Wikileaks and the Truth/Trust Dilemma

Truth and trust bear an impor­tant rela­tion­ship to one anoth­er. In fact, it could be said that they only oper­ate togeth­er effec­tive­ly when they are part­ners in the cre­ation or redemp­tion of human rela­tion­ships. In that regard they serve with­in a self-rein­forc­ing cycle. We can’t live well with­out either’s contribution. 

Too often in my work with clients, I see peo­ple come down on one or the oth­er side of the equa­tion. Imag­ine two indi­vid­u­als, one of whom says to the oth­er, “I’d like to trust you, but how can I unless you tell me the truth.” And the oth­er who says, “I’d tell you the truth but how can I if I don’t real­ly trust you.” Of course, these two (and we) may not use those exact words, but their (and our) words do com­mu­ni­cate that exact mes­sage. It is so easy to form a sta­sis and a block, a state of half-trust, half-truth that is extreme­ly dif­fi­cult to influ­ence. And then we try to live with it. But, of course, it is not sat­is­fy­ing. Below the sur­face there is unhap­pi­ness; anger, dis­ap­point­ment, frus­tra­tion and pain.

How can we get past this dilem­ma? I could tell more of the truth in order for you to trust, but that would require a risk. — Or — I could trust you in the hope it would make it eas­i­er for you to tell the truth in return. But that requires a risk, too. And we’d both have to be com­mit­ted to some­thing high­er, some­thing that would draw us to con­nect with one anoth­er, find our part­ner­ship, syn­er­gy, and com­mon ground — in the face of that pain.

Wik­ileaks is a clas­sic exam­ple of try­ing to force the issue. If the truth is on the table, the assump­tion is that peo­ple will be forced to look at a dif­fer­ent way of doing busi­ness. No secrets lead­ing to a bet­ter world. How­ev­er, if trans­paren­cy is demand­ed through invol­un­tary expo­sure rather than by invi­ta­tion, the result in my expe­ri­ence most often just cre­ates (or bet­ter said) con­tin­ues a rag­ing war of the spir­it. Truth alone can be a killing force, and can lead to waves of retal­i­a­tion and revenge. To be suc­cess­ful, a mean­ing­ful and last­ing pos­i­tive influ­ence, truth must be paired with trust, and that is the chal­lenge of human beings, to find more and bet­ter ways to do this. Oh yes, and of course, trust with­out truth is an oxy­moron, too often a com­pact among thieves. We need to have both.

I have to tell you that I admire what Julian Assange is doing and try­ing to do. He is a rev­o­lu­tion­ary and a hero­ic fig­ure. I hap­pened to watch this video inter­view of him from TED. In it, in response to a ques­tion about his guid­ing val­ues, he says, “Capa­ble, gen­er­ous men nur­ture vic­tims, not cre­ate them.” It’s a pow­er­ful and hon­est state­ment, and he is clear about his own chal­lenges with the nur­tur­ing part of that equa­tion, acknowl­edg­ing his ten­den­cy to be “com­bat­ive.” But, of course, you will also hear how his words divide the world among per­pe­tra­tors, vic­tims, and res­cuers and if you start there, with the world divid­ed in that way, then the actions, lim­its and dra­ma of Wik­ileaks all nat­u­ral­ly fol­low on their world-wide stage. I am admir­ing, and I also believe that the approach is only half of what’s need­ed; both vital and insufficient. 

Whether it’s a nation state, an orga­ni­za­tion, a team, or only you and me, what it comes down to is this chal­lenge: to put it togeth­er. Truth and trust. Trust and truth. If you want to know what this is like, just ask your­self, “What could we be if we expressed our truth with deep care for those who must hear it,” and also, “What if we trust­ed oth­ers enough to active­ly invite their truths, even if it was hard, painful, and embar­rass­ing for us to hear?”

Per­haps you will find this all naive. 

Nev­er­the­less, I’m just saying.

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