Certain events of late have gotten me thinking about the ways in which honourable men set ourselves up to be tricked and taken advantage of by the world around us.

An honourable man is such because his word is his bond. He does what he says, and he says what he means. There is no subterfuge about him. If he thinks you are an asshole, and you ask him for his honest opinion, he will tell you that you are an asshole. He might try to sugarcoat his statement a bit – only autistic or sociopathic men are incapable of understanding other people’s feelings – but in the end, he will tell you, one way or another, what he thinks of you.

An honourable man finds it extremely difficult to lie. He will do it if he has to, but doing so causes him great personal discomfort and distress, because lying goes against everything he believes in. And it is usually very easy to catch out an honourable man when he lies, for precisely this reason. His face, body, and voice will almost always betray him. Honourable men tend to be very bad poker players. (There are exceptions to this rule.)

An honourable man lives his life according to a very simple set of rules. Those precise rules depend on his time and culture, of course. If you go by the standards of the ancient Spartans, for instance, honour was gained through military service – and the ultimate honour was always a glorious death in battle against the enemies of Sparta. The Vikings were similar in many ways, placing a high premium upon face-to-face combat with sword and shield and axe and spear against an enemy that they could literally touch. The feudal Japanese code of bushido stressed honourable conduct through duty, devotion, good personal conduct, and veneration of the old ways.

Many of these ancient cultures seem positively weird by modern Christian standards – but a common thread runs through all of them when it comes to the concept of honour, because the idea itself is as old as humanity.

The best example of it that I have ever seen is from The Iliad.

If you think about it carefully, The Iliad is actually the story of Hector, Tamer of Horses. He is the only character in that entire saga whose conduct is without blemish and devoid of fame-seeking or attention-whoring. His personal philosophy might well be summed up as: “Honour the gods, love your woman, and defend your country“.

That, indeed, is what makes an honourable man.

Those of us men who were raised by good and strong fathers – which is an increasingly rare occurrence these days – understand instinctively that honourable conduct is something to admire and emulate. It sounds very simple – don’t lie, don’t cheat, don’t steal, tell the truth (in kindness, wherever possible), and live a simple, humble, virtuous life.

Those are precisely the kinds of men who are the easiest to trick.

The problem with being honourable is that such men have a real disdain and even hatred for the underhanded, sly, shady ways and tricks of others who do not have their scruples. Those who take shortcuts and look for the easy ways to get things done will usually produce better results, in the short term, than those who understand that discipline, focus, and perseverance are the paths to success.

That disdain is a huge blind spot for most men of honour, no matter what code we follow. Because we hate side-talk and have problems with anything other than straightforward plain dealing, we tend to ignore the machinations of those who mean us ill, thinking that they are rather beneath us – until it is far too late.

Here is an excellent example of just what happens when an honourable man leaves things too late before noticing that people are out to get him:

That is the sad reality of being a good and decent man, especially in a culture that rewards slyness, cheating, and double-dealing. Honourable, good, decent, but ultimately blind, men always get tricked and torn down by those who hate them and are willing and able to resort to underhanded tactics to get their way.

As ever, this trait goes from the individual to the collective. Some cultures are definitely more open and genuine and – let’s face facts – honourable than others.

Asian culture tends to be particularly bad at the whole “straight talking” thing. There is a reason why James Clavell’s Shoguni and Tai-Pan novels featured so much Oriental double-talk. The Chinese have many good qualities, but they are also perhaps the most racist people anywhere on Earth, and have absolutely no problems with cheating their own kind – never mind anyone who is not of their race – if it suits their purposes.

The Japanese are considerably better in this regard; in my experience they deal honourably enough among themselves. But they have few problems, if any, with tricking outsiders if they think that it will get them an edge.

The other major problem with Asian cultures is that people rarely, if ever, tell you what they are really thinking. In Indonesia, for instance, everyone is very polite and deferential to your face – but the moment your back is turned, the knives come out, and Indonesians, for all of their many splendid qualities, are excellent at stabbing you in the back if you let them.

A typical Asian organisation works something like this:

Whatever the boss says, is what everyone else agrees on, at least within the meeting room. No one ever dares to disagree with the Big Man, because this would mean that he would lose face.

If you have ever wondered what that phrase means, by the way, it literally means that you are faceless and nobody will look at you as a result. It is a terrible, and highly effective, form of social ostracisation that works wonders at keeping Asian people in line, unquestioning and obedient. And that is because social isolation is extremely psychologically damaging to any social animal, especially one that communicates through language and physical contact the way that humans do.

The result of this highly hierarchical method of command and control is that nobody ever says what he really thinks. You only find out much later that the supposedly “brilliant” idea that the Big Man said would work, was actually laughed at during the evening drinking sessions that always take place at just about every Asian organisation at some point during the working week.

By comparison and contrast, Westerners of European descent tend to be much straighter shooters.

There are exceptions to this rule also. Canadians and Scandinavians in particular seem to be utterly horrified by the idea that they could ever be rude to anybody. By contrast, Germans and especially the (!@#$%^&*) French have no such compunctions whatsoever.

But, in general, it is much easier to get a straight answer out of a Westerner than an Asian. And this tends to make Westerners relatively easy and straightforward to deal with in the process.

At any rate, the question that faces every honourable man is: how does one survive and keep one’s honour intact in a world that hates him and will do whatever it takes to destroy him?

The answer, as far as I can tell, is to exhibit a certain amount of ruthlessness, and even cruelty, to show one’s enemies the consequences of crossing one.

This sits uncomfortably with Christian teachings about loving your enemies and praying for them. But it is also a necessary thing to do.

One of the best examples that I have ever seen of a deeply flawed, but fundamentally honourable, man is, of course, the God-Emperor, Donaldus Triumphus Magnus.

Make no mistake, President Trump is a DEEPLY flawed man. And he is nobody’s idea of a totally honourable guy. But he did spend a large part of his life in the real estate business, which is a world based on contracts and the honouring of one’s word. And the fact remains that, as President, he has done more or less exactly what he said he would do.

He may not be doing it fast enough, or comprehensively enough, for our liking. But he is doing it.

And his behaviour demonstrates both honourable conduct, and absolute ruthlessness.

If you look at the way that he has treated his subordinates, you see a very clear pattern. He looks for the best people that he can find. He expects great loyalty and top performance from them, and tells them so. He praises them fulsomely to their faces and to the rest of the world when he hires them. He gives them as much responsibility as he thinks that they can handle.

And when they fail him… he cuts them down. Ruthlessly. And then destroys their reputations in public with his Twitter account.

Is he a good man? Not necessarily. Is he a good Christian? Heck no.

Is he effective?

Oh yes.

That is the key lesson that honourable men must draw. It is not enough to be honourable. Honour must be complemented by utter ruthlessness.

Do not hesitate to crush your enemies. Do not feel sorry to screw over any employer who fails to live up to what it has promised to give you. Do not feel like you owe anyone anything if he consistently breaks his promises to you.

Never forget that the world hates you, and will see you ground up and destroyed if it can.

Don’t let it. The honour of your name is priceless – but it is of no use to you if you cannot preserve it.