Here’s my truth: I’m sick of other people’s ‘truths’

If you’re playing Married at First Sight bingo this year, by which, every time an inane word or phrase is spouted by a participant, such as “gaslighting”, “walls up” or “being on the show for the right reasons”, it’s time to yell, “bingo”.

But I’d like to propose a new addition to your bingo card: that zinger, “my truth”. As in, “If you are feeling a certain way about somebody, I feel like it’s better to speak your truth than hold it in,” as participant Rhi said during MAFS’ confessions week, which involves writing long letters about your feelings and rating the hotness of other participants in front of your partner under the guise of “helping them to understand what you find attractive” and certainly not to inflame jealousy in the interests of good TV.

Their truths: Rhi from MAFS, Sam Kerr and Meghan Markle.Credit: Nne, PA via AP, AP

I’ve always been a sucker for any article purporting that intelligent people watch reality TV because they support my truth that shows such as MAFS are fascinating social studies, not trashy, heavily edited dumpster fires of tattooed Instagram influencers drunkenly yelling “That’s not OK!” across the table at some participant who commented on the shape of someone else’s wife’s bum.

But one thing MAFS reminds me of is how the phrase “my truth” has become so normalised we hardly notice when it’s added to the ream of everyday psychology-speak. “My truth” is the catch-all for my interpretation of events, and I’m sick to death of hearing it used as an excuse for poor behaviour or how someone made you feel.

As we’ve seen from recent high-profile stoushes, “my truth” can be problematic when the actual truth is being sought in a court of law.

Take Sam Kerr, whose trial garnered an inordinate amount of public attention: according to her fiancee, Kristie Mewis, Kerr was “speaking her truth” when she called the police officer “stupid and white”. At the same time, Stephen Lovell’s, the police officer in question’s “truth” was that Kerr was being obnoxious and drunk.

Or now that we’re all lapping up Apple Cider Vinegar on Netflix, watch alternative health advocate Belle Gibson’s 2018 60 Minutes interview, where she spews a psychobabble word salad about her “truth”. When Tara Brown asks if she lives in fear of being found out, she responds: “No, because I wasn’t living in a space where I didn’t know that this wasn’t my reality.”

It’s like putting questions to a malfunctioning oracle, the supercomputer Deep Thought in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which announces that the meaning of life is, wait for it ... 42.

I love the idea of “my truth” in theory; as a writer, part of the fun is exploring a world of kaleidoscopic truths, whether it be different religions, political parties or those super fun dark-web conspiracists. Everyone feels they’ve cornered the market on truth.

But there are some self-evident truths, especially in the ways we behave towards one another. Some days, when my kids are flinging wet clogs of Weet-Bix around the breakfast table, I want to announce “my truth is that I cannot parent today”.

But here’s the thing: child services would be utterly disinterested in “my truth” when they found my small kids abandoned in the playground while I was at the day spa for some #selflove. My kids’ “truth” is that they need me. They rely on me to protect them and feed them Chicken Crimpies intermittently.

Having “your truth” doesn’t make it real for everyone else, especially when recollections may vary, as Queen Lizzie said in her 2021 mic-drop moment of Meghan Markle’s “allegations”.

“People who claim to speak ‘their truth’ may not actually be endorsing relativism,” Jeremy Wyatt and Joseph Ulatowski wrote in The Conversation. In other words, “my truth” has become interchangeable with “the truth” as we keep seeing in these public spats. “Valuing truth should actually encourage you to engage with points of view that differ from yours,” Wyatt and Ulatowski wrote.

As another wise TV show once told us, the truth is out there, but we’ll continue to live in a fractured society until we acknowledge there are other truths “out there”, not just our own. It is a truth universally acknowledged that Married at First Sight is first-class trash, but if you watch it, you might learn some hard truths about the human condition. Bingo!

Cherie Gilmour is a freelance writer.

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