Acting versus lying essay
From the start of life we are taught not to lie. As life progresses we learn that honesty may not be the best policy. That is, if getting ahead in life is important. This idea is taught in many ways, one is by acting. Every time an actor/actress is on a set they portray a different character this is evidence that lying is fine as long as it is acting. Movies and plays support that maybe lying is not always bad. The thing is are the different or are they the same? Are we acting when we are lying? Or are we lying when we are acting?
Lying is something that happens on a regular basis. Lying may be as common as a second nature to us. When caught in the act of lying we may try to cover it up. Either changing the whole story or using words that let others know that it was only for play or how sorry we are. On the other hand acting is done just as often as lying. The only difference is actors often do not make up their own lies in movies or plays. They have someone else do it. When the actor/actress is not believable they do not just pretend that they did not say it. This is when the script is changed to make it more believable.
When a person is lying there is often a sequence that is followed. They will start off with little “white lies” to see how much they can get away with. The more that they get away with, then the more in depth the lies will get. People tend to become very good at telling a lie. Making it hard to tell which are true and what a flat out lie is. A story is how these lies become alive. As actors/actresses convey a story throughout a movie, this rarely has anything to do of how the actor/actress really is. Lies that you can see characters share with each other in a movie are lies within lies. They set up a story and make it as real as possible but often it is the furthest from the truth.
Feeling comes into play when lying. A good liar will know how their feelings should be brought in. when something is tough the occasional tear will appear. If they are not so good they will often be caught because of them trying to force feelings out.
According to Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, lying means to tell an account of an untrue event or give false information.
The people who claim that they do not lie are probably lying when they say it. Whether it is to deceive authority or just to play a joke on a friend, it is part of human nature to lie. In the novel The Great Gatsby written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jay Gatsby takes on a character of wealth and luxury. Gatsby wants to win back his love interest from five years ago, so he secretly becomes wealthy through owning an illegal drug business, using his abundance of money to impress her. In contrast, in Tobias Wolff’s “The Liar,” he tells a story of teenage James as he lies about his life to appear more fascinating. He lies not because he wants to, but because it comes naturally to him. Both stories convey people struggling to find the purpose of their
In “The Ways We Lie,” Stephanie Ericsson discusses what she sees as ten types of lies: the white lie, façades, ignoring the plain facts, deflecting, omission, stereotypes and cliches, groupthink, out-and-out lies, dismissal, and delusion. After naming and defining each type she goes on to discuss when they are acceptable or beneficial, and what their negative effects are. Lying has become a part of everyday life and Ericsson wrestles with the justification of that while questioning when all the lies will end.
An abundant amount of people would say they try to contain honesty, however, we are all liars, no matter how hard we try. Because of the pressure from society, we all are forced to make ourselves look and feel satisfactory with the rest of society. This is not just considering students in a school setting, but also parents and those at home. My cousin
In “The Ways We Lie” by Stephanie Ericsson, the author uses her knowledge to talk about the different ways of lies and how those lies affect the liar, as well as the people who had been told lies. According to the author’s essay, there are 10 types of lies that people encounter every single day: the White Lie, Facades, Ignoring the Plain Facts, Deflecting, Omission, Stereotypes and Cliches, Groupthink, Out-and-Out Lies, Dismissal, and Delusion. Throughout the essay, it is connoted that people are lying in various ways even though they are not intended to. I had been taught that lying is a bad habit. According to Ericsson, there are many types of lie and I did three of them in my life: the White Lie, Omission, and Out-and-Out Lies; however, I can defend my lies for good purposes.
The book, “Pretty Little Liars”, made me reflect, to why people lie. To tell you the truth everyone lies, many just lie to lie. Many also have their reasons to why they lie, either if it’s for a good cause or a bad cause. For example,
It can occur without their direct knowledge. “White lies” are told because they aren’t seen as “real” lies, only small fibs. The reasons as to why people tell “white lies” depend on the person and event. That being said, some people tell these lies in order to fix the situation at hand. As stated in an article named “White Lies in Interpersonal Communication”, “Lies may be the most common form of duplicity used by man (Bak, 1978). Most of us find ourselves ‘telling white lies more or less regularly’ (Boyers, 1974:151), often treating the lie as the most efficient solution to interpersonal communication problems (Knapp, Hart, & Dennis, 1974).” (Camden, Motely, Wilson 309). This article states that people tell “white lies” all the time and it’s in order to regulate communication problems. Other times, people think they are telling the truth, when in reality, they are not. People with mental disabilities can find it hard to keep ideas straight in their minds. This can cause people with these types of issues to lie without meaning to. In CIDN, Christopher has a conversation with a policeman when trying to run away to his mom. He was upset with his father after finding out he had lied to him about his mom being dead. Christopher says, “‘I’m going to see Mother… I have a cashpoint card.’” (150). He forgets to mention that he has stolen the card from his father and is running away to see his mom. This way,
The article, “Is Lying Bad for Us,” accurately describes the intentions of a “liar.” The author says, “Though liars do not tell the truth, they care about it, while the bullshitter does not even care about the truth and seeks merely to impress” (Gunderman). This statement proves that lying should not be viewed as out of the ordinary, or unacceptable, and that liars should not be viewed as bad people. Lying can be shown as a way of protecting or caring
Lying involves asserting a claim that one knows as false to the other with the intention to mislead the listener. There is generally a widely accepted constraint against lying. Constraint against lying should not be mistaken with a requirement to tell the truth since no such requirement exists. One has a negative duty against telling a lie whereas there is no positive duty requiring one to tell the truth.
Stephanie Ericsson’s The Ways We Lie, analyzes and reflects on how lying has simply become the norm in our society. We all lie, there is not one person in the world that does not lie. Most people lie because they are afraid of telling the truth, however what they do not know is telling a lie can lead them in the wrong direction because many things can happen when lying to a person. The person can find out when everything unravels that person will not have trust in you and you would be known as a liar. To every action there is a consequence, so why not deal with just one consequence when telling the
To begin with, the majority of people believe that lying is okay when used for protection or protecting others. In the article entitled “It’s the truth: Americans Conflicted About Lying” ethics columnist Randy Cohen states, “ Not only is lying justified, it is sometimes a moral duty.” This shows how if a person is in a life or death situation you are going to lie to save them. This also shows that lying is
We lie all the time, lying is not something new to our culture. We lie to our parents, we lie to our friends, we even lie to our significant other, but why do we do it? There is not one set reason on why we lie but they can vary from an insignificant reason to something more nefarious. A good operational definition of a lie is “A lie is a false statement to a person or group made by another person or group who knows it is not the whole truth, intentionally.” (Freitas-Magalhães) We have been raised to know that lying is usually a bad thing, and it’s better to tell the truth, not to mention the circumstances get exponentially worse if you are caught lying. No one wants to be labeled as a liar, or untrustworthy. This may sound unorthodox but I personally think lying is perfectly fine; depending on the situation. If you have a prima-facie duty to be dishonest it’s perfectly acceptable. Ross says a prima facie duty or obligation is an actual duty. “One’s actual duty is what one ought to do all things considered.” (Carson) I’m not the only one who finds this too be true. Ross would also agree with me, He says “Lying is permissible or obligatory when the duty not to lie conflicts with a more important or equal important prima facie duty.” (Carson) As I was doing research on this topic I did read one extremely compelling argument on why we ought not to lie. Aristotle basically said a person who makes a defense for lying could never be trusted. (King.)
You can tell a lot about a person by the way they dress, by the cars they drive, and by the people they associate themselves with. You can also learn a lot about a person by what they say, because their honesty, or lack-there-of, shows the type of person they are. When a person is forthright, it is easy to believe and trust the person; however, when the person has tendencies to be misleading or manipulative, the trust is not as evident. To lie, according to www.answers.com, means to present false or invalid information with the intent of deceiving or misleading another person. Choosing to lie to people is a self-dilemma that one has, and this act may alter the relations they have with the people they lie to. Some lie and completely change the information they are spreading, altering the story for some reason or another. Other people simply leave a couple of facts out, speaking carefully and holding back parts of the story for their own benefit or to make the listener think differently. It is a question as to whether either method is good, and what could happen by speaking in such ways to another person. In George Bernard Shaw’s play, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, Mrs. Warren is careful when she speaks to Vivie so she can keep parts of her life hidden from her daughter; by not stating all of the facts, one may wonder if Mrs. Warren is lying to Vivie, or simply leaving out information.
People lie everyday to, in someway or another, keep themselves out of trouble. Many teenagers will lie to their parents about what they are doing for the evening, how much of their homework they have done, or how that glass vase got broken while they were out of town. We even lie to our significant others about who that other boy was that called the house or what exactly we did with our friends last night. All anyone is trying to accomplish by this is to stay out of trouble when we know we’ve done wrong. But we never think of the effects of lying. Although we think we’re being sly, parents are usually smarter than we give them credit for! And eventually our boyfriends and girlfriends will find out! Then the problem becomes the issue of trust. If you lie, there is no trust. That can be one of the serious consequences of lying.
Liars have rumors spread around about how they lie all the time. Nobody wants to talk to them because they won't know if they are lying to them or not. They aren't trusted as much as people who don't lie. Liars never get very far in life and always have a reputation of lying. It's much better to tell the truth and have friends who trust them, rather than lying and having rumors spread around making no one like them.