Diogenes the cynic was a Greek philosopher of the fourth century B.C. who walked the streets of Athens carrying a lamp in broad daylight. People asked what he was doing. He said, "I am just looking for a human being." After Plato offered Socrates' definition of humanity as "featherless bipeds," Diogenes brought a plucked chicken to Plato's Academy, saying, "Behold! I have brought you a human being." When captured by pirates and sold into slavery his new master asked what his trade was. "Governing men," he replied, adding that he wished to belong to someone who needed a master. One morning, when Diogenes was basking in the sun, Alexander the Great came to see him. Wishing to do the philosopher a kindness, Alexander asked if there was any favor he could bestow. "Yes," replied Diogenes. "Stand out of my sunlight."
The integrity of Diogenes has much to do with his independence. He was not interested in advancing his career, winning the favor of princes, or making money. He didn't flatter his teachers or the public. When he spoke, there was no reason to distrust what he said. He had nothing to sell, so he had no motive to flatter or manipulate. In today's world we have become very comfortable buying and selling things. It is also our habit to say what is pleasing to our superiors. More and more, our culture emphasizes the necessity of having a career, of promoting oneself, of making money and impressing other people.
To be wise, to love wisdom, requires a different emphasis than that of today's culture. It requires an emphasis on truth and clarity. To be successful today, to advance your career, truth and clarity aren't always appreciated. Perhaps you have heard that the customer is always right. And everyone with common sense knows that the boss is right - because he is the boss. Despite our egalitarian pretenses, rank is an inescapable reality of human existence. And when rank and privilege are abused, when truth is disregarded, what is the underling to do? Should he, like Socrates, drink the hemlock? Alexander the Great admired the nobility of Diogenes, because Diogenes revered his own clarity and the truth above all mortal masters. The Macedonian said, "If I were not Alexander, then I should wish to be Diogenes."
The crisis of our time is a crisis of intellectual integrity. We are suffering a deluge, in which common sense is drowned by the career logic of millions of nonentities. They are nonentities because they are careerists, because they have put something trivial above what is non-trivial. Their indifference to truth is seen in their daily compromises, their evasions, their manipulations of each other. They have become accustomed to subtle distortions, euphemisms and rationalizations. "I have to make a living," says the salesman. "I have to win votes," says the politician. "I have to raise my ratings," says the television personality. "I have to keep my job," says the employee.
Quite naturally, ducking and weaving through reality is sometimes required for survival - or so we think. But survival is easier than we imagine, and the truth is more important than the supposed glory of a chosen career path. To become a collaborator against the truth, to participate in a regime of self-deception, should not have been normalized. We censor ourselves because we don't want to be unpopular. We don't want to offend our "superiors." But the salvation of a country - of any country - usually boils down to the willingness of one respected figure taking an unpopular stand, or one subordinate risking the wrath of his superior.
Consider the significance of Christ on the cross. Read the words of Mathew 16:25: "For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosever will lose his life for my sake shall find it." This is not a guide to success in the popularly accepted sense. It is something far more important. Ask yourself, honestly: What is the value of a false position? The policy of holding your tongue and deceiving others by omission is not workable. Why should we waste our time ducking and cringing? To hide what we think, and disguise our true thoughts, is to act the part of a slave or underling who serves his master by fooling him. This is not a position of self respect. It is a position of retreat and compromise. Isn't it better to speak the truth?
