Ethical Wisdom for Friends by Mark Matousek

Author:Mark Matousek
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ethical, wisdom, friends, navigate, life, complicated, curious, common, relationship, dilemmas
Publisher: Health Communications, Inc.
Published: 2013-05-13T00:00:00+00:00

FOURTEEN

When Friends Lie

Beth had known Christopher a long time before she realized that he was a liar. Not a fibber. Not an occasional truth stretcher. Not a change-the-facts-to-spare-someone’s-feelings-once-in-a-while fabricator. But a conscience-free, habitual liar who used misinformation and glaring omission to shape his image in the world and get ahead with his tall tales.

Beth was not a gullible person—but she was idealistic about honesty between friends. She’d been raised to believe that friendship was a sacred contract between people guaranteeing truth and transparency. Beth assumed that such candor was something respected by all friends. This is how assumptions trap us and outfit us with ethical blinders. Assumptions about friends can blind us to facts. Assumptions are “heuristic devices,” emotional shorthand, that invite us to stop observing closely or take in information contradictory to what we already know (stereotyping serves the same social function). It’s impossible to live without assumptions about our friends—imagine having to reappraise every friendship with each new encounter—but these assumptions come with built-in blind spots, as Beth came to realize with Christopher.

Her wake-up began with Christopher’s lie about his father’s funeral. Christopher was voluntarily estranged from his family, whom he blamed for everything wrong with his life, although he was almost forty. Like many neurotics engaged in perennial therapy, Christopher blamed his present on his past. He’d invented a self-excusing mythology around parental neglect that he suffered as a child. Christopher’s parents were the villains of this myth wherein he was unloved, unseen, and misunderstood. He had incorporated this myth of childhood neglect as an excuse for all of his personal failings and banished his parents from his life as a way of keeping this fiction alive. Then Christopher’s father died.

As it happened, Beth and Christopher were watching TV at his house when the call came from his mother. “Chris,” an old lady’s voice said on the message machine, “Daddy’s gone. Please call me back. I hope that you can come down for the funeral.” Beth was surprised by the affection in Christopher’s mother’s voice. She sounded nothing like the sadistic monster he had made her out to be. “Please call me back. I miss you, Chris. It’s Mama.”

Christopher ignored the call and did not attend his father’s funeral. Although Beth was confused by this decision, she knew better than to lecture him on the subject of filial piety. When Christopher explained to Beth that his mother’s call had been nothing but a ruse—that she didn’t really want him to come—Beth did her best to believe this far-fetched story. Families are mysterious systems whose codes and signs are hard to decipher when you’re inside them; from the outside, it’s next to impossible to know for sure what is going on. Beth convinced herself that Christopher was telling the truth and attempted to mind her own business. Then the revealing lie was spoken and she realized that her friend was a faker. They were having dinner with their friend Larry a few weeks after Christopher’s father’s death.

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