Honesty

Something cultural in our era revolves around the issue of honesty. Most people, if queried about honesty would say that it is a good and important quality. In theory, being honest is great.

It doesn't always work out that way in practice.

Several years ago I read Vincent Bugliosi's fine book entitled "Outrage" where he reflected on the OJ Simpson trial. Bugliosi spent some time on the issue of honesty or lack thereof. He said that when there is a trial there are people who are lying. Most defendents, no matter how strong the evidence, will state to the universe that they are innocent. As much as I like the CSI shows, I find the fact that virtually everyone confesses when confronted with the evidence to be stretching reality a tad. Or two tads.

We do not expect our political leaders to be honest. I write this sadly. We state that we expect political leaders to be honest, but it is not a real expectation.

Most of us watch commercials for candidates which are filled with lies. Both parties are guilty. When we vote and the person we voted for does not do what he or she said that he/she would do, we are not surprised. We expect people to lie in order to be elected.

Often, watching TV, the 'spin-doctors' take a bit of truth and 'spin it' which, essentially, is creating a lie using some actual facts in the process.

We purchase items from TV which promise the universe and are often not surprised when they don't work as advertised.

And, of course, Microsoft comes out with the latest, greatest version of Windows and our expectations are that we are in for an adventure. In reading much about Vista it doesn't sound like much has changed.

My point is that dishonesty is so rampant because we expect it and we tolerate it. Until we get to a point where we will no longer tolerate dishonesty, we cannot expect anything other than that.