Why is brutal honesty so highly encouraged when it just hurts others?

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PTSDintheAsylum

We’ve all heard about the morals of honesty written all over the Bible. However, there’s one thing that bugs me. It’s the term brutal honesty. First of all, the words brutal and honesty have entirely different meanings. Second, using this is more so on the intention of making recipients miserable. And finally, it is invented as an excuse to harass and bully others and without any moral support within themselves.

So many will claim that it is encouraged for those to express cold harsh truths to peers instead of sugarcoating and asspatting flaws. However, I feel that in itself uses the utter sadism to watch people feel miserable and gain satisfaction from it. Honesty still needs to be encouraged, just not in this particular manner. Because who would want to tolerate someone who’s heavily obsessed with watching others fall from grace? I’m surprised no one really has talked about this yet and I’m interested of what you guys think.
 

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PTSDintheAsylum said:
We’ve all heard about the morals of honesty written all over the Bible. However, there’s one thing that bugs me. It’s the term brutal honesty. First of all, the words brutal and honesty have entirely different meanings. Second, using this is more so on the intention of making recipients miserable. And finally, it is invented as an excuse to harass and bully others and without any moral support within themselves.

So many will claim that it is encouraged for those to express cold harsh truths to peers instead of sugarcoating and asspatting flaws. However, I feel that in itself uses the utter sadism to watch people feel miserable and gain satisfaction from it. Honesty still needs to be encouraged, just not in this particular manner. Because who would want to tolerate someone who’s heavily obsessed with watching others fall from grace? I’m surprised no one really has talked about this yet and I’m interested of what you guys think.
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Hello PTSDintheAsylum ,

Truth and honesty need not be brutal. Truth and honesty are very important because truth and honesty are needed if trust is to grow and trust is needed if friendship is to blossom.

However, it is the ‘sweet truth’ that Jesus loves and this is what we should practice, that is, to speak the truth to others with love for Him whenever this is possible.

We have to try our best to be like Him, to help others find rest for their souls and tell truth the way we would want to hear it told to us.

Life is often hard and one of the best things you can do to be help others is to show true compassion when a difficult truth needs to told. We can be kind and speak the truth humbly and sweetly.

“Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.”
– 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

God bless you sister.
 
PTSDintheAsylum said:
First of all, the words brutal and honesty have entirely different meanings. Second, using this is more so on the intention of making recipients miserable. And finally, it is invented as an excuse to harass and bully others and without any moral support within themselves.
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Ecclesiastes 3:1-9 (KJV)
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate;
a time of war, and a time of peace.
What profit hath he that worketh in that wherein he laboureth?


"Truth" is not a reason to harm another. As you point out, it is often used to attack another.

There are times when it is important to help someone understand an error in his life ( or other fallacy ), but this is seldom and are best done with great care by someone that cares (and is known to care) for the one being corrected.

Anytime the intention is "making recipients miserable' the so-called honesty is just an attack.
 
PTSDintheAsylum said:
We’ve all heard about the morals of honesty written all over the Bible. However, there’s one thing that bugs me. It’s the term brutal honesty. First of all, the words brutal and honesty have entirely different meanings. Second, using this is more so on the intention of making recipients miserable. And finally, it is invented as an excuse to harass and bully others and without any moral support within themselves.

So many will claim that it is encouraged for those to express cold harsh truths to peers instead of sugarcoating and asspatting flaws. However, I feel that in itself uses the utter sadism to watch people feel miserable and gain satisfaction from it. Honesty still needs to be encouraged, just not in this particular manner. Because who would want to tolerate someone who’s heavily obsessed with watching others fall from grace? I’m surprised no one really has talked about this yet and I’m interested of what you guys think.
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The Bible teaches absolute honesty, but it also teaches wisdom, tactfulness, and courtesy. Truth must always be expressed in its fullness, but it need not be expressed cruelly.
 
Sometimes when I speak my honesty can seem aloof, like it comes from a "cold" place. However, it is because I care so deeply, I wish to express my unadulterated truth. It is not to have whom I address to fall from grace, but to lead them to it. Sometimes the truth does hurt so deeply it forces us to make must needed changes. I do try not to be cruel though. My two adult daughters will attest to the fact "if you dont want to really know, dont ask our mom". Sugar coating is an art I have learned living in the south, but seldom use with those whom I love the most. If someone wishes to take the time to explain themselves and ask my opinion, it is my duty as a Christian to share with them my truth. It might not always be nice, but it will be honest.

In my life it is the toughest lessons that Ive gained the most knowledge from. I would rather hear a brutal truth, than a sugar coated lie spewed forth to spare my feelings. Thats me though, and we are all different. Praise the Lord on that one, cause it would be a boring world if we were all the same.
 
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thenami said:
Sometimes when I speak my honesty can seem aloof, like it comes from a "cold" place. However, it is because I care so deeply, I wish to express my unadulterated truth. It is not to have whom I address to fall from grace, but to lead them to it. Sometimes the truth does hurt so deeply it forces us to make must needed changes. My two adult daughters will attest to the fact "if you dont want to really know, dont ask our mom". Sugar coating is an art I have learned living in the south, but seldom use with those whom I love the most. If someone wishes to take the time to explain themselves and ask my opinion, it is my duty as a Christian to share with them my truth. It might not always be nice, but it will be honest.

In my life it is the toughest lessons that Ive gained the most knowledge from. I would rather hear a brutal truth, than a sugar coated lie spewed forth to spare my feelings.
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And what about the lies that are not sugarcoated but catastrophised (made up to be a lot worse than it actually is)? Instead of brutal honesty in terms of revealing exaggerations, wouldn’t it be considered to be called benign honesty? I think that should also be considered, wouldn’t you agree?
 
Yes, I do agree, but as a Christain I have a tendency to believe what others choose to share. Its not that I am naive by any means, but I give others the benefit of the doubt before my b.s. filter kicks in and I stop listening (different from hearing). Then I pray instead.
 
thenami said:
Yes, I do agree, but as a Christain I have a tendency to believe what others choose to share. Its not that I am naive by any means, but I give others the benefit of the doubt before my b.s. filter kicks in and I stop listening (different from hearing). Then I pray instead.
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I feel that catastrophising has been overlooked and not very many people have discussed about this in the forum. I honestly don’t understand why some people believe that all lies are sugarcoated (when in reality some of actually over-exaggerated (to make things sound worse)) and that it’s better to prefer harsher truths over beneficial ones. There are two different versions of lies and truths, one to soften and one to stir drama. One should be careful over these differences and how they use them to the recipients.
 
Not sure, is there someone in your life that does that, or are you meaning on this forum. Often brutal honesty is mentioned when the recipient can't face the truth or handle looking in the mirror. So there would be something someone can't face up to. In Asian culture it's often called 'saving face' as a form of politeness to avoid humiliation. But it can lead to outrageous lying! Otherwise people would be saying others look ugly all the time and belittling each other! (Men seem to put a great store on what a woman looks like for example, and can never honestly say to a lady who's overweight well you look like an elephant and can stand to lose a few pounds - but you can say she's 'cuddly')

I had a girl in school who's name was Honesty, nobody ever called her brutal.

I don't think 'brutal' honesty is 'highly encouraged' or maybe you are just hanging round the kind of people who just tell it like it is. Or maybe they are just brutes!
 
As Christians we just tell the truth.
Unfortunately the truth was brutal when it came to the crucifixtion. Yes Jesus was beaten to near death and when that didn't kill him the Romans crucified him by nailing him to the cross. Jesus died for our sins. His blood paid for you and me. That was kind of brutal and yes, it hurt!

The wages of sin is death

However, the story did not end there.
 
A big trouble with being brutally honest is being so selective with which truths to be honest about.

Like relentlessly denouncing on the sinfulness of man and neglecting to mention God's Love for men and His redemptive death on the cross.

The resulting picture is not an honest depiction.
 

Why is brutal honesty so highly encouraged when it just hurts others?​


John 16:33 These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.
 
I am sure the Pharisees and the Sadducees thought Jesus was brutal when he called them vipers, as did the money changers when Jesus said they were turning the house of God into a den of thieves. Honesty is only brutal when someone knows it is truth and they are wrong. It is hard to face facts sometimes.
Yes we should present the truth as gently as we can, but sometimes you just have to tell like it is.
 
Dave F. said:
I am sure the Pharisees and the Sadducees thought Jesus was brutal when he called them vipers, as did the money changers when Jesus said they were turning the house of God into a den of thieves. Honesty is only brutal when someone knows it is truth and they are wrong. It is hard to face facts sometimes.
Yes we should present the truth as gently as we can, but sometimes you just have to tell like it is.
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So honesty is NOT brutal if it is intended to make the recipient miserable or cause a catastrophe?
 
I think apples and oranges are being compared.

Speaking truth to authority is what Jesus did to the money changers at the temple. In an instance like this a brutal honesty is appropriate and was needed to make an impression to change evil practices.

When you don’t like you friends new future, knocking it over and calling it an abomination is not proportional to the circumstances or the truth being told and would be inappropriately brutal.

This is common sense and should rule the day. If common sense is not easily accessible then we can apply the ‘golden rule’ and ‘do unto others as we would like them to do to us’.

“In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”
Matthew 7:12 NASB
 
PTSDintheAsylum said:
So honesty is NOT brutal if it is intended to make the recipient miserable or cause a catastrophe?
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The Pharisees and Sadducees did more than just hold to incorrect private views. They used their position of power to hold onto power for themselves. In so doing they led the common people away from the love of God and replaced it with their own interpretation of the law that kept them as authorities over the people by misuse of the law instead of servants of the people.

It was important to at least attempt to jar them out of their self serving self righteousness and also for the people they were misleading to see that they no longer served God or His people.

Given their place of authority, it was not so much brutal honesty but steadfast forthrightness.

Misery of the Pharisees and Sadducees was not the intent of our Lord's rebuke. Repentance was.
 
Siloam said:
The Pharisees and Sadducees did more than just hold to incorrect private views. They used their position of power to hold onto power for themselves. In so doing they led the common people away from the love of God and replaced it with their own interpretation of the law that kept them as authorities over the people by misuse of the law instead of servants of the people.

It was important to at least attempt to jar them out of their self serving self righteousness and also for the people they were misleading to see that they no longer served God or His people.

Given their place of authority, it was not so much brutal honesty but steadfast forthrightness.

Misery of the Pharisees and Sadducees was not the intent of our Lord's rebuke. Repentance was.
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Actually, I’m talking about not the use of God’s but of humanity’s intention of misery upon others. The involvement regarding the Pharisees and Sadducees is particularly out of the question.
 
PTSDintheAsylum said:
Actually, I’m talking about not the use of God’s but of humanity’s intention of misery upon others. The involvement regarding the Pharisees and Sadducees is particularly out of the question.
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"humanity's intention of misery upon others"

Who are you referring to by humanity's intention? If you are referring to our Lord's intentions, I would point out that Christ was both fully human AND fully God. The Godhood of Christ is not an incidental thing. But by your post, you are explicitly not talking about God.

Regardless, it is precisely the involvement of the Pharisees and Sadducees in opposition to Jesus and Jesus's ministry among common man of Israel that prompted the Rebuke.
 
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