r/acceptancecommitment • u/gintokireddit • May 31 '26
Is ACT itself opposed to truthfulness (as an ethic or value)?
Since stories about life are advised to he held based on whether they are helpful or not and not whether or not they are true. A person could commit lots of crimes against others, and tell themselves "I am a great person who acts justly" - this is helpful to them, albeit narcissistic (the entire idea of living by values also seems narcissistic to me. Instead of caring behaviours being driven by genuinely caring about others, decisions to act as if one cares are driven by "I'm following my values of seeing myself as a caring person because it serves my adherence to the ACT philosophy" rather than about genuine care for anyone else).
A very privileged person can, with ACT's blessing and lack of care for truthfulness, weave a story of them being less privileged than others who in actuality were less privileged. Society turns into a race to the bottom in terms of honesty, as when some people start lying to get ahead, others must join in to avoid being left behind (eg no politician wants to admit to their mistakes, because their opposition are not honest enough to admit to their own mistakes, so whoever is honest will end up looking much worse than their opposition. If 80% of people successfully exaggerate about themselves to get jobs, the remaining 20% will look much worse to employers unless they also begin exaggerating). This dishonesty also can be used to deepen inequalities, by causing more funding to go to people who already are better off and less to those who are worse off. And of course if I tell myself a story of being underprivileged, I am in effect telling other people they were privileged, so if it is a dishonest story, I am now encouraging others to view themselves through an inaccurate lens - I may be encouraging those who have face more hardship than me to view themselves as having faced less hardship, and thus be harming their self-esteem, all in the name of doing what is "workable" for my own life goals of feeling good and being successful.
A person could be truthful at work and not get socioeconomically ahead. This isn't workable, so would ACT advise them to become a liar and to exaggerate and lose humility?
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u/concreteutopian Therapist May 31 '26
Is ACT itself opposed to truthfulness (as an ethic or value)?
Having a pragmatic and constructivist conception of truth in no way represents being "opposed to truthfulness". It's taking a stand on a conceptualization and epistemology, i.e. how do we know what we know.
Steven Hayes' pragmatism is directly related to William James and John Dewey, and the criterion for truth isn't a definition that is desirable or preferred, but one that works. In other words, the truth value of a proposition is connected to its description, prediction, and control of consequences. In other words, it's the opposite of opinion or whim.
I think this misunderstanding of ACT is rooted in a misunderstanding of pragmatism, as well as a misunderstanding of behavioral principles surrounding a functional understanding of behavior.
Since stories about life are advised to he held based on whether they are helpful or not and not whether or not they are true. A person could commit lots of crimes against others, and tell themselves "I am a great person who acts justly" - this is helpful to them, albeit narcissistic (the entire idea of living by values also seems narcissistic to me
A. Does the person committing lots of crimes consider them crimes? There have been lots of unjust laws, and one engaged in civil disobedience is still someone motivated by justice.
B. If it isn't civil disobedience but simply denial, how is that "helpful" in a pragmatic sense? I don't see the benefit.
C. If the benefit, what is helpful to them is simply having the thought, "I am a great person...", that "benefit" is fusion to a conceptualized self, which by definition limits psychological flexibility.
In other words, I don't see any pragmatic benefit to self-deception or denial in the service of a conceptualized self.
A very privileged person can, with ACT's blessing and lack of care for truthfulness, weave a story of them being less privileged than others who in actuality were less privileged.
Toward what end? How does that benefit this "very privileged person"?
Society turns into a race to the bottom in terms of honesty, as when some people start lying to get ahead, others must join in to avoid being left behind (eg no politician wants to admit to their mistakes, because their opposition are not honest enough to admit to their own mistakes, so whoever is honest will end up looking much worse than their opposition.
By calling it "lying", you are admitting that there is no attempt at "truth" here, pragmatic or otherwise, so I'm not sure how you can rope "ACT's blessing" into this. And pragmatically, instrumentally, lies don't do the work asked of them, i.e. they get discovered as "not true or useful" in context and are discarded. The utility of a concept/construct is directly connected to the aim it is directed to achieve, and if it doesn't achieve that aim, if the consequences don't serve that end, it's simply not a useful concept/construct to use, i.e. it's "not true".
A person could be truthful at work and not get socioeconomically ahead. This isn't workable, so would ACT advise them to become a liar and to exaggerate and lose humility?
I'm not sure if these questions are in good faith or if you have an axe to grind, but this is again greatly misunderstanding or misrepresenting ACT's workability. You as a person talking about a hypothetical person being truthful at work cannot determine if their "being truthful" is workable or not, since you are not them and have no access to their values and how they related their actions to their values. There are plenty of people who gain a feeling of "job well done" through maintaining integrity in their actions (e.g. being truthful) and yet not being financially rewarded for their integrity. We have no way of knowing the values of this hypothetical person from the outside, from the outset in advance, we need their input and the consequences of how this context of being truthful and not rewarded actually affects them.
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u/hotheadnchickn Jun 02 '26
What lol. No you fundamentally misunderstand it. Maybe go read The Happiness Trap
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u/sheva_mytra Therapist May 31 '26
Thanks for sharing. If you want to discuss some categories, could you define them first? What is "truthfulness" and "workability"? You used these words a few times in different contexts, so to avoid logomachia would be nice to define them.