Okay everyone, get out your soapboxes and let world know. What kind of lies do you find acceptable? When your best friend walks in, wearing the ugliest pair of shoes you've ever seen and you tell her they're the most beautiful shoes in the world, are you going straight to hell? Or is a lie to spare someone's feeling just not the same as one that's meant to conceal a truth that someone has the right to know. Well?

-- Anonymous, June 12, 2000

Answers

I was raised to believe that a small white lie to preserve a friendship is kind of almost acceptable, but that you should always make sure the situation warrants. If my best friend walks in wearing the most god awful thing in the world, telling her that she looks great may not send me to hell, but it may make life icky for her. Because after everyone else asks her what she was thinking, she'll ask me what I was thinking. My personal belief system is based on the fact that once you start lying, it gets harder and harder to remember what you told everyone. My friends still belive that my mother is the antichrist because I usually use her as an excuse to get out of social situations and such that I don't have any other way out of. And I do find that lying or bending the truth and ommitting details is a shit-assed way of dealing with people, but I find that I have to do a lot of it.

However, there are some times that lying in any form is totally unacceptable. The first is to lie to hurt someone deliberately. The second is to omit the truth when the information could have a profound effect on others. The third is to use mistruths to get what you want. Things like lying on a job application, or doing something and then scapegoating someone to get yourself off the hook, and especially making a contract with someone and then breaking it with no prior agreement.

The whole situation of lying to spare someone's feelings is an odd one. If you lie to someone so that _you_ won't hurt their feelings, but there is a chance that someone else may hurt their feeling even worse, then is the lie really sparing their feelings? I don't think so. Sometimes, the truth hurts, but if it is delivered with well used humor and a healthy dose of compassion and caring, it can be a lot more helpful.

-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

Well, this is a sore spot with me and I am just going to let loose.

I hate people who tell lies with good intent. Fuck that shit. Tell me the damn truth, try not to be overtly cruel, but don't lie to me about something that will hurt me when the truth comes out. I always find out the truth and the repercussions for telling a lie with good intent are just as bad as telling me a lie with the intent to protect yourself.

When someone wears something or has something that I do not like, I don't lie and tell them it is cool or I wish I had something like that. I simply state "I don't really care for that, but you are able to carry it off well." In cases when the person is wearing a fucking ugly ensemble and I can't find anything nice to say, I don't say anything. Better to be quiet and not hurt feelings, you know.

My expectations in a relationship are for total honesty and total commitment for not "pulling one over" on each other. Unfortunately, I am partnered to someone who believes that intent is paramount above anything and if he is trying to protect me from being hurt, he is, in his own mind, excused from the actual lie telling.

And that is the basis for many of our arguments. I have to spell out exactly what is and is not acceptable and what I do and don't want to know in order to try to prevent a lie happening to me. Is that fucked up, or what?

Von


-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

I want to also add that while in my head I am making up white lies to save my ass in potentially embarrassing situations or to get myself out of a tight spot, usually what happens is I concoct this very elaborate story, get all the details in place and then when I go to tell it, blab the truth anyway.

Karma is my friend and too often have I taken out huge withdrawals from the karma bank because of a white lie that has snowballed into an avalanche. No thanks, really, I would rather have the red face for a while and feel like an ass.

-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

Well, I have been thinking about this alot and I have come to the realization that honesty, tho not always simple, is necessary to relationships. My problem is that when I am in the midst of talking, my brain slips into overdrive and I blather on and lose whatever focus I had. I recall subjecting poor Sasha to a few of my blatherings, to which I apologize. I feel a relationship cannot advance if the partners are not honest with each other. Although, I do also know that I have had moments of dishonesty, which only made the situation much worse.

-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

Falsehoods can be good or bad; it depends on who you're telling and why you're telling it. Some false statements are perfectly acceptable. Lies are morally repugnant: they're falsehoods told to someone who has a right to know the truth.

Thus, a thug breaks into the house and wants to know where the rest of the family is - well, they're grocery shopping, of course, even though I've just hidden them in the attic. The thug has no right to know the truth.

But, if your spouse/S.O. asks you where you spent the night instead of coming home, and you tell him or her that you spent it just driving around when in fact you met your secret lover, then you've lied - that's bad. Because of your pledges to each other and the underlying committment, the spouse/S.O. has an absolute right to know your feelings and thoughts when it comes to your romantic inclinations.

I use this analysis when a situation arises that makes telling the truth difficult. Does the person asking me for this painful disclosure have a right to know the truth?

-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

I just read this entry because it was referenced by Meghan http://www.angelfire.com/oh2/confused/today.html who took the opposite position in her journal entry of 6/12. Basically, Sasha is right, Meghan is wrong. What kind of friendship is it if you you have to lie to someone to spare their feelings? Not much of a friendship, in my opinion. Now, does that mean that you should go to the opposite extreme? Think up all sorts of hurtful, nasty things to say to people--then excuse it with "but I was just being honest!"? No. You can be honest but tactful and diplomatic, in my opinion. Or you can at least try. There have been many books written on the subject, but one of the best, and one that sums up the literature is _Lying_ by Sisela Bok. She is a first-rate scholar in her own right, but also the wife of the (then) Dean of Harvard University. Get thee to a library and read it if you haven't already.

-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

When i was growing up, you lied to get out of trouble. Well, you know how that always ends up... even after my motehr screamed at me for saying that outfit really didn't do anything for her (in a nice tone too!) I still don't think lying is right. It always catches up to you.

I can't ever look my husband in the eye and lie. I just can't. I blab the truth every single time. It's like my mouth is independant from my brain.

-- Anonymous, June 13, 2000

Acceptable lies: 1. Size doesn't matter 2. nice shoes.....(if they are ugly doesn't mean that can't be nice if they are on your friends nice feet. right?) 3. No honey I never thought of being with anyone but you ( always lie when your man is insecure, it helps him.) 4. Yes your dress is sexy 5. No you do not look fat :) 6. This is delicious honey (knowing she's been cooking all afternoon) 7. Tattoos are cool ( if she/he already has the damn thang permantly placed on their bod.) 8. I don't vote ( you voted for clinton and are so ashamed) 9. I am sorry I didn't get your message something must be wrong with the telephone ( when you don't want to talk to your mother in law at that exact moment) 10. Oh I was just around my friend and she smokes....( if your significant other doesn't want you smoking but you do sneak a puff every now and then)

Un-acceptable LIES 1. Yes there are women where I work but I don't talk to any of them. ( kill the fucker ) 2. It was guys night out. No women were there. ( when in fact you know 2 of the guys had to bring their women or catch holy hell) 3. I love those fabulous shoes girlfriend ( when you hate the mother fuckers and are laughing because everyone will be gawking at the ugly shoes and loving the little designer shoes you have on ) 4.I was asleep I didn't hear the phone ( fuck no I let it ring 934 times). Twice.) 5. I've only been with 3 others ( ha, when you know they've made a fucking list a page long) 6. Yes I love children ( yea you might but you don't want to babysit and you left that impression that you do) totally unacceptable 7. No one said anything about you honey....( they called you a bitch and a ho) 8. Not telling your true age. Bad. very bad. 9. I swallow...........when in fact you don't ( never lie about swallowing) 10. Your thighs are not big. ( another don't lie we really want to know that men.)

-- Anonymous, June 27, 2000

To me truth, tact and thoughtful diplomacy go together in a group. Knowing a close person I think it is possible to know if they could handle a diagnosis of their terminal condition or not. I do not think there is a particular formula other than common sense. I don't lie frivolously, and rather than lie myself out of a corner it is usually possible for me to get to a better resolution.

-- Anonymous, September 03, 2000

"sometimes the TRUTH can be LYING right in front of you, and you still won't see it." That's what I told someone whom I care for very dearly, although we will never be together again, I still what to help her. She hurts people constantly without realising the consequences of her actions. Some people just can't help lying, it's a sickness of the mind, even if the heart is good !! "The truth can be hard to face , but at least it's the truth!"

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002