All of us can remember being told that someone we knew (or knew of) had gotten in trouble, been arrested for drug use, or in some way found with their pants literally or figuratively down. And we can all remember saying, “How could that be? He was so nice!”

Good People

They understand the battle against evil but never take pleasure in its defeat, rather sadness in its necessity.

They have consistent integrity.

They are appropriately (not helplessly or cunningly) selfless.

They are the last ones to see themselves as good and definitely the last ones to tell anyone they are.

Super Nice People

They interact with a pseudo-intimacy, behaving as if they’d known you personally for years.

They relate to you on the surface and let you in only so far.

They do not respond to your needs but gloss over them in a way that makes you wonder whatever you needed that for.

They need to maintain a persona or a position in a social circle at all costs because how they are seen is more important than who they are.

They have no compunction about lying to get what they want so long as they are nice about it.

Niceness is conscious and deliberate. It is a social skill that is turned on and off, a vehicle for self-enhancement.

Coexistence

Perhaps it should not go without saying that a nice man may in fact be a very good man. Not all charm is a cover for sadism or cruelty, although very often it is. Good and nice can coexist. A good man may be quite charming and engaging. But not always. Only in the right circumstances and for the right reasons. In the choice between what is right and what is “nice”, a good man will choose what is right. He knows that true goodness is a Grace bestowed in brief moments. Sometimes a good man will say and do things that may offend, hurt someone’s feelings, or even lead to battle.

I imagine Chamberlain thought he was being quite nice with Hitler. I don’t believe anyone in Czechoslovakia would have thought it was very good.

Sounding the Cultural Alarm: Discernment

In 1940 C.S. Lewis was already sounding the alarm about this radical change in modern society. He stated emphatically that kindness (or niceness) was not the measure of goodness, just as apparent cruelty was not the measure of evil. For as Russ Murray points out in his blogspot column on good vs. evil, (www.thekingpin68.blogspot.com), someone can be quite nice and have the most horrible of intentions, citing as an example how Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss. Doctors do the opposite all the time: they reset dislocated shoulders, suture lacerated skin, and remove decayed teeth sometimes causing awful (albeit temporary) pain in order to facilitate proper healing. Is it nice? Hell, no. Is it good? Until we have better means, yes, it is very good.

Because our culture puts such a premium on niceness, charm, and pleasure, ordinary, good people are put at a disadvantage when it comes to discernment. A narcissist can appear quite innocent because she has so mastered the technique of ingratiation. So much so, that she can make you feel that you have somehow committed a terrible injustice by denying her X or Y or Z as she positions herself as the victim.

As Gavin De Becker points out, this failure to see behind the mask of niceness can make the difference between life and death. World-wide, the crime records attest to the danger. A woman who can’t say “no” to a nice stranger’s unsolicited offer to escort her to her car at night, even though she doesn’t like him, may wind up filing reports of assault, rape, and attempted murder. This is not to blame the victim, rather to point out how charming that charm can be and how carefully we need to pay attention to the differences.

So, what does a person do? How do you tell the difference?

When I teach Verbal First Aid to emergency workers, a communication protocol used to facilitate healing in traumatic situations, I ask them what they think their most important tool is. Inevitably the hands go up: the defibrillator, the oxygen tank, the Jaws of Life. I tell them: No. Your most important and most healing instrument is you.

What makes them—or any of us—healing is at least in part what makes us good: the ability to develop rapport, our integrity and compassion, our benevolent presence and support. To be healing (or good) one must respect the patient (or person) before him and do what is necessary even if it is not “nice” to deal with the disease or the injury. Part of what is necessary in Verbal First Aid, of course, is dealing with the patient honestly and with a gentle, but firm authority. Manipulating and healing are mutually exclusive.

The Bible defines Good for us as “an inherent rightness of being.” It never ever mentions niceness. It never equates it with beauty or talent. It never, ever mistakes it for showmanship. (Moses himself had a lisp and timidly refused his mandate by God to lead the Jews out of Egypt.)  If anything it warns us from the very beginning to beware of pretense.

We can start to tell the difference by remembering that there is a difference.

For full-length article, please see: http://ezinearticles.com/?Nice,-But-Not-Good—Discernment-Skills-For-Modern-Americans&id=3610725