h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Plain speaking has its place.
The Talking Point asks : Do you have a friend who isn't afraid to say what they think – no matter what the consequences?
Personally, I wouldn't want any other kind of friend. Within a true friendship, there should be no need for conventions of diplomacy.
Then : Is honest speaking always a good thing?
No. Stark truth usually upsets some of the people who hear it. In many cases, the best thing to say is the thing that pulls everyone together, regardless of its literal truth. By the same token, the world wouldn't be a better place if everybody said what was really on their minds. What's in a lot of people's minds isn't really true anyway. We all have a personalised version of the truth.
Discussing perceptions to understand each other's experience is (usually) a good thing, but the problem with plain speakers is that they tend to be prescriptive. They're not out to share and weigh experience. They're out to make their own case, and they use the shock value of impolite behaviour as a means to carry an argument. Plain speakers often have a conviction that they're right about the subject, whereas in reality individuals are almost never wholly right about anything.
And the world would indeed be a more straightforward place if we didn't lie, but dream on. The question in the Talking Point suggests a belief that lying is a conscious and deliberate act. In my experience and that of everyone I've discussed this with, that's a preposterous assertion. Lying is a subconscious reflex. Trying to straighten out the lie, and thereby compounding it, is a rational act, but most social liars have no idea why they said what they said in the first place.
White lies are frequently more than acceptable; they're necessary. They are part of the currency of respect.
Coming back to friendship, I think you can define friendship as the level of a relationship at which total honesty becomes acceptable to the parties. For all relationships short of that, some measure of diplomacy is needed, and brutal honesty should then only be a last resort when all the euphemism and allusion has failed to get an important message across.

Hi Pin,

There's a lot to what you say. Almost all of us have our opinions formed by other people; original thoughts are few and far between.

What do they say, "Those that matter don't mind and those who mind don't matter."? Just about says it.

Does my arse look fat in this hypothetical context?