Barbara Patton: Integrity takes on more than one meaning

I’ll bet if I asked you about the word “integrity,” you would be able to easily tell me about it. Right? That’s what I thought until I started to write this column on the Character Word of the Month. I have struggled and gone in all kinds of directions.

According to Webster, the first definition of integrity is “soundness of moral principle and character; uprightness; honesty.” Then there are two other meanings that we will not discuss here. We’re not talking about the integrity of a stream or the integrity of a database. We’re also not talking about an attribute of one’s profession, like artistic integrity. We’re talking about integrity as a virtue, making reference to the quality of a person’s character.

Then there is another definition, also from a reliable source. According to Wikipedia, integrity is “the basing of one’s actions on an internally consistent framework of principles. Depth of principles and adherence of each level to the next are key determining factors. One is said to have integrity to the extent that everything one does and believes is based on the same core set of values. While those values may change, it is their consistency with each other and with the person’s actions that determines the person’s integrity.”

So just what is it to be a person of integrity? What if you and I have a different set of core values and our actions and beliefs are different because of those values? Can we both be people of integrity? For example, you and I made our decisions in light of our values but our decisions are totally different. Aren’t we both acting with integrity?

L. Ron Hubbard says that “Personal integrity is knowing what you know have the courage to know and say what you have observed – there is no other integrity.” I take that to mean that we see what the truth is and we do the right thing based on the right and wrong of it. We’re honest. If we make a mistake, we accept the responsibility for it.

If we think that integrity is important, then shouldn’t the government and the other institutions that shape our lives be structured to promote it. Susan Babbitt, in “Personal Integrity, Politics and Moral Imagination” says that an adequate account of personal integrity must: “… recognize that some social structures are of the wrong sort altogether for some individuals to be able to pursue personal integrity, and that questions about the moral nature of society often need to be asked first before questions about personal integrity can properly be raised …”

Is our society structured in such a way that it undermines people’s attempts at either knowing or acting upon their commitments, values and beliefs? If it is, then it can’t be conducive to personal integrity? Can the government and all sectors of society be restructured to have transparency and accountability along with regulations regarding conflicts of interest?

Character education is one way to help our young people grow up wanting an uncorrupted society – one with integrity but they also need knowledge to build it to benefit everyone. An old Chinese proverb says: “If you are thinking a year ahead, sow a seed. If you are thinking 10 years ahead, plant a tree. If you are thinking 100 years ahead, educate the people.”

Barbara Patton is executive director of Envision Opelika and writes a column for the Opelika-Auburn News.