It is impossible that you should be sincere

‘I am sincere!’ she broke in, with more passion than he had ever imagined her capable of uttering.

‘I cannot call it sincerity. It is impossible that you should be sincere; you live in the latter end of the nineteenth century; the conditions of your birth and education forbid sincerity of this kind.’

George Gissing - A Life's Morning (1888)


An interesting passage where Gissing’s character says that it is not possible for people of a certain social class and education to be sincere in certain circumstances. Today we tend to call this hypocrisy, but it is useful to see it as a selective failure to acknowledge the real world, a failure to be sincere. 

Insincerity is one of the roots of woke culture, accounting for that strange ability to blend ersatz sincerity with blatant virtue-signalling. To outsiders, woke rhetoric seems insincere because it is. It is not rooted in the real world, but in a politically ersatz world where ersatz sincerity is correspondingly necessary. 

Today it is one of the problems faced by sceptics in a world where professional insincerity is no obstacle to advancement. It never was an obstacle of course. Yet although such cultural shifts are nebulous and diffuse, perhaps the value of sincerity has been eroded. It certainly seems like it.

A major problem faced by sceptics is that virtue-signalling is a widespread substitute for public sincerity, as are emotional outbursts, high-profile stunts, appeals to authority, arm waving and so on. But for sceptics there is a reliable guide through the swamp –

As for me, I will believe in no belief that does not make itself manifest by outward signs. I will think no preaching sincere that is not recommended by the practice of the preacher.

Anthony Trollope - Barchester Towers (1857)

This of course is the guide to sincerity which is not ersatz - outward signs. It is the guide in our day just as it was in Trollope’s. 

Today we know all about outward signs which point unerringly towards insincerity. The rich climate activist who travels by private jet, the celebrity with multiple houses, the journalist with a villa in a warmer climate, the callow young activist with wealthy parents.

It is impossible that you should be sincere...

But he would know what he meant

As what I now write will certainly never be read till I am dead, I may dare to say what no one now does dare to say in print, — though some of us whisper it occasionally into our friends’ ears. There are places in life which can hardly be well filled except by “Gentlemen.” The word is one the use of which almost subjects one to ignominy. If I say that a judge should be a gentleman, or a bishop, I am met with a scornful allusion to “Nature’s Gentlemen.”

Were I to make such an assertion with reference to the House of Commons, nothing that I ever said again would receive the slightest attention. A man in public life could not do himself a greater injury than by saying in public that the commissions in the army or navy, or berths in the Civil Service, should be given exclusively to gentlemen. He would be defied to define the term, — and would fail should he attempt to do so. But he would know what he meant, and so very probably would they who defied him.

Anthony Trollope – An Autobiography (1883)


Even in Trollope 's day this claim was not one to make out loud. Yet we need some way to define an honest, upright, incorruptible and experienced ideal by which we measure those who would rule over us. Some way to draw together the necessary threads of character without which we end up where we are now.

The current spat between Corbyn and Starmer highlights the problem. Neither man is fit for high political position. Corbyn is appalling and as one of his shadow ministers Starmer supported Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour party. A gentleman in the mould of Trollope’s ideal would look down his nose at both men and vote for neither.

Yet according to many mainstream commentators, Starmer has “dealt with” the Corbyn issue. In a sense he has, but he hasn’t dealt with the Starmer issue.

Priti Grim

It is to be regretted that no mental method of daguerreotype or photography has yet been discovered by which the characters of men can be reduced to writing and put into grammatical language with an unerring precision of truthful description.

Anthony Trollope - Barchester Towers (1857)

Priti Patel today backed police to confront people outside supermarkets, on park benches, stop cars to check if passengers are all from the same household and knock on doors to hunt for parties as officers pledged to fine everyone breaching Boris Johnson's lockdown laws.

The Home Secretary spoke out after Scotland Yard revealed officers will quiz citizens about why they are not shut away in their homes after four friends were fined £800 for travelling in the same car to McDonald's in Northamptonshire.

And yesterday police in Maidenhead in Berkshire stopped drivers outside Tesco and handed them leaflets asking: 'Why are you here?' in a clampdown on non-essential travel - despite shopping for food being allowed.

Ms Patel says that police should stop people who are outside to ask them why they are not at home and 'explain to them they should not necessarily be out unless it was for key reasons', adding that it is 'right' that the police confront people sitting on park benches. In the past two weeks more than 800 fines were issued for 'egregious' breaches of the coronavirus rules, she said.

What do we say as this disgusting totalitarian shambles goes on and on? How is it to be reduced to writing and put into grammatical language with an unerring precision of truthful description? 

Honesty is not cool

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a certain class of dishonesty, dishonesty magnificent in its proportions, and climbing into high places, has become at the same time so rampant and so splendid that there seems to be reason for fearing that men and women will be taught to feel that dishonesty, if it can become splendid, will cease to be abominable.

Anthony Trollope - The Way We Live Now (1875)

Something seems to be going wrong with the modern world, creating an enormous temptation to give it a single name to haul it into the public arena. The trouble is it has too many names and a fragmented impact on our lives, particularly via news sources, current affairs, political opinion, economic opinion and so on.

It isn’t political correctness although that is certainly a major symptom, but political correctness is just too amorphous and multi-faceted to encapsulate whatever is dragging us down, maligning what was good about the past, what our forebears achieved, what our culture achieved. Our culture that is - our Western culture, our decent, tolerant civilisation. Not the mythical good old days, but merely what was good, what was done well, what worked.

Yet the problem seems to circulate around something very familiar, something so old and so simple that it often slips into the background. That something is honesty, a virtue which has become lost in the complex opportunities created by modern life. Dishonesty has become simpler, easier to live with, profitable, convenient, supportive, emotionally satisfying, exciting, exalting, even cool. Dishonesty has too much going for it and honesty is not cool.

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In the past we have tacitly recognised the crucial importance of honesty by allocating special domains where honesty has to be enforced more or less rigorously because otherwise these essential domains would fail and damage the rest of society. Science, engineering, accountancy, medicine, history, banking and many others are special domains where honesty must prevail. Even if dishonesty gains some kind of foothold, honesty must be made to prevail in the long run. That is understood, if only tacitly.

Unfortunately these special domains never included politics and there are other more modern domains such as public relations where honesty is necessarily compromised. As governments have grown enormously in size and reach, they have invaded those domains where honesty must be maintained. As a direct result we are losing the capacity to remember that there really are vital activities where honesty must prevail. 

Yet if we say such things or if we publicly approve of what was done honestly in the past, what counts as worthy achievement – then there is another problem. Honesty can be portrayed as dishonesty or dissent or politically extreme or politically immoral or just plain bad. An honest person can be portrayed as a bad person. An honest historical figure can be portrayed as a monster because we cannot be honest about the mores of the past. We are losing the ability to filter out dishonesty because honesty itself is under attack and honesty is the only filter we have. 

In the past we have done many things well and have many worthy achievements, particularly scientific, cultural and humanitarian achievements. The past may have been unimaginably grim for most, but there were achievements and there were lessons. Yet it is no longer easy to say these things because to do so is to discriminate and even if done honestly, discrimination is no longer easy without the prickings of doubt. Am I saying the right thing? Not the honest thing but the right thing?

There are those among us who do not understand how their world evolved, do not feel part of that evolution with its many imperfections and absurdities. Some seem resent the whole idea of anything worthwhile achieved by their forebears and a few seem to resent it very deeply indeed. Yet with absurd irony they reap the benefits of what they are and where they are and pour dishonest scorn and bile on the source of those benefits past and present.

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The problem of dishonesty presents itself as malice directed at people who still wish to be honest, describe the world they see and the culture they trust and value without being slotted into malign and dishonest political categories.

In other words the problem of political dishonesty presents itself as identity politics and malice and political correctness and stupidity and intolerance disguised as tolerance and malevolence disguised as social justice and anti-capitalism disguised as egalitarianism and environmental activism and racism disguised as anti-racism and misandry disguised as feminism and fascism disguised as anti-fascism and pseudoscience disguised as science so on and so on.

Which takes us back to where we started because we still do not have that name, that single name with which to drag the whole foetid, destructive, uncivilised mess kicking and screaming into the public arena. Dishonesty it may be but as a name it won’t do. Ironically the name would be too honest.

And yet. And yet even without a good overarching name it is already in the public arena because it is being discussed and analysed by some very capable people who only a few years ago would have been dishonestly excluded from the public arena because there were no social media, no way for any but a tiny minority of honest and capable commentators to have their say and dissect the rot.

That may be all we are seeing, the battle for civilised honesty which has been going on for a very long time indeed. But honesty is not cool.