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      %APPROPRIATE OPENNESS AND HONESTY NOT CONTROL 880918

     Honest   statements   can   be   used   to   exercise
inappropriate control over other people.   Open and honest
expressions  of feelings can  be  used  to embarrass other
people.    True  statements can be use to do  violence  to
people at times when they are  vulnerable.   People can be
violated by demands that they be open and honest when they
do not wish to be open and honest.

     Openness  and honesty are not ultimate criteria.   It
is  NOT true that actions are integrative if and  only  if
they are open and honest.  Actions which are both open and
honest  can be manipulative,  embarrassing,   violent  and
disintegrative.  This fact does not mean that openness and
honesty are of little worth.   Openness and honesty are of
great worth in contexts where they are not demanded,   not
manipulative,  not deliberately embarrassing, not violent,
not disintegrative.

     Openness   and   honesty  may   be   compulsive   and
inappropriate; then they are not likely to be integrative.
Openness and honesty may be unwelcome and intrusive. There
are  times  when it is appropriate to be open and  honest,
and there are times to refrain from being open and honest.
Wisdom  and love know the difference between the two kinds
of times.

     We  may  feel that we can never safely  be  open  and
honest about some significant aspects of our lives:   some
of  our thoughts,  feelings,  desires,  opinions,   fears,
concerns,   etc.   If there are significant aspects of our
lives  which we can never safely share with others,  there
is  something seriously wrong with our lives  and/or  with
the  life  of  our  community.    Every  member  of  every
community should have opportunities to be open and  honest
about  all significant aspects of their lives.    Communal
life should assure this.

     A  community is disintegrating if any of its  members
can rarely safely  be open and  honest with another person
and  also  with  a  small  group  of  people  about   each
significant  aspect of their life.    Not every  situation
calls  for openness and honesty,   but  every  significant
aspect  of  one's life calls for some situation  in  which
each significant aspect can be shared openly and honestly.
If  such  opportunities  for  openness  and  honesty   are
lacking,  the community is disintegrating, and integrative
efforts are overdue.

     The  way to move from a lack of integrity in personal
and  communal  life,   to lives of personal  and  communal
integrity,  is  to agree on the importance of personal and
communal integrity,   above  and  beyond the importance of
ideals and  values  which  threaten personal  and communal
integrity   when   they  are  regarded  as   of   ultimate
importance.     Personal   and  communal   integrity   are
impossible  in   the absence of opportunities to be safely
open  and honest about  each  significant aspect of  one's
life.   Such security  in the presence of vulnerability is
essential  to  personal and communal integrity.   It is  a
security which each member of a community should be  given
by the community  to   promote   personal   and   communal
integrity.
                                                                                                                               
                         (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in      
                    (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy)  
                                                                                                                               
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