Associated blog post date: 2nd Oct. 2012, link: http://eklavyasai.blogspot.com/2012/10/truth-telling-tough-job.html , short link: http://bit.ly/truth-t
Trying to be a truth-teller in today's world is a tough job. It is an unpopular affair.
I recently saw a few videos and read articles about how the great physicist Feynman faced the same challenges when he investigated the Challenger disaster. It was an eye-opener to me that even such a world-famous physicist had to face significant resistance from powerful administrators. If you have not seen it I recommend you see this 4 min 42 sec. video, Richard Feynman - Space Shuttle Challenger Investigation, [archived link: https://web.archive.org/web/20120225062425/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCLgRyKvfp0 (short link: http://bit.ly/feynman-ch ) for following broken link] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCLgRyKvfp0. The official view now seems that Feynman did catch the real problem: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman#Challenger_disaster.
The wiki page above states the following (He is Richard Feynman):
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He concluded that the space shuttle reliability estimate by NASA management was fantastically unrealistic, and he was particularly angered that NASA used these figures to recruit Christa McAuliffe into the Teacher-in-Space program. He warned in his appendix to the commission's report (which was included only after he threatened not to sign the report), "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled."[174]
...
[Wiki Ref:]
174. Richard Feynman. "Appendix F – Personal observations on the reliability of the Shuttle", https://history.nasa.gov/rogersrep/v2appf.htm. Kennedy Space Center. Retrieved September 11, 2017.
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My respect for the great physicist Richard Feynman went up enormously after I recently came to know of the above human goodness side and the sheer *guts* to speak out the truth in the face of powerful opposition side of him.
So, I guess, it is always a challenge to be a truth-teller - material truth-teller - and far more challenging perhaps to be a spiritual truth-teller (e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mansur_Al-Hallaj). The saying goes: Sathyam Bhruyath Priyam Bhruyath Na Bhruyath Sathyam Apriyam. [English translation: Speak the truth; speak the pleasant truth; don't speak the unpleasant truth.]
Perhaps the safe path is to just put out one's views on the Internet and provide opinions only if people ask - a low-key activism and not a pushy activism.