Does social unity require lying?

[Neko-koku]

(Warning: This OP requires a non-theistic worldview)

Since humans are usually absurdly irrational and poor at fact-checking the cheapest way to promote social unity and decrease defection seems to be lying. All major political factions regularly lie shamelessly. All states produce nationalist or SJ pseudohistory. Familism is one of the least challenged and most widely believed lies in history because it is largely a product of evolution and predates humanity. Numerous people work hard for every dollar....but give everything they have to their wives and children instead of investing or enjoying what they deserve to enjoy. Natalist ideologies filled most of the world with borderline starving people and caused the world to be a Malthusian hell which is only rectified thanks to contraception.

It is not true that lying is inherently required for social unity to exist. However in practice that's what usually happens. This leads to an interesting phenomenon: trustworthiness correlates with belief in pro-social lies and negatively correlates with knowledge and intelligence. Anti-intellectualism is inevitable because intelligence and knowledge are indeed simple and fairly reliable markers of untrustworthiness. Later other memes such as nerdism evolved to resolve the issue of knowledge and social unity being negatively correlated. Nerds often have above average amount of knowledge in some domain. However they are more trustworthy than non-nerds with comparable level of intelligence and knowledge because they are socially less capable and hence less capable of defecting.

I'm not sure whether nerdism provides a good resolution to the problem of social unity usually being achieved by lying. What do you guys think?

[Valentine Z]

Sometimes I think the world will be better if we lie down, have a talk, and just chill.

Wait, it's not that type of lying? Blast.

---

For the OP itself... I think just trying to be as honest as possible will help. Better to have a hurtful truth now, than to have a lie that hurts absolutely everyone and breaks trust later in the future. Though of course, I think being 100% truthful all the time could be a bit... err, unproductive. Being too honest (and blunt) could hurt relations, but that doesn't mean that I am going to be a compulsive liar.

[Rojava Free State]

Kinda. Many of our unifying myths as nations and people's are lies. I mean seriously we say in america all men are created equal but those words were written by slave holders. If our founding fathers believing in equality isn't a myth, I don't know what is

[MineLegotia and Equestria]

Social Unity doesn't need lying. Instead, it needs Omission. You omit the differences, and leave the same things, people can easily unite . But over time, we will find out of the differences, and that will divide, big groups will unite around smaller and more specific concepts, such as race, and belief, over a nationalist fiction.

Soon, once that is dealt with, soon they'll on their own diffreneces between people within their own race, like morality, and priorities. Social Unity requires Omission, not lying

[Pacomia]

In theory, no.
In practice, probably. If people knew what things were really like, especially in the case of the universe, some might not take comfort in it like atheists but instead spend their whole life freaking out that there’s no omnipotent being watching their every move. And even in an atheistic society, there would probably still be a lot of lying, since, oddly, sometimes you have to lie to make people trust you. Either way, it’d just be a whole lot of lying. I think the first paragraph in the OP sums it up pretty well.

[LimaUniformNovemberAlpha]

"SJ" history? As in social justice history?

Anyway, I'd need a source on the trust inversely correlating with knowledge, because if you're referring to Trump supporters, I think it's just a case of tapping into the racial biases that even otherwise knowledgeable people sometimes have. (Yes, it's about racism. It's plainly obvious from how much his supporters obsess over the idea of a border wall.)

We need more honesty. Not overnight; too much brutal honesty at a time might be too much for some to handle; but a gradual cultural shift to it as a society. If this takes some future President citing Trump's history of contradicting himself, juxtaposed with his policies, to get the ball rolling on convincing people does more harm than good, so be it. (Too many people are stuck in a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" about lying.)

[Neko-koku]

Sometimes I think the world will be better if we lie down, have a talk, and just chill.

Wait, it's not that type of lying? Blast.

---

For the OP itself... I think just trying to be as honest as possible will help. Better to have a hurtful truth now, than to have a lie that hurts absolutely everyone and breaks trust later in the future. Though of course, I think being 100% truthful all the time could be a bit... err, unproductive. Being too honest (and blunt) could hurt relations, but that doesn't mean that I am going to be a compulsive liar.

What about the truth that Serbs and Croats aren't that different from each other? The truth that Greeks and Turks aren't that different from each other? The truth that Sephardic Jews and Palestinians being genetically very close? The truth that Christianity and Islam aren't that different from each other? The truth that there is actually racial differences of average IQ? The truth that male power is inherently based on nothing but pure violence and blackmailing?

[Soviet Tankistan]

Social unity will never happen, the closest chance is self extermination of the species.

[Pacomia]

Social unity will never happen, the closest chance is self extermination of the species.

I think this is supposed to be a hypothetical.

[Neko-koku]

In theory, no.
In practice, probably. If people knew what things were really like, especially in the case of the universe, some might not take comfort in it like atheists but instead spend their whole life freaking out that there’s no omnipotent being watching their every move. And even in an atheistic society, there would probably still be a lot of lying, since, oddly, sometimes you have to lie to make people trust you. Either way, it’d just be a whole lot of lying. I think the first paragraph in the OP sums it up pretty well.

Two comments:

1. Atheists and other secular people have actually made up and do believe in a lot of unity-boosting lies. The worst offenders are of course numerous ethnicity-based beliefs. If you look at the textbook conflict between Spain and Catalonia for example you can see how both sides weaponizes education.

2. Ironically religion if true can not serve the role of unity booster well. If a religious sect is actually answerable to one or multiple deities then it pretty much can not be changed for any social, economic or political reason. Since rewards and punishment in religious afterlife outweights any mundane gains and losses. Any "pragmatic concern" by secular standards are just minor concerns if a deity or deities actually exist in the same sense that the convenience that can be gained by stealing a buck is a minor concern compared to the threat of an arrest.

Religion as unity booster actually requires something intellectually very weird but amazingly achievable among humans. For that to work such a religion needs to be false so that religious leaders and the public can change it over time without a deity or deities stopping them...and at the same time it needs to be widely believed...AND such a belief needs to be de facto acceptance of the authority of doctrine-changing religious leaders to interpret it 100% correctly.

[Otira]

Kinda. Many of our unifying myths as nations and people's are lies. I mean seriously we say in america all men are created equal but those words were written by slave holders. If our founding fathers believing in equality isn't a myth, I don't know what is

The man who wrote it owned slaves but was at heart also an abolitionist who originally tried to also condemn the slave trade in the same document. He was very aware that the system he was a part of was wrong and wanted to change it. So it doesn't make it a myth but something of an acknowledgement of our human failings. He supported gradual emancipation and banning the extension of slavery into new territories. He even proposed a national plan to end slavery at one point.

But he didn't free most of his own slaves because he was in debt and living in the agricultural society of the time he couldn't free them all without ruining himself financially. Since he worked to end slavery through his lifetime, it was probably a fair wager on his part that he could accomplish more for those people in the long-run profiting off their labor by creating a place for them in the world than he could just freeing them and exposing them without protection to that unready world.

I feel for the people he owned, but I can stand back and objectively analyze why he did it without assuming he meant to lie about everything he said. I think we've all been the hypocrite at some point or another in our lives, espousing an idea while failing to live up to it. I don't think Jefferson was a perfect man, but I applaud that he worked to end a practice he knew was wrong.

[MineLegotia and Equestria]

Sometimes I think the world will be better if we lie down, have a talk, and just chill.

Wait, it's not that type of lying? Blast.

---

For the OP itself... I think just trying to be as honest as possible will help. Better to have a hurtful truth now, than to have a lie that hurts absolutely everyone and breaks trust later in the future. Though of course, I think being 100% truthful all the time could be a bit... err, unproductive. Being too honest (and blunt) could hurt relations, but that doesn't mean that I am going to be a compulsive liar.

What about the truth that Serbs and Croats aren't that different from each other? The truth that Greeks and Turks aren't that different from each other? The truth that Sephardic Jews and Palestinians being genetically very close? The truth that Christianity and Islam aren't that different from each other? The truth that there is actually racial differences of average IQ? The truth that male power is inherently based on nothing but pure violence and blackmailing?

Truth is a hard thing to accept, and remember we're humans. We believe in ideas that have no claim in reality other than our minds, and we try to show signs of our ideas in reality.

Add on to the fact, that we may not even agree on what is the truth! For example in the quote above, i already disagree with... two of them! Man's pride will cause us to fight over the truth, well, what we claim is the truth. For example, i disagree with the last statement on the quote above, i will say, what about the female rulers then? That they do not do the same? See what i did? I tried to show signs that my idea is the truth by trying to show the counter evidence in reality.

Social Unity is a fickle concept, Man can easily be turned on each other when important people say symbols mean something because they say so. Man will never truly unite, we are too prideful, we will fight each other over small details, beliefs, looks, genetics, and even more.

[Scomagia]

To an extent, I suppose, at least inasmuch as lies of omission are often necessary. Telling outright falsehoods, in my experience, tends to end badly for the liar. I tell as few lies as I can manage, even when I bear consequences for doing so. As a result, some people don't especially like me because I'm too honest, but people I know generally trust the things I say even if they don't like me all that much. I think that can be extended out to society at large. Lying may keep a sort of false peace and unity but it isn't necessary.

[-Ocelot-]

I don't think so.

Since humans are usually absurdly irrational and poor at fact-checking the cheapest way to promote social unity and decrease defection seems to be lying. All major political factions regularly lie shamelessly. All states produce nationalist or SJ pseudohistory.

Ultra-radical centrism.

[Gagium]

Omission is all that's really needed to make yourself look purely good in a speech or whatever, at least in theory. In reality though, there's always people, media outlets, other politicians, or whatever who's going to look at that and say, "But what about what's happened with your policies and ISSUE Y or ISSUE X?" Now that they've brought up a point that makes yourself look bad that you can't just 'omit', you need to lie. So in truth, at least in a state where political dissent is legal and widely available, lying is necessary for social unity in regards to whatever power is in charge. At least in a system like ours in the US where your goal in every election is to get elected and remove the other party from office. In a state where political dissent isn't available or is illegal, sure, you probably *could* just rely on omission, as there's nobody to make you look bad (That isn't or won't be thrown in jail). Most dictatorships and totalitarian states, if not all, have or do utilize propaganda that amounts to outright lies, however.

[Nouveau Yathrib]

Lying by omission is still technically lying.

[Bienenhalde]

What about the truth that Serbs and Croats aren't that different from each other? The truth that Greeks and Turks aren't that different from each other? The truth that Sephardic Jews and Palestinians being genetically very close? The truth that Christianity and Islam aren't that different from each other? The truth that there is actually racial differences of average IQ? The truth that male power is inherently based on nothing but pure violence and blackmailing?

And maybe it would be better if more people knew these things. Except for the part about racial differences in IQ, because I fear that it could be distorted and misinterpreted.

[Chan Island]

No. It's possible to build social unity on a foundation of truth, and we ought to.

[Neko-koku]

No. It's possible to build social unity on a foundation of truth, and we ought to.

How?

[Ostroeuropa]

No. It's possible to build social unity on a foundation of truth, and we ought to.

How?

personally I think you can build a national myth as a unifying tale while acknowledging it is mythology and is merely allegory for the values we want people to hold.

It's one reason I think the left wing is pissing people off. They've gone after the "Western world" mythology of liberty/democracy/justice/science/progress throughout the ages and so on and aggressively attacked people who repeat it because it ignores historical reality of racism and so on, which is functionally no different to turning up to native americans and saying they're fucking stupid backward hicks who don't understand how rivers work and its nothing to do with a river spirit so they're not allowed to repeat that senseless trash anymore and instead have to sit around talking about river dynamics.

It's kierkegards madness infecting an entire political movement.
(A madman escapes an asylum and realizes that everyone will soon know he is mad and send him back, and so resolves only to say true and uncontroversial things to avoid this. Needless to say, he is quickly recognized for a madman, and committed to the asylum.).

Instead of attempting to crowbar off the mythology and have people appreciate it at the same time as knowing it is not literally true, they sought to destroy the mythology, and one result is the rapid rise in white supremacy because if you tell people they can't have their mythology unless they are racist, big shocker, they're gonna be racists a lot of the time rather than give it up.

[-Ocelot-]

How?

personally I think you can build a national myth as a unifying tale while acknowledging it is mythology and is merely allegory for the values we want people to hold.

It's one reason I think the left wing is pissing people off. They've gone after the "Western world" mythology of liberty/democracy/justice/science/progress throughout the ages and so on and aggressively attacked people who repeat it because it ignores historical reality of racism and so on, which is functionally no different to turning up to native americans and saying they're fucking stupid backward hicks who don't understand how rivers work and its nothing to do with a river spirit so they're not allowed to repeat that senseless trash anymore and instead have to sit around talking about river dynamics.

It's kierkegards madness infecting an entire political movement.
(A madman escapes an asylum and realizes that everyone will soon know he is mad and send him back, and so resolves only to say true and uncontroversial things to avoid this. Needless to say, he is quickly recognized for a madman, and committed to the asylum.).

Instead of attempting to crowbar off the mythology and have people appreciate it at the same time as knowing it is not literally true, they sought to destroy the mythology, and one result is the rapid rise in white supremacy because if you tell people they can't have their mythology unless they are racist, big shocker, they're gonna be racists a lot of the time rather than give it up.

Myth literally means "lie".

[Kowani]

Not necessarily. A national myth based on truth will last longer than one buil on lies.

[-Ocelot-]

Not necessarily. A national myth based on truth will last longer than one buil on lies.

That's still a lie with extra steps.

[Neanderthaland]

OP's weird obsession with Social Justice is weird.

But it does seem to. Or at least I can't think of a society that doesn't seem to have some kind of highly-embellished national myth.

[Ostroeuropa]

personally I think you can build a national myth as a unifying tale while acknowledging it is mythology and is merely allegory for the values we want people to hold.

It's one reason I think the left wing is pissing people off. They've gone after the "Western world" mythology of liberty/democracy/justice/science/progress throughout the ages and so on and aggressively attacked people who repeat it because it ignores historical reality of racism and so on, which is functionally no different to turning up to native americans and saying they're fucking stupid backward hicks who don't understand how rivers work and its nothing to do with a river spirit so they're not allowed to repeat that senseless trash anymore and instead have to sit around talking about river dynamics.

It's kierkegards madness infecting an entire political movement.
(A madman escapes an asylum and realizes that everyone will soon know he is mad and send him back, and so resolves only to say true and uncontroversial things to avoid this. Needless to say, he is quickly recognized for a madman, and committed to the asylum.).

Instead of attempting to crowbar off the mythology and have people appreciate it at the same time as knowing it is not literally true, they sought to destroy the mythology, and one result is the rapid rise in white supremacy because if you tell people they can't have their mythology unless they are racist, big shocker, they're gonna be racists a lot of the time rather than give it up.

Myth literally means "lie".

You can then at least be self-aware about it is the point.