Authenticity is all the rage these days, at least on the internet, but while most people have at least a reasonable grasp on what inauthenticity is, I think that the concept of authenticity is often misunderstood. The most common way I see people misunderstand authenticity is by taking it to be the simple opposite of inauthenticity. This has the same problem of trying to figure out what real money is by assuming it’s the opposite of monopoly money.

Since most inauthenticity, at least on the internet, involves acting in a manner to try to please another person in order to achieve a result, the erroneous conclusion I often see is that authenticity must involve not caring what people think, and therefore putting no thought into how one’s words will be taken by others.

This is, of course, often tempered by practicality since being “authentic” by not giving any thought to how one’s words will be perceived borders on sociopathy and is too self-destructive to last, even if someone is more committed to this version of authenticity than they are to self-preservation.

But, as I said, this is going about things all wrong. Rather than asking what inauthenticity isn’t, one should ask what authenticity is. And surely authenticity must be acting with all of the parts of oneself in total harmony. Since human beings are rational creatures, this must involve the use of reason. Since human beings are relational creatures, this must involve the use of reason to consider how one’s words will be understood. What makes this authentic is what one does with the conclusions of that rational thought. And here, I think a line from Pride & Prejudice will illustrate what I mean very well. After Mr. Collins told Elizabeth how great Lady Catherine De Bourg was and how fortunate he was to be connected with her, the narrator says:

Words were insufficient for the elevation of his feelings; and he was obliged to walk about the room, while Elizabeth tried to unite civility and truth in a few short sentences.

That, I think, is the key to authenticity—to unite civility and truth.

Another way to look at this is via a quote I saw many years ago, and have never been able to trace the source of (or even to find again):

A polite man never offends without intending to. A nice man never intends to offend.

The polite man, in this quote, is actually much closer to authenticity. There is something wrong with a man who never intends to offend anyone—no one is so fortunate as to always be among people who are always perfect, and so a man who never intends to offend anyone must necessarily lack a backbone. Rarely? Sure, that’s often the right balance. But never? There’s something wrong with that man. Just ask yourself, what would Jesus do?

At a technical level, the difference is really about what effect in others one is concerned with. It is very much a thing one should care about that one’s words are understood correctly. The thing one should not be so concerned with is what effect will happen after one’s words are correctly understood. In authenticity is generally attempting to control the effect, and so does not concern itself nearly so much with being understood correctly. Inauthenticity is concerned with civility, but not with truth. It does not follow that authenticity is concerned with truth but not with civility; rather, authenticity is trying to unite them. Authenticity is just willing to deal with the consequences if civility united with truth still offends.