To think 'my truth' or 'your truth' doesn't mean THE truth?

[FridayNightAtTheBronze]

I've seen this phrase used so much recently, and it really irritates me for some reason!

People saying 'This is my truth.'

Surely they just mean 'This is my side of the story'.

Or

'This is my version of events'.

AIBU to think that 'my truth' shouldn't be conflated with telling THE truth? And to be irrationally irritated when I hear it?!

"My truth" means "the web of lies I've constructed and which you are not allowed to challenge". It's a power play.

My truth is very hard to challenge, you can't say that it isn't their truth because to them that is how they see it. Regardless of the actual facts. If someone has delusions lets say - you can tell them to your blue in the face that the earth is not square but they will never believe you. It is their truth that the earth has never been round, it is has always been square, and you are the one that is mistaken.

It is a very clever way to evade facts.

You either did get married for instance with vows, witnesses and signatures or you didn't. There is no grey area. The facts are there, or they are not.
My truth might be that 'I felt married at the time, it felt real. It was the only service that truly mattered to me. For me it was real'

That doesn't make it factually correct, it is just a feeling - an inner feeling that makes it your own experience/truth you can bend at will regardless of the solid facts.

It is one of the reasons why our justice system works so well most of the time, it focuses almost entirely on the known facts of any case. Not emotion, your truth, my truth - the dog's truth. It is just pure facts.

I don't like the term because to me it is stolen from something important another poster has mentioned, used in trivialised ways, but as if it was important. So like it used to be used in therapy to encourage abuse victims to who had never been believed abd/or conditioned into believing nobody would believe them because the abuser told them so. So it was used with emotive undertones of "I believe you" against, for example a childhood of gaslighting. A serious thing.

Now it's been taken by a certain type of person to say "You can't question anything I have to say or it means you don't believe me." In it's original usage, someone who didn't believe the victim would basically be a shit. But in ordinary things, it's not abusive to simply ask questions to better understand something or to disagree/have your own understanding of events.

It's pretty disgusting in my opinion to weaponise something that was used to help victims of some of the most difficult equals to overcome.

Also, it's used to say I'M A VICTIM. If you in any way challenge what's being said, you're seen as revictimising/abusing them.

There are few victims who publicise these feelings from what I've seen. Plenty of manipulative people though. So now when I hear it, I look to see where/who is the other side, especially if it's, for example, a wealthy white man in the public eye.

@daretodenim

I don't like the term because to me it is stolen from something important another poster has mentioned, used in trivialised ways, but as if it was important. So like it used to be used in therapy to encourage abuse victims to who had never been believed abd/or conditioned into believing nobody would believe them because the abuser told them so. So it was used with emotive undertones of "I believe you" against, for example a childhood of gaslighting. A serious thing.

Now it's been taken by a certain type of person to say "You can't question anything I have to say or it means you don't believe me." In it's original usage, someone who didn't believe the victim would basically be a shit. But in ordinary things, it's not abusive to simply ask questions to better understand something or to disagree/have your own understanding of events.

It's pretty disgusting in my opinion to weaponise something that was used to help victims of some of the most difficult equals to overcome.

Also, it's used to say I'M A VICTIM. If you in any way challenge what's being said, you're seen as revictimising/abusing them.

There are few victims who publicise these feelings from what I've seen. Plenty of manipulative people though. So now when I hear it, I look to see where/who is the other side, especially if it's, for example, a wealthy white man in the public eye.

Agree

The term "woke" has also been stolen by (usually) white social media users to show how virtuous they are. Generally in western countries with university education.

People who are fed up of "wokesters" are responding to them. Generally they very much support the rights of, for example, black communities to live with equal opportunities etc. But they object to the use of the word by people who basically use it to self congratulate on how virtuous they are, when in reality they're self centred and not interested in actual rights.

YANBU OP

Also very irritating when someone wants to impose 'their truth' on others

The silencing of the factual truth in favour of My Truth is scary. Cancel culture is appalling and should not be tolerated. People should be fighting for the right to free speech

This with bells on

I only ever hear it used in a derogatory way against people who are calling out bigotry, and who are supposedly ‘cancel culture’. I’ve never heard it used positively by the other side.

@daretodenim

I don't like the term because to me it is stolen from something important another poster has mentioned, used in trivialised ways, but as if it was important. So like it used to be used in therapy to encourage abuse victims to who had never been believed abd/or conditioned into believing nobody would believe them because the abuser told them so. So it was used with emotive undertones of "I believe you" against, for example a childhood of gaslighting. A serious thing.

Now it's been taken by a certain type of person to say "You can't question anything I have to say or it means you don't believe me." In it's original usage, someone who didn't believe the victim would basically be a shit. But in ordinary things, it's not abusive to simply ask questions to better understand something or to disagree/have your own understanding of events.

It's pretty disgusting in my opinion to weaponise something that was used to help victims of some of the most difficult equals to overcome.

Also, it's used to say I'M A VICTIM. If you in any way challenge what's being said, you're seen as revictimising/abusing them.

There are few victims who publicise these feelings from what I've seen. Plenty of manipulative people though. So now when I hear it, I look to see where/who is the other side, especially if it's, for example, a wealthy white man in the public eye.

Agreed!

I have also seen it used by people on both the right and the left (and completely apolitically). It isnt a specifically left wing/cancel culture thing (although the American right/republican party invented cancel culture anyway circa 2001. But thats by the by)

It isnt a specifically left wing/cancel culture thing (although the American right/republican party invented cancel culture anyway circa 2001. But thats by the by)

That’s helpful, thank you. I knew it had to be a newish term, as it wasn’t around when I was studying social sciences in the early 1990s.

@Mittens030869

*It isnt a specifically left wing/cancel culture thing (although the American right/republican party invented cancel culture anyway circa 2001. But thats by the by)*

That’s helpful, thank you. I knew it had to be a newish term, as it wasn’t around when I was studying social sciences in the early 1990s.

I am not sure if the term dates from then. I just meant that its ironic people on the right are complaining about "cancel culture"/the banning of words now when during the war with Iraq the changed French fries to freedom fries and did their best to destroy the -Dixie- Chicks career. Actually, that behaviour probably goes back much further.

It's definitely a way of saying 'my opinion' 'this is how I see things'

It's fucking stupid imo

@KittytheHare

Surely this refers to the concept that perception is everything, and that ‘truth’ as an independent construct doesn’t exist?

But there are many objective, independent truths. For example if I said "I walked five miles to the bus," and my stepometer showed I had only walked four, that wouldn't be the truth. I might have felt like I'd walked further, or got confused with my route but it would be wrong.

For the Megan Markle thing (which is where this phrase seems to have originated from rather than to bash her) either they legally got married in their garden 3 days before the "big" wedding, or they didn't. If they didn't, what she says is neither "the" truth nor "her truth". She can prefer to think of it as her real wedding if she wants, but she can't say "her truth," is that it was her real wedding because it's not true!

OP you are so NU that I was going to start this very thread!

Why use "my truth" to mean "my opinion" (or "my understanding/belief/interpretation") i.e. something completely different to what "truth" actually means!

The term "woke" has also been stolen

I think the problem with this term is that it implies the listener is asleep? and/or needs to be educated. When it may just be that they don't agree with a specific opinion. Very patronising and disrespectful in my view

thevassal - yes, but how it works is: you need to create a new version of zero in your mind.

So if you want to weight 8st and the scales say 10st, you deduct it off yourself because in your "truth" you know the scales are wrong by 2stone- so now you're 8 stone. Fabulous.

So it only works if everyone's view of stretching a little bit of the truth is equal then we're in John Lewis with dress sizes that say 8, 10 and 12 and one from each fits perfectly. Hmmmm

Setting the new "normal" or "zero" is how a person can sometimes create a new version of their truth IMO.

Truth is the opposite of lies.

A truth doesn't need to be correct. It does not need to be proven. All it needs is the person saying it to believe it to be so. It is then a truthful statement.

If we believe that telling lies (ie saying something that we do not believe to be fact or that we believe to not be fact) is unscrupulous (and many cultures do), then stating something is 'my truth' is simultaneously admitting that the subject may be open to alternative interpretation, while simultaneously forcing someone to imply you are unscrupulous if they attempt to present an alternative interpretation.

It is a device to present an unproven opinion as fact, relying on the politeness of others to prevent discussion, or worse, to present those with an alternative position as aggressive or insulting and thereby discourage response.

I don't think it is 'woke' per se, so much as a technique adopted by those who are emotionally rather than factually minded.

In some ways It's the same principle used by those who stand up and give a rundown of their expertise before speaking: if you question what they have said you are questioning their expertise, and no one wants to cause an adversarial atmosphere so less people ask questions.

It's woke speak.

My truth
My lived experience
Check your privilege
Sit down and shut up

no one wants to cause an adversarial atmosphere so less people ask questions

This tactic has been overused now, people seem to be more clued up and losing patience.

A truth doesn't need to be correct. It does not need to be proven. All it needs is the person saying it to believe it to be so. It is then a truthful statement.
You've described a belief; not truth.

@GreyhoundG1rl

A truth doesn't need to be correct. It does not need to be proven. All it needs is the person saying it to believe it to be so. It is then a truthful statement. You've described a belief; not truth.

Yes. But sometimes one can the telling the truth and still be incorrect. Truth is not fact. A belief can be a truth.

Thus 'an individual's truth' is what they believe to be true but isn't necessarily fact.

No, an incorrect belief is not truth. Imagining it to be true makes it an error, not "your truth".

In the movie “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” there is a trans performer, The Lady Chablis, who refers to her penis as her “T” or her “Truth”.

This is what I think of when someone says they are going to share their “truth”.

*Chablis was a real person and played herself in the movie. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend.

As per the dictionary definition:

truth=that which is true or in accordance with fact or reality

true=in accordance with fact or reality

Yes. But sometimes one can the telling the truth and still be incorrect.

How so?

@ODFOx thats just sophistry though. First of all, if "truth" is the opposite of a lie then what is a lie (And do NOT say a lie is something which is untrue. That is nonsense).
Secondly, it is completely possible to believe a lie. In which case, it mat be what you sincerly believe but it is still not true, it is a lie. You may not be deliberately lying (arguably to "lie" is an act that includes both the intention and the act itself), but you are still spreading lies.
Thirdly, a million people can believe something and it can still be a lie. This matters because it can be about big things. e.g. Trump might sincerly believe Obama was born in Africa. That doesnt make it true. Or (and I am not being goady, this is a genuine problem with this kind of thinking). I might genuinely, sincerly believe the holocaust never happened and that 6 million Jewish people were not killed. That does not make it true. It did happen. If I deseminate that information to others I am spreading a dangerous lie.

In terms of emotional v logical. I actually think that kind of "alternative" facts stuff is used by those who are manipulative minded rather than emotionally minded. (I am not talking about the term "my truth" itself, which I think is just used more by Americans than English people. Using it doesnt make someone manipulative.)