Matt Dinan in The Hedgehog Review:
I do not think that being mean is a virtue, but it is related to the virtue by means of which we tell the truth. There are other ways of telling the truth. We can be circumspect or ironic—there is very often a nicer way to put something. Yet there are good reasons for sometimes being just a little bit mean. (No, I am not thinking about that gratuitously nasty and rebarbative character now dominating our public realm.) I think of being mean the way that the King of Brobdingnag in Gulliver’s Travels talks about dangerous views: “For a man may be allowed to keep poisons in his closet, but not to vend them about for cordials.” That is to say, I think being nice is required for good politics, but being mean has definite social utility in private life—and it should stay there.
An example might be useful.
More here.
Enjoying the content on 3QD? Help keep us going by donating now.