As a lawyer, I come face-to-face with the rampant lack of integrity in our society. Trials for divorce and custody cases are perjury-fests. No one cares that perjury is a five-year felony. Why not? Because no one in Allegan County has been charged with perjury for the past 25 years. Have all the witnesses been that honest? Hah!
Lawyers, judges, prosecutors, and the public in general have come to accept the fact that people will lie when the stakes are big enough. They will act with self-preservation, even if it means that they put their hand on the Bible and swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help them God. There is no expectation of honesty, and no punishment of dishonesty. At least in medieval times, there was the fear of eternal torment at the hands of an angry God. Now, lying is done with impunity.
It’s not just divorce cases, either. People will tell obvious lies in criminal and civil cases as well. Even when it would be easy to prove perjury, there simply is not a societal will to hold the perjurers accountable for their actions.
It is a sign of our times. I come from the old school where my word is my bond. I have sold buildings on a handshake and have had people lend me thousands of dollars on my word. I have repaid every loan ever made to me, and closed on a building that had no purchase agreement ever drafted. I will do what I tell my clients not to do, and that is to enter into verbal agreements and not worry about the fact that there is no written contract.
I started a real estate office because of my immense distaste for the lack of integrity in so many things that I had to do in the law. Now, however, I find that the same lack of integrity that is rampant in my clients in the law firm is the same lack of integrity that people display in buying and selling houses.
People will take a real estate agent and use that agent to see dozens of houses, which involves calling other agents, making sure no one is home at the time of the showing, printing information on each of the homes, and going with the client to the homes. After finding out about all the homes in a particular price range in a particular area, the person will then strike a deal on his or her own and completely cut out the agent, even though that agent spent hours of time helping the person find out about houses in the area. I have found that people, including pastors, will even cut out the agent even though they have signed an exclusive contract for our office to represent them just to save a few bucks!
In my naivete, I thought there would be less integrity issues in real estate, but I was wrong. No matter what I do in life, I have to do it with other people. When you interact with others, you open yourself up to the fact that many people in our society are so self-centered that they have no qualms about harming you if it helps them.
I pray for the strength not to become so cynical that I cannot trust anyone any longer, and I am thankful for the faithful friends and acquaintances that I have that do value their personal integrity over and above the things of this world. Were it not for them, it would be easy to despair.
I write in hopes that those of you reading this who have integrity stay the course and those of you who lack it can see the error of your ways and make life changes that restore your integrity.
Blawgerman
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