Do we tell the truth more?

Post Reply New Topic

I tend to say the truth alot when a Credit Card company called I mention the SSI and amount and then CARDS CANCELED! (my family says they saw me as someone who couldn't make payments although I WAS NEVER LATE!) Today I was doing an application for a at home bus service and my doctor asked how far I can walk I said about a mile she said if she put that they'd deny me so she put 100yds. (football field or whatever) I was curious if this tell it like it is brute honesty not lieing is an Aspie thing or not and does anyone have anymore life examples as the above.

Telling the truth all the time is not an "Aspie Thing". I will admit I would lie to spare someone's feelings if I knew what I was going to say would bother them, or, if I didn't feel like I had to say something. It's more like a compulsion with me. I just gotta say it but a lot of the time I try not to. It's like that with lecturing more than anything else.
I don't like to "tell the truth for truth's sake", because, like many philosphers, I don't think that there's such a thing as a "truth" anyway. So, I try not to hurt people's feelings.
I can only see half truths at the most, so, I am not going to lie to myself and tell myself "I am an Aspie therefore it's honesty at all costs" because I don't even know what that means and that could be a lie, too. Yeah, I lack the intuition sometimes, and I am impulsive sometimes. That is when I am most likely to step on some toes. But, I don't agree with all this honesty for the sake of honesty because it's the Aspie way bs. I don't mind if people lie to me to spare my feelings, unless I got toilet paper or something stuck to my skirt. Then, I don't mind if they tell me so I can remove it.
I don't want to be told a bunch of subjective, negative, crap however. I will lie to spare someone's feelings if I think it's appropriate and it will save me getting a punch in the nose

Oh, wait, I should amend this...I don't mind being lied to sometimes. It depends on what's it's about. If someone thinks I look ugly I don't want to hear that because I really don't care what they think. If my clothes are wrinkled, please, spare me the obvious. HOWEVER I don't want to be lied to about important things. Those should be as close to reality as possible. Like, if I am not going to get a job, I want them to say "we don't want to hire you" instead of other bs lines, like, "we already filled the position but we'll keep your application", or, I would rather be fired than pushed off the schedule for two weeks. That's when I appreciate honesty.
Sometimes I want honesty, othertimes I want to hear lies. It depends on what it's about and how meaningful it is.
I'm the same way. If it's something important I would tell what I think is the truth, but if it's a comment on the way someone looks or acts, I might lie about that. So, it all depends. There's a time to lie and a time to attempt to tell at the very least, a half truth (since I wonder if we experience truth in fragments)

Last edited by ooOoOoOAnaOoOoOoo on 23 Sep 2009, 7:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I think it may be more of a matter of that we suck at lying.

That's it!! ! I wonder why. LOL!

Yes, and even though I certainly have lied a time or two, there is just not enough originality on hand here ... and that is the truth!

I know I had a tendency to be brutally honest long before I knew I was on the spectrum. Like when I worked at a newspaper and a horrible new boss showed up one day bent on making major changes. I came back from driving around looking for feature photos and talked the the guy saying that things just didn't click that day. I really looked but just didn't find anything interesting to shoot.

Evidently he went to my boss and told him I had been goofing off at company expense. I should have kept my mouth shut, but they would have found some reason to fire me anyway, when they did it wasn't about that. My aspieism probably made me a target.

I found I usually have to stick to the truth as much as possible cause if you lie once, it can set up a chain where you must keep lying. I worked at a Wendy's once and my sister came in to see me. I told one of the girls who worked there that she was my girl friend. Later she started asking questions, "Are you going out with her tonight?" First I thought it was none of her business, but then I thought that I would come across as rude if I said so. But I f I made up something she'd come around again and ask more questions and I'd have to keep making things up, so to get out of it I confessed that she was really my sister.

Aspies don't have Wonder woman's lasso wrapped around them, but I know from my experience I had to learn the prudence of holding back or lying, if the truth could give others the power to hurt you. And to lie to keep from hurting other peoples feeling unnecessarily.

I think it's not only the sucking-at-lying, but the never-being-believed. So it seems (although sometimes falsely so) that if at least we tell the truth, we'll be more likely to be perceived as honest. It doesn't seem to actually work that way, though.. Usually someone is just as likely to disbelieve the truth as they are a lie.

I would never even let other people tell lies. You know how at restraunts have like, kids under the age of 7 or something are only charged so much? Well, my parents would say about me and my brother, 'oh, they're six and four', I would step out and say, 'that's not true. we're eight and six'.

I'm not saying I've never lied, or anything like that. It's more like...I've learned when not to tell the truth. Ah, I've never really understood it myself.

I'm personally really into Astrology. I find that brutal honesty is more common among Taurus (people born between April 21 and May 20) and Sagittarius (people born between November 23 and December 21). Taureans, like myself, don't like surprises, assumptions, or lies. So, we tend to be brutally honest and expect the same (sometimes unreasonably so) from others.

One the whole I think I'm honest in most ways.....if someone asks me something I don't want them to know I give a true but vague answer eg. " Is that >>>> new?" I'd probably say "not really I bought it some time ago" .....and that could have been a few days or months ago.
However, I do not make a habit of telling lies asI'm useless at it and don't see the point.

I think telling the truth is an Aspie trait. Or at the very least very common. I have always hated lies, manipulation, set ups et c. As a kid I was actually shocked when I discovered that people were lying, it was something that never had occurred to me. If I didn’t want to answer something, I’d clam up.
I live by the mottos: “I don’t always say what I mean but I always mean what I say” and “If you can’t take an honest answer, don’t ask the question”.

There is a difference between always saying what’s on your mind, and telling the truth if asked. Let’s take the classic example: You see a fat person on the street. If you walk up to him/her and say ”You’re fat”, then that’s rude. He/she didn’t ask for your point of view. But if said person were to ask ”Do you think I’m fat?” (and he/she is) confirm the fact is being truthful. I would expect the same from others. If someone tells me an obvius lie, the only thing I have learnt is to never trust that person again.
I always hate being lied to, big or small.

Einstein said, if someone can't tell the truth about small things, how can you trust them to tell the truth in big things? Though IMO truth matters no matter if it is big or small. The truth is true, lies are false. Nothing in between.

I've never been able to understand why you can't just show what's on your mind. If you don't like something/someone and you're uncomfortable, you just say it. I know now that it's not always right, so I keep my mouth shut, but I still can't help thinking, why can't you just tell them.

Skilpadde, I know what people mean when they say they are "brutally honest", it means they are going to go up to the fat person walking down the street and say "You're fat.". If a fat person walked up to me and asked "Tell me the truth, do you think I'm fat?", first I would ask "what do you weigh?" If they said "300 pounds", I would tell them, "most physicians would call you fat.". I don't consider that to be brutally honest because it shows I am being sensitive. I am not approaching the person nor am I giving a subjective answer that would hurt their feelings or cause them to feel worse about their situation. If someone is obviously fat I wouldn't tell them they are skinny, either, but I might say "you look fine" if they seem distressed about how they look.

Let's say someone is getting dressed and is nervous about going somewhere. A brutally honest person would say "Nice dress but you look fat in it and all the makeup in the world isn't going to make your eyes more symmetrical." That is what is meant by "brutal honesty". I don't use Asperger's as an excuse for that kind of inconsideration.

Besides, more often than not, the truth isn unknowable. Even when people think they know the truth, often it's a lie.

I'm very uncomfortable with lying. First of all, it's a lot of work & usually leads to worse consequences than telling the truth. "Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive." - Sir Walter Scott

That said, I also try to tell the truth in such a way that it doesn't hurt others. Sometimes, that means that I keep my mouth shut & don't volunteer information - if the only virtue to my information is that it is true. If my telling the truth can do nothing to improve things, then it probably doesn't need to be said. I don't just blurt out every thought that floats through my head.

Under no circumstances will I lie for someone else. There is always a better way - so that the truth can be told while causing the minimum amount of damage.

The matter of "telling the truth" or lying is a matter of morality, but being factually oriented certainly makes lying less likely, I think.