The foolishness of believing one-sided stories - Punch Newspapers

Dr Dokun Bojuwade was my director at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism (NIJ) in Lagos, where I launched my immersion in the profession of the Fourth Estate of the realm 42 years ago. Bojuwade was a walking and working wordsmith of immense wisdom and marked erudition. His oratorical submissions were peculiarly plangent. As a student, I was one among many who stood in awe of the language legend in that season of life. One of Bojuwade’s rotund renditions sticks out in my mind to this day. “Nobody will state his case to attract the guilty verdict”. Bojuwade was only teaching that as human beings tell their stories, they are very likely to declare themselves innocent even if they are guilty. Nobody tells his story to look bad. It’s a natural flow in every breathing being to appear innocent and saintly, with no guile, as they state their case. My instructor’s wise words helped me navigate life as I grew up becoming a leader across a few strata. My parents, of blessed memory, also often chipped in, corroborating Bojuwade’s words with the following, straight out of the Yoruba worldview and word purview, when they often wisely admonished their children that: “A gbo ejo enikan da, agba osika ni.” That is, a man or woman who relies on one person’s account without hearing the other side of the story before declaring a verdict is wicked. No matter how smooth a story is told, when we listen to just one side and then make a judgement call based on the sweetness of the story, by the time you hear the other side, we may appear as fools. The downside of this misbehaviour is that a life may have been hurt in the process, and a destiny may have been derailed as a result. If you have never heard of the “Dreyfus Affair” story, this is an opportunity to add its lessons to your knowledge archive. In France in 1894, Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish man and a French army captain, was accused of passing military secrets to Germany. The accusation rested largely on a handwritten document found at the German embassy. Widespread antisemitism fuelled the weak case against Alfred into a conviction. He was publicly stripped of his rank and sent to a prison colony on Devil’s Island, off the coast of French Guiana.See more Punch stories on Google.Add Punch on Google But in 1896, army officer Georges Picquart uncovered evidence pointing instead to another French officer, Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy. Senior officers resisted reopening the case, and a forged document reinforced the accusation against Dreyfus. The case became a national crisis. Dreyfus’s supporters demanded justice, while his opponents defended the army and insisted he was guilty. In 1898, the novelist Émile Zola published his famous open letter, J’Accuse…!, accusing the authorities of covering up the truth. Dreyfus was brought back for a second trial in 1899 and, astonishingly, convicted again. He received a presidential pardon soon afterwards, but a pardon did not clear his name. In 1906, France’s highest court overturned his conviction, and he was reinstated in the army. The Dreyfus affair is a powerful example of the danger of accepting one side of a story too quickly. Investigators settled on Dreyfus as the suspect; when evidence pointed elsewhere, some officials valued protecting the original judgement more than correcting it. It also shows how prejudice and public pressure can make an injustice harder to undo. Readers, people tell false stories about people every day to advance a cloistered agenda. At the leadership level in any family, business, and community, it is incumbent upon people positioned to oversee others to be wary about jumping to conclusions until the other side of every story is heard. If you have already formed a firm opinion about someone who allegedly did or said something, wisdom dictates that you don’t jump to conclusions based on your prior experience with them. You may think you have made the right judgment call, but what if you are flat-out wrong? You’ll look like a prejudiced person. You’ll appear like a hater. You become a man or woman of no wisdom. You look like a fool! My friends, you must wait until the veracity of a story is determined before you jump to a biased conclusion. Throwback: Ogogo’s ‘I would vomit blood’ account resurfaces after death OPL 471 dispute: Court orders Chinese oil firm to pay $100m Osoba leads media icons to celebrate Oshunkeye at 70 King Solomon in the Good Book listened patiently to the stories of two women prostitutes. Both were in dispute over whose child was dead and whose was alive. The lying woman wanted the baby cut in half, while the other, who was the real mother, said, “No; give my baby to the lying woman. With wisdom, Solomon judged right. He ordered the child to be handed over to his biological mother. The lie was debunked, and truth shone like a billion stars. As you read this short admonition, I’m certain somebody has told you that somebody did this and said that about you or somebody. Like Solomon, hear everybody out before you judge. It’s called wisdom! One side of a story can be convincing and still be incomplete. Hearing both sides does not mean both sides are equally truthful. It means giving the truth a chance to emerge before you judge. There are two sides to every story—and sometimes a third side called the truth. The psychology behind telling your side of a story to look good is often called self-serving bias. A striking story in the Good Book is David, Ziba, and Mephibosheth. While David was fleeing from Absalom, Ziba brought him food and claimed that his master, Mephibosheth, had stayed behind hoping to reclaim Saul’s kingdom. David accepted Ziba’s account and immediately gave him all of Mephibosheth’s property. When David later met Mephibosheth, he heard a different story: Mephibosheth said Ziba had deceived and abandoned him, leaving him unable to travel with David. David had already acted before hearing him. A person can tell a convincing story, bring gifts, and still leave out the truth. Before judging someone or taking away what belongs to them, hear their side too. Self-serving bias is the tendency to explain events in ways that protect our image. People tend to explain events in ways that protect their self-image: they emphasise their good intentions, leave out their mistakes, and focus on what the other person did wrong. Sometimes it is deliberate deception. Other times, the person genuinely remembers the event through a flattering lens. That is why a sincere account can still be incomplete. X-@FolaOjotweet Fola Ojo

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