Thoughts on Brutal Honesty and characters who use it.

Exactly What It Says on the Tin.

I want to hear your thoughts on this trope, and what you think of characters who don't bother softening the blow.

Is just being upfront just better then coming up with clever euphemisms for telling somebody they suck, or should you consider how you say what you say, honest or not.

How often do you think that it's one person trying to be genuinely helpful, and how often do you think it's just someone choosing to be a dick?

After all, even if somebody is absolutely horrible at something, and even if you decide to be completely honest about something, there is a point where you have to ask yourself if saying that Rabies would be more enjoyable or something along those lines is taking it a bit too far.

After all, being honest doesn't mean you are right.

Anyway, what do you guys think. Discuss.

~Shakes fist at tropers.~

Discuss.

It all depends on whether it's necessary. If a friend gives you the blunt truth when you're just not getting it or doing the wrong thing, then it's both a really hard and really kind thing for them to do; they're risking making you angry because they think that you deserve to be better. But if they're just telling you what you already know or being brutally honest at at time when you don't need it (high stress or something) then it's pretty selfish and rude.

Though of course, Not all characters who use Brutal Honesty are doing it on purpose. There are a lot of characters who do it without realizing because that's simply the way their mind works.

And in a lot of occasions, Brutal Honesty can be the least offensive to go about something, as sometimes euphemisms come across as shifty and sugarcoating the truth. Sometimes it is best for the characters to just be blunt.

Most of the time the offensive truth is better than the sugary lie. I have no problem with either.

What if said offensive truth is completely subjective.

ie, the person is being honest, but their opinion is flawed.

Also, what if it was possible to tell the truth without even being so offensive in the first place. Basically using Baseball bat when a softer touch would have gotten the same point across?

I think that characters that use brutal honesty as a defence can be very unlikeable when they're being disingenuous jerks.

For example, it seems disingenuous saying "Your soup tastes like diesel fuel mixed with dogshit" is 'honest'. It's not like the character has tasted that combo before (I hope). It's more of a hyperbolic insult. Stories sometimes treat this as 'brutal honesty', which makes it unsympathetic to me, because it's a stretch calling it 'honest'.

In other cases, it depends on the story and the writing. I think brutal honesty can actually be a good source of humour when the story treats it realistically. I think the same goes for hyperbolic insults, when they're treated like insults or hyperbole or bluntness rather than 'honesty'.

I think Brutal Honesty can be a good character trait, but it depends how realistically it's portrayed.

edited 11th May '14 12:33:41 AM by editerguy

same here. In any group you need somebody who is willing to speak up when everybody else is ignoring the proverbial elephant in the room while it's eating the drapes and shitting on the carpet. Sometimes there are just things that there really is no polite way to say them. For example if you've got a friend or relative who always offends other company at your house or social gatherings with their overbearing political beliefs or racist/sexist/homophobic jokes you need to say something or else you start to look bad by association.

On the other hand a character who tries to use "honesty" as an excuse to be a tactless asshole should be called on it. It's just like a douchebag who always insults people or plays malicious pranks and then hides behind saying "I was only joking" to avoid a well deserved asswhooping.

Brutal honesty is okay, but yeah, I see a lot of people using it as an excuse to make total asshole characters. That's not really the point to me, and it's also tiring. The character isn't even cool or anything.

I think that the intention -whether it is used dickishly or harshly-but-helpfully- depends on the character themselves. The effectiveness depends on the situation at hand. To make a probably shallow analogy: Some problems need blunt hammers, but subtle screwdrivers will be more effective in other situations. By itself though, just a trait, a tool, just like a hammer: equally effective at driving home a nail as it is at cracking a skull.

edited 11th May '14 5:04:00 AM by LittleBillyHaggardy

Most people say they want Brutal Honesty, but few truly mean it. Still, it's a vital trait for the Honest Advisor, and a Reasonable Authority Figure can rapidly establish himself as such by taking such honesty in stride.

And of course, brutal honesty has to be... well, honest. And preferably with a critical intent to help people correct or improve, not merely to torment or amuse one's self.

Others may argue, but I personally think Kitchen Nightmares is a pretty good demonstration of how to do brutal honesty right in the real world. Occasionally there's some hyperbole, but mostly it's telling people what they need to know so they don't fuck themselves over.

edited 11th May '14 7:41:19 AM by KillerClowns

Then here's the kicker, what if it really does?

Then the eating habits of the critic are even worse than the culinary skills of the cook?

It depends for me. On one hand, when in a situation where sugary lies and all are always there to keep the peace or for some reason, being brutally honest is a trait I do like.

On the other hand, characters who view themselves as people who don't sugarcoat things and say that they don't hesitate to say out the bitter truth often gives me the impression that they're just naive and trying to appear as mature and straightforward when they're not, which annoys me a whole lot.

there is a rather distinct difference between stating your feelings flat without regard for the actual consequences (be they positive or negative), and saying what you feel but with an additional layer of spite and contempt.

alas, that difference is not "one is not brutally honest" and thus this horrible version of brutally honest will continue to pop up, and will continue to be treated exactly the same (aka, as a desirable trait, if a little harsh at times) more often than i care for just the same.

There's a difference between brutal honesty and honestly brutal.

^note For instance: my high-school theater teacher. I could have told her she was extremely overweight, and needed to diet and exercise. That would have been brutally honest. If I, instead, told her was that she needed to stop making excuses for her own bad habits, and that eating wouldn't fill the hole that her feelings of inadequacy for never making anything more of her passions than unintelligible gibberish... That would have been, honestly, brutal.

edited 14th May '14 5:38:25 PM by Poisonarrow

If the character is supposed to be sympathetic, have them be just as straightforward when saying honest, true positive things.

Gestalt therapy can be a brutal "in your face" technique. It has it's many, many critics and yet it has many therapists who use it. Many will outright tell a client "You are lying to me" or call them on their B.S. For some, it's a relief. For others, it's why they hate therapists...

Characters who hate brutal honesty may not like that it cuts to close to home. Some are needy emo balls of Wangst who want attention, others are just too hurt. And some are lying. Honesty is not their friend.

And when the "honest" character is wrong then that's another can of pepsi all together. Some characters can be so wraped up in being "right" they can't see that they're off by a country mile (or 1.6 rural kilometers for you metric fans). Others are just that clueless they keep pressing the point even if they are wrong because they can't read the other character.

This is more to do with Real Life people than characters, but I've always found that most people who boast of their Brutal Honesty enjoy the brutality more than the honesty. To the point of using the latter as cover for the former—quick to criticize but slow to compliment, etc.

^ Indeed. To me that's what makes it Brutal Honesty in the first place: it's honesty with a total disregard for how it affects the person it's inflicted on, or even a degree of enjoyment in knowing that it will hurt.

• Tactful Honesty: I like the green dress better.
• Honesty: That dress isn't the most flattering one you have.
• Blunt Honesty: That dress doesn't look very good on you.
• Brutal Honesty: You look fat in that dress, and the color makes you look sick.

There's Brutal Honesty and then there's brutal honesty.

Telling someone they need to lose weight vs. giving them "The idiot's guide to weight loss".

Some characters just don't get tact. Some are sadist a-holes who just don't care. And some are a mix inbetween. They mean well, but they think that being a Jerkass is "tough love" or some non-sense.