In 1987, President Corazon Aquino testified in a libel trial that she was just telling the truth, and her credibility as national leader had been damaged by a newspaper column written by Louie Beltran that said she “hid under her bed” during a 1987 coup attempt.
On cross examination, counsel for Defense, Dean Antonio Coronel, warned Complainant President Aquino: “Madam, truth has many faces: your truth, my truth, his truth, their truth, and the real truth which only God knows!”
Today, expressing what one sees as truth can have consequences, telling the truth is sometimes dangerous.
Especially when it threatens the status quo, long-standing understanding of how things are supposed to be.
Telling the truth, or uncovering lies, can lead to a loss of friends, status, access to decision-making or credibility. Telling the truth in an environment of deceit, according to George Orwell, “a revolutionary act”.
Or does anyone believe that lying is justified when the good consequences outweighed the bad?
Failing to tell the truth is lying, the downside is that lying -— any lying -— eats away at trust.
Lying, when it becomes consistent deceit, is evil at its core, and includes consistent scapegoating, excessive but subtle intolerance of criticism, concerned only with the creation of an alternative perception of a favorable public image.
This is more so when a person has something to hide.
Failing to confront lies is symptomatic of powerlessness, and the feeling of powerlessness may contribute to corruption and violence.
Recall the case of Maria Ressa: In her ruling, Judge Rainelda Estacio-Montesa argued that Rappler, “did not offer a scintilla of proof that they verified the imputations of various crimes in the disputed article… They simply published them as news in their online publication in reckless disregard of whether they are false or not, quoting Nelson Mandela, saying, “To be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”
Ressa warned that her conviction could augur the end of freedom of the press in the Philippines.
Spokesperson for Malacanang Harry Roque asked the media to “respect the decision” and affirmed the commitment of President Duterte to free speech.
Most people in power feel free from the guilt of lying, surrounding themselves with “yes” people, and collectively feel their increased ability to deceive others.
Truth-telling or honesty is seen as a basic moral principle, rule, or value.
Withholding information, or otherwise deceiving the public, would mean disrespect to each person’s dignity.
Philosopher John Stuart Mill stated: “Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.”
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
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