performing. We need to be aware of how our words and actions can affect others both on and off the screens of our devices.
