Is it unethical or dishonest to hide your opinion on the media narrative from your friends?
Recently, Alice (one of my growing group of wonderful paid subscribers) posed two questions on a comment thread.
The first had to do with class consciousness in the age of Covid, etc. and I may make a post or podcast about this soon.
Alice’s second question was: “Is it unethical/dishonest to hide one's own opinions on the gov't-corporate media narrative from one's friends?”
Of course, I could go on and on trying to answer this one. For now, I’ll say that the last line of the Beatitudes popped into my head: “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness.”
Then again, if I wanted to suggest discretion over valor, I could’ve just as easily quoted: “Blessed are the peacemakers.”
So… I’ll put the question to you — with two caveats:
Firstly, I apologize in advance for not being able to keep up in the comments section.
Secondly, I realize that virtually everyone reading this has awful stories to tell about being rejected and abandoned by loved ones. I’m not trying to silence you but, if you choose to participate, please answer the question as it was originally worded:
“Is it unethical/dishonest to hide one's own opinions on the gov't-corporate media narrative from one's friends?”
Thanks in advance…
Unethical? No.
I'm playing the long game, as someone has already said. I started a new job 6 months ago and am busy building up a reputation with my colleagues as someone who is very level headed, reliable, and knowledgeable about current events.
I am gradually slipping counter narrative things into conversation.
Sometimes they look startled....because I'm a 'nice', and 'educated' (I have a PhD) lady they don't expect me to deviate from the mainstream narrative. The cognitive dissonance is good for snapping them out of the mainstream hypnosis.
But having said that, my loved ones know exactly what I think.
Not dishonest. I choose my battles carefully and assess people as best I can before speaking frankly. Timing and context matter greatly. I try to play a long game when it comes to persuasion and, whenever possible, I try to have something practicable to demonstrate. On rare occasions, with loved ones, I will deploy all my social capital to get something across. After that, I back off.