Gimme Some Truth

I live in a very black and white world. There is the truth and there is everything else. It ties into my not being a good liar. I'm horrible at covering my tracks, so telling the truth means I don't have to invent a second story to cover the first one. It makes life a lot simpler.

But now we have 'alternative facts.'

By now you've heard about White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer and his statement that President Trump's inauguration crowd on January 20, 2017 was the largest ever. This flies in the face of demonstrable evidence that it wasn't. It seemed like if he was saying it was true, it automatically was.

There are three things that are needed for good PR to happen. Transparency, trust, and truth. When we aren't dealing with the truth, everything else just flies right out the window. I've felt that the White House press secretary's job is all about PR-- presenting the administration's side of the story within the parameters of the truth.

Now that the truth was handled somewhat loosely, for whatever reason, trust is lost. What are we supposed to believe? We've been lied to before, so why should we accept what's being said as truth?

Nine years ago, Dr. Mohammed A.S. El-Astal wrote an article asking whether honesty is an absolute PR value. In my mind, it is. But it's a fascinating question. From the synopsis on the IPRA website:

"IPRA members were discussing recently, via yahoo-groups.com, a UK debate among PR practitioners where a motion that ‘PR has a duty to tell the truth’ was defeated by 138 votes to 124."

On the surface, that seems a little disturbing. However, Dr. El-Astal did a little research (synopsis here) and found that honesty is not as scarce as it may seem. He found that respondents’ ethical judgments on four hypothetical practices tested in the study, regardless of their cultures and religions, were consistent with the IPRA Codes of Conduct as well as the literature written on honesty. The four practices were: 

1. Telling the public a lie on a matter of no real importance to protect the reputation of the institution you are working for; 
2. Telling the public a lie on a matter of real importance to protect the reputation of the institution you are working for; 
3. Telling the public a lie on a matter of no real importance to protect the reputation of and employee working in the institution you are working for; and 
4. Telling the public a lie on a matter of real importance to protect the reputation of and employee working in the institution you are working for. 

Dr. El-Astal's work found that, "...respondents’ ethical judgments on the four hypothetical practices tested in the study, regardless of their cultures and religions, came consistent with the IPRA Codes of Conduct as well as the literature written on honesty. Briefly, honesty outweighed all other considerations." 

So it's helpful and reassuring to know that honesty and truth were still held in high regard nine years ago when this research was done. Judging by what has been said since last Saturday, that's still true even when people are playing fast and loose with facts. 

It makes me hopeful that the truth is still out there. Hopefully the trust can be rebuilt because it's currently in shambles.