I heard a close mutual friend of my best friend and I insulted my friend behind their back. Do I have a moral obligation to tell them even if it will only hurt them? Or should I keep it to myself?

Written by Lizzy Y.

I heard a close mutual friend of my best friend and I insulted my friend behind their back. Do I have a moral obligation to tell them even if it will only hurt them? Or should I keep it to myself?

Ah yes, the classic high school dilemma. We feel as though we owe our friends complete and total honesty as well as loyalty. But many of us have been caught in a situation where those two values do not justify the inevitable drama and hurt feelings that will follow as a result of our honesty. Suddenly, it’s not gossip. It’s a horrifying truth that if your friend knew, it would send her into a spiral. Suppose you don’t tell them, the heartbroken “You knew and didn’t tell me?” could surface, leaving us with nothing to say. The thing is, ignorance is bliss until it’s not. When we can’t ‘unknow’ something, our minds do not first arrive at “Wow I wish I never knew.” We resort to a plan of action; we get sad; we confront; we get angry. Part of that anger is directed at the friend who knew the truth and didn’t tell us. What if I’d known sooner? I wouldn’t have wasted my energy on being nice to someone who had said such horrible things about me. And there you are. The involuntary middleman. What on earth do you do? 

We can approach this from a few ethical lenses. The utilitarian approach, for example, urges us to maximize overall happiness and minimize suffering to most people. This approach would advise you to keep it to yourself, as reporting this truth would keep the least amount of people unhappy. Virtue ethics, on the other hand, centers on cultivating good character traits. In this case, honesty and courage are the virtues that come into play. Bracing yourself for the uncomfortable conversation, you should be truthful and brave enough to tell your friend, despite the highly possible uproar of consequences. Unfortunately, life is not this absolute — life is circumstantial.

In this situation, you overheard your mutual friend insulting your friend. This person did not approach you, insult your friend and ask for your confidence. Therefore, you do not owe this person anything. You have full license to report this to your friend. Now it’s just a question of in which circumstance should you tell your friend. Can you guarantee that your best friend would never find out otherwise? If this were to be something like “Lizzy did so bad on her test, she’s actually so bad at math,” what real good would it do Lizzy to know that fact? At the end of the day, Lizzy is only focused on her grades, nobody else’s. Everyone is trying their best, would knowing this motivate her to do better? No. It would likely add self-deprecating motivations and stress to prove those who agree with that statement wrong. If she scores poorly again, Lizzy will likely consume the narrative that she is simply “bad at math” and have further implications on her academic performance. In this case, you shouldn’t tell your friend. It’s not something that would do her any good. Even if Lizzy were to find out, this isn’t an insult detrimental enough to implicate you as a bad friend. 

Now suppose what you overheard your mutual friend saying was regarding your best friend’s financial status “I don’t know how she goes to this school… her house is so small and old.” There are layers here. Not only is Lizzy going to continue speaking to her friend, but the insult was something no decent person should say about anyone, let alone a friend. Lizzy deserves to know this so she can decide whether or not her supposedly close friend is someone she should continue to surround herself with. Yes, it’s going to hurt Lizzy’s feelings and yes, friendships may be broken. But there is a clear plan of action for Lizzy to better her social circle, something that would only be enabled if she were to know the truth. You are a far better friend bringing this to her attention than you would be protecting her feelings.

Essentially, you should only tell your friend if there is a point to them knowing. Are they better off knowing because they can actually do something about it? Or would this really only hurt their feelings? This ethical situation is almost never black and white: it’s shaded in nuance. But navigating this nuance separates you from someone who is strong on their morals and someone who is not.