Is honesty important in close relationships?

 Does " I want you to be honest with me" conflict with the sentiment " I want you to support me unconditionally"?

This is the crux of the debate in Stephanie Murray's piece in the Atlantic on Dec 12th titled: Should friends offer honesty or unconditional support? It is a worthy read.

She argues that while some advocate for complete honesty, we have a culture of passivity. Friendship is a choice and, therefore, expendable. In other words, people tend to hold back on being forthright with their friends even where red flags are abundant, justifying silence by offering the alternative: being there for your friend when their bad choices blow up in their face, and they need support.

She ends with this sentence: ( she is referring to being honest if you are looking only for close friendships)

"But if it’s friendship of the closest sort that you are after, it’s a risk you’ll have to take."

I will be honest. I like honesty to the point that I wonder if my obsession with the truth comes off as brutal and unsupportive. It has been a challenge for me since childhood. As a cancer doctor, I have been trained to use professional but compassionate language at work. 

It is part of my daily work to discuss how much time someone has when diagnosed with advanced cancer.

 I don't use the crystal ball analogy some doctors use ( " I don't have a crystal ball to predict") because I find it incredibly patronizing. Of course, the patient knows you are not a tarot reader or some gypsy lady. So I keep it short: "It is hard to predict, but in my opinion, based on how you are doing now, it could be...."

I grew up with intensely critical parents.  I have fine-tuned my ability to distinguish between constructive feedback and gaslighting from envious individuals. This has resulted in an inbuilt lie ( or B.S) detection system. So it was surprising to recognize that most people find it hard to accept unpleasant truths. But then I realized: most folks do not have overcritical parents. Our need for societal acceptance has decapitated our instincts-- that embedded GPS within our souls meant to guide us away from danger.

Which is where good, honest friends should come in. But if our friends too are motivated by acceptance, what then protects us from the dangers of our blind spots?

Are we facing this barrage of disinformation because of our culture of passivity that focuses on the listener having a "pleasant "experience, even if ultimately harmful? One can point fingers at this culture in the emergence of social media and the internet to provide ratings to people and businesses. 

I was once at a yoga class where the participants discussed one of the core principles of yoga: non-attachment, something I knew of, growing up in India.

A lady in her mid-forties openly acknowledged that she had issues because of her relationship with her son, which others, including the boy's dad, had described as unhealthy. The concept of 'non-attachment 'triggered her. Her opposition to this ancient principle of living was forceful and passionate.  

When this woman completed her oral arguments in defense of her excessive attachment, she had forgotten why she was in a yoga class.  But what I found disappointing was the yoga teacher's passive nodding as if in agreement. She did not challenge this woman or tell her that the core principle of non-attachment was not up for debate. Rather it was her choice whether to adopt that principle. And the reason for this passive and dishonest approach was simple: it was a business. The yoga teacher may have wanted the participant to write a good review about the business, so she did not feel the need to expound on that topic, even though a yoga teacher or guru has a fundamental duty to impart knowledge. Or the teacher was a product of the culture of passivity, preferring instead to let the participant take as much as she wanted from the class.

This was, of course, a class in the US. I wondered if a guru in India would have passively accepted a student arguing that attachment was an acceptable quality to practice en route to attaining a yogic lifestyle. Probably not. Don't get me wrong: anybody is welcome to have an opinion. You can believe that ivermectin cures COVID and that attachment to people and material objects makes you a yogi or even a yoga teacher.  Your beliefs may make you happy in the moment, but they won't get you where you want to reach.

One of my former colleagues told me about his two daughters, aged 8 years and 4 years, fighting and how the younger one seemed adept at gaslighting.

Half in jest, but probably coming from submerged childhood pain, I laughed and told him:

" Make sure you are fair to the older one. Don't let the younger one get away because she is cute or small or whatever justification parents use. Or else your older one will turn out like me. A rebel who speaks her mind."

He laughed and said: " I would not mind a daughter like you. There is nothing wrong with standing up for what you believe in and speaking your mind. With you, I know exactly what I am getting. And I would trust you any day over someone who keeps quiet when things go wrong."

I was surprised at his remark because no one had ever seen my honesty as a strength. Or at least said so. For that one friend who felt this way, probably a hundred have moved away because they have no appetite for that kind of bluntness.

But because it is friendships of the closest kind I am after, that is a risk I have always been willing to take.

P.S: This article has nothing much to do with history or medicine. But history has taught us that passivity among the majority unknowingly contradicts honesty in those few willing to speak. It can compromise large chunks of society when faced with existential threats.  Just look at our recent pandemic!