Does telling the truth constitute inciting to anger?
It all depends, roscoe. I'm from the Midwest, lived for many years in Latin America, and now reside in the South. These three places all have at least one thing in common: in general, their inhabitants try to avoid conflicts, especially in spoken conversations. Have you ever heard of "Minnesota Nice," or "Southern Hospitality?" Those stereotypes are well-founded in the fact that those of us from those areas generally try to be tactful when informing others of their faults, which we do only from necessity. We tend to overlook and "let slide" others' shortcomings whenever possible, in the interest of preserving the peace. I have noticed that
some (not all) people from
some (not all) other areas of the country tend to be more blunt and aggressive in their speech. They like to "call a spade a spade" as they say and often mask what to me would be rude or tactless comments by saying, "I was only telling him the truth! What, is telling the truth against the law these days?" To me, there is a certain amount of facetiousness in those words. Those people usually know darn well that they're being offensive but they like to cover it with the "well, somebody has to tell the truth around here" routine.
I think that how you say something is just as important as what you say. Anyone who has ever been in the hands of a tactless teacher, doctor, confessor, etc. knows what I mean.