Re:Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific m...
by thwarted on Sunday January 30, 2022 @07:46PM
(#30143011)
And yet few people want to hear "your family is not fine". Many people don't want honesty, they want comfort, and they (wrongly, IMO) look to experts for comfort. This puts doctors in a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-dont situation. It's easy to translate "doctor was honest" to "bad bedside manner".
Re:Royal Society cautions against censorship of scientific m...
by jimkleiber on Sunday January 30, 2022 @08:39PM
(#30143450)
I think people want both—I believe I do. I want people to be honest with me and considerate. I don't think it has to be one or the other, yet we often haven't learned how to communicate with both.
I can say, "I want to be honest with you, your relative may only have a few weeks left. I imagine that might feel really scary to hear or perhaps you might even feel angry, I don't know. I wanted to be honest with you and to let you know that my team and I will be here for you and your family."
For example, I think many distrust Fauci less because of Fauci himself and his behaviors and more because his behaviors may remind them of their primary care physician who treated them condescendingly, saying they were stupid for asking a question. Or because their parent got Alzheimer's or cancer and don't know where it came from and were told by doctors that their family member would be fine, even though their family is not fine.
I guess I just wished we paid more attention to the transgressions that happened to find the presumed cause of distrust so we can repair it, because I think trust can be highly efficient and distrust highly inefficient at times.