History Main / HonestyIsTheBestPolicy

* At the end of ''{{Watchmen}}'', [[spoiler:Veidt reveals his master plan to his fellow heroes after carrying out the most extreme part, confident they won't try to undo the beneficial effects of his crime. They don't. Or do they? The one fellow hero that does want to undo it, Rorschach, gets killed, ''but'' his diary is picked up by a newspaper...]]
** [[spoiler:A small-press paper known, if at all, for racist and anti-Semitic views.]]

* Tinkerbell tries this in ''PeterPan'' (yes, [[DisneyAnimatedCanon the Disney one]]) when she flat-out admits to Peter that she tried to have Wendy killed by the Lost Boys. However, she wasn't exactly successful in the "not getting punished" part.

* In the Xanth Novels, by PiersAnthony, demons are infamous, not for being liars, but for being 100% honest at all times. They may not tell you the whole truth, but they'll never just make something up, because [[AwfulTruth a single truth will often be far more devastating than a thousand lies.]]

Your dad corners you about your having chopped down a cherry tree, a key step in your evil plan.

Differs from a SarcasticConfession in that a SarcasticConfession is when someone says the truth in a sarcastic tone, as if to make you think he is lying. This is when you tell them the truth with a straight face, and yet you are confident that it will not set you back. Differs from JustBetweenYouAndMe in that it is an intentional revelation that hinges on the person being unable (or unwilling) to do anything about it, rather than [[EvilGloating triumphant gloating]] to an endangered hero. The finest examples of this trope have things set up in advance so that [[XanatosGambit the person to whom you've confessed will actually advance your plans if he acts on the information you just gave him.]]

* The protagonist of DragonAgeTheCrownOfThorns can somehow pull this off even when he's setting up XanatosGambit after XanatosGambit, plus a [[spoiler:ZeroApprovalGambit]] on the side. He also manages to make people believe whatever he wants, like [[spoiler:Trian being dead when he isn't]] yet ''still'' avoids lying by phrasing his words as questions and hypotheses. That said, every one of his direct statements can qualify as BrutalHonesty.

->"I want an iron-clad lifetime contract, along with a full wipe-the-fucking-record-clean pardon for any and all prior acts. I know you don't trust me. The beauty is that ''you don't have to''. [[GodzillaThreshold Nothing I can possibly do will make shit worse than it is already.]]"
-->--'''[[TheUnfettered Caine]]''' (making his closing argument after TheReveal at the end), ''[[Literature/TheActsOfCaine Caine Black Knife]]''

* Moist von Lipwig in the ''{{Discworld}}'' novel ''Discworld/MakingMoney'' by Terry Pratchett. At least twice.
* The page quote comes at the end of the XanatosGambit the protagonist spent all of ''CaineBlackKnife'' [[XanatosSpeedChess finagling]] into place. Caine has just royally screwed the [[OmniscientCouncilOfVagueness Board's]] plans up. Their two choices are: reward him for sabotage and murder of one of their number by giving him a total pardon and more authority and free rein than they gave to the guys sent out to catch him, or permanently lose access to Overworld and possibly risk Overworld's most powerful empire marching over a portal with dragons and warmages to blast Earth into submission. Caine is happy to unveil all the details because he's not afraid to die and they have no alternatives.

-->--'''[[TheUnfettered Caine]]''' (making his closing argument after TheReveal at the end), ''CaineBlackKnife''

* The page quote comes at the end of the XanatosGambit the protagonist spent all of ''CaineBlackKnife'' [[XanatosSpeedChess finagling]] into place. Caine has just royally screwed the [[OmniscientCouncilOfVagueness Board's]] plans up. Their two choices are: reward him for sabotage and murder of one of their number by giving him a total pardon and more authority and free reign than they gave to the guys sent out to catch him, or permanently lose access to Overworld and possibly risk Overworld's most powerful empire marching over a portal with dragons and warmages to blast Earth into submission. Caine is happy to unveil all the details because he's not afraid to die and they have no alternatives.

* At the end of ''{{Watchmen}}'', [[spoiler:Veidt reveals his master plan to his fellow heroes after carrying out the most extreme part, confident they won't try to undo the beneficial effects of his crime. They don't. [[OrIsIt Or do they?]] The one fellow hero that does want to undo it, Rorschach, gets killed, ''but'' his diary is picked up by a newspaper...]]

* In ''{{The Order of the Stick}}'', the Inter-Fiend Cooperation Commission play this technique beautifully on Vaarsuvius as part of a preplanned BatmanGambit. When they offer the elf near unlimited magical power, they are perfectly willing to explain the entire terms of service of their DealWithTheDevil up front, explain what they plan to get out of making the deal (but see below), and decline to produce an elaborate contract because, "Contracts are for people with something to hide." But the real clincher is that they are willing to point out an alternate route that Vaarsuvius could take to save his/her family without making the deal, confident that it wouldn't be chosen.

* Doc Scratch of ''{{Homestuck}}'' is overt about this-- he tells people on many occasions that he never lies, and has never been seen actually contradicting that statement. As a near-"omniscipotent" being, he can see the entirety of any conversation or interaction (with a few "dark spots") prior to the actual initiation of the conversation, and sees no reason to lie to people about things he knows they are going to do.

* The first-season ''{{Gargoyles}}'' episode, "The Edge", where Xanatos reveals the entirety of his [[XanatosGambit Gambit-of-the-week]] to a VERY irritated Goliath, as part of a ''second'' plan that has nothing to do with the first... and succeeds.

* While the AesopsFables that actually teach that "honesty is the best policy" are well-known, there's another, hilarious one in which someone tries to be GenreSavvy in this way and [[WrongGenreSavvy it backfires]]. Two men get kidnapped by apes and hauled before the ape king, where they see he's set up a whole court for himself with all the trappings of actual royalty. The "king" asks each man in turn what they think of him and his court. The first one sucks up to him about how magnificent he is, and is set free. His friend figures that if that's what you get for lying, the reward for telling the truth must be even better, and tells the ape he looks like a idiot pretending to be a real king and that he's not impressing anyone. The king naturally orders him executed. The moral of this one seems to be, "Don't go overboard."

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
* Tinkerbell tries this in ''PeterPan'' (yes, [[DisneyAnimatedCanon the Disney one]]) when she flat-out admits to Peter that she tried to have Wendy killed by the Lost Boys. However, she wasn't exactly successful in the "not getting punished" part.

->"I want an iron-clad lifetime contract, along with a full wipe-the-fucking-record-clean pardon for any and all prior acts. I know you don't trust me. The beauty is that ''you don't have to''. Nothing I can possibly do will make shit worse than it is already."

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Jokes]]
* There is a joke about a family of rednecks with three sons, who get told the Cherry Tree legend by their father, who then asks which of them knocked down the family outhouse. One son, inspired by the legend, steps forward and admits to the deed... and gets paddled for his trouble. When he complains, "But George Washington's father didn't punish him for chopping down the cherry tree!" the father replies, "George Washington's father wasn't sitting in the cherry tree when he chopped it down!"

** Also, the alternative plan they offered was highly risky and probably wouldn't work. Among other things, it required V to cut off her own head.

** Also, the alternative plan they offered was highly risky and probably wouldn't work.

Differs from a SarcasticConfession in that a SarcasticConfession is when someone says the truth in a sarcastic tone, as if to make you think he is lying. This is when you tell them the truth with a straight face, and yet you are confident that it will not set you back.

Differs from JustBetweenYouAndMe in that it is an intentional revelation that hinges on the person being unable (or unwilling) to do anything about it, rather than [[EvilGloating triumphant gloating]] to an endangered hero.

** [[spoiler:A small-press paper known, if at all, for racist and anti-Semitic views.]] SoYeah.

** By a newspaper [[spoiler:that openly supports Ku Klux Klan.]] SoYeah.