I’ve lived my whole life hearing people say, “I’ll be brutally honest…” before they offer some harsh nugget that’s supposedly designed to help or enlighten the listener. The use of the word “brutal” is misleading. Most people don’t actually want to be brutal, they want to be naked.

Merriam Webster defines brutal as cruel, cold-blooded, harsh, severe and ruthless or unfeeling. That’s not what most people are intending when they offer truths. Most of us use the word “brutal” when what we mean is “naked.” We’re offering unvarnished, straightforward truth-telling designed to aid the listener. There’s a big chasm between the violence of brutal truths and the tenderness of naked truths. 

I might not want to hear a naked truth, yet I know when my friend or teacher offers it to me, it’s given with my growth and wellbeing in mind. It might hurt. It’ll probably be uncomfortable and perhaps even a truth I don’t want to know. AND it’s something the other person feels I need to know because they care about me.

Those people who are offering brutal honesty without your wellbeing in mind, don’t actually care about the truth. They care about the brutality. They want to hurt you. It’s word-based violence and the conversation is so much more about them than it is about you. It’s these wolves in sheep’s clothing who are hiding behind the idea of “I thought you should know…” to cover up their own feelings of insecurity, pain and unresolved anger. It’s schadenfreude at it’s finest.

Give me the hard truths. Tell me you care by kindly and tenderly sharing with me the truths I need to know. Be naked with your truth-telling, give me that respect. The world is brutal enough. I don’t need it in my honesty.

LB Adams is the Founder of Practical Dramatics, headquartered in Charleston, SC, providing interactive, theatre-based communication skills training.  She is the author of The Irreverent Guide to Spectacular Communication, available in paperback, ebook and audiobook.