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importance of dishonesty
importance of dishonesty
the causes and effects of telling lies
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Growing up, we are always told to never lie because it is the worst thing you could ever do. “Lying will only lead to a horrible situation with less than mediocre results. While lying is not always good, it is not always bad either. Samuel Butler once said “Lying has a kind of respect and reverence with it. We pay a person the compliment of acknowledging his superiority whenever we lie to him.
To begin, sometimes it is better to lie rather than telling the truth and hurting someone’s feelings. It is not wrong when you tell a little white lie to keep someone you care about from getting hurt. To be specific, if your friend asked you how you feel about her hair, and you do not like it, you would not want to tell her that. Instead of telling the truth, and hurting her fragile feelings, you would rather say a little lie, telling her that you love it. If you are lying to keep someone you care about from getting their feelings hurt, or their pride wounded, then what is the harm? In conclusion, there is nothing wrong with telling small lies, if you are doing it with someone’s best interest in mind.
Secondly, it is okay to be untruthful if you are trying to protect people. In certain situations, it is safer, and more practical for you to tell a lie rather than putting a loved one in jeopardy. To illustrate you may be in a situation where you are in a serious or dangerous situation, and you do not what anyone else involved, to keep them safe. For example, if you are getting held up for ransom, would you tell the truth to a loved one and get them involved, or lie and keep them safe? The obvious answer is to keep them safe at all costs, even if it means lying. Also, you do not want to put someone in harm’s way, so it would be ...
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...narios, and can give the wrong impression. Nevertheless “little white lies” that help you or others feel better do not cause any harm. When you amplify stories, what is the harm and making yourself more exemplary? Embellishing tales only raise your self-esteem up, and does not harm anyone.
In certain circumstances and situations, I truly believe it is ok to lie. Initially, it is extremely beneficial to lie, rather than hurt the feelings of a loved one. Equally important, if you are trying to protect someone from getting impaired, it is okay to lie in order to keep them safe. Last but not least, exaggerations can help boost people’s self-esteem by making them exceptional. William Blake once said “A truth that's told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.” I urge you to question if honesty is really the best route, or is it okay to lie sometimes.
Richard Gunderman asks the question, "Isn 't there something inherently wrong with lying, and “in his article” Is Lying Bad for Us?" Similarly, Stephanie Ericsson states, "Sure I lie, but it doesn 't hurt anything. Or does it?" in her essay, "The Ways We Lie.” Both Gunderman and Ericsson hold strong opinions in regards to lying and they appeal to their audience by incorporating personal experiences as well as references to answer the questions that so many long to confirm.
She lies to the bank so she doesn’t get charged with “$60 in overdraft fees”, out-and-out lie. She does not tell the truth to her husband about her day so he does not “[keel] over,” white lie. She lies to her clients so that she does not get fired for telling the truth about the reason she is late. She lies to her friends so that her friend’s feelings do not get hurt, (Ericsson 181).All of these are justifiable because of the intent. There are consequences to telling the truth in these cases and thus Ericsson needs to lie to avoid the
Richard Gunderman and Stephanie Ericsson each have written a piece explaining the impacts of lying on society. In Gunderman’s article, “Is Lying Bad for Us?” he outlines the health effects of lying, and how there are serious “mental and physical consequences,” (Gunderman 1). Ericsson’s essay, “The Ways We Lie,” focuses more on the different types of lying, and how each has a different impact. Although Gunderman’s and Ericsson’s pieces of literature both relate to the negative impacts of lying, their different thoughts of how lying impacts society, including types, health, and solutions, outweigh their similarities.
Lying is never the better option to take, as shown in the book, The Memory Keeper’s Daughter.When you lie you destroy relationships with the people you love, some of which relationships can never be made whole again and you will have to live life with your
Philosopher Immanuel Kant has a completely different perspective on the moral righteousness of lying. Kant believes it is unethical and sinful to lie no matter what situation presents itself. “Kant finds it especially offensive, contrasting the ‘dim, moles’ eyes fixed on experience’ with the ‘eyes belonging to a being that was made to stand erect and look at the heavens’. Kant believes in the ideology of promise keeping and if you break your promise, it is considered
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 is an issue that has been debated on for a long time. Some people believe that lying is sometimes ok in certain circumstances. Some people believe lying is always acceptable. In contrast, some believe lying is always bad. Keeping all other’s opinions in mind, I believe that lying is a deficient way of solving problems and is a bad thing. I claim that only certain situations allow the usage of lies and that otherwise, lying is bad. Dishonesty is bad because it makes it harder to serve justice, harms the liar individually, and messes up records. Furthermore, it should only be said to protect someone from grave danger.
When you’re honest about the things you do, you don’t have to carry burdens about lying. Being honest can lead you to being happy because you made the right the decision to begin with. Doing honest deeds are rewarded to the people who tell the
At the same time, however, even though people have the tendency to be dishonest, not all lies are legally prosecutable. When asked to judge another person’s appearance, for example, some tend to lie in favor of that person, just to make the person feel better. When trying to avoid doing chores, some tend to lie about being too occupied with homework. Those are what I considered to be lies in the names of politeness and laziness; lies that cause no harm to others.
When is it okay to tell a lie? Some may say you should lie to spare the feelings of a friend, or to keep yourself out of trouble. However, in a way, lies will always come back around in the end. Therefore the truth is always better than lying because there may be less consequences. This is a lesson that can be observed from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams. The play takes place on an expensive plantation home owned by a wealthy family in Mississippi in the 1950’s. Williams based the whole basis of the play around lies, and even the absence of the truth. The truth was rarely discussed to satisfy the views of society and to keep the Pollitt family together.
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.)
Is “lying” really acceptable and needed? According to statistics and articles, there are many circumstances in which lying is perfectly reasonable. Lying can very often be acceptable because it may be best for society, keep one out of trouble, and can help maintain a strong friendship.
I once believed that lying was the only way out of hurting another person but after lying on many occasions not to get caught got me nowhere. I would lie on numerous times to my boyfriend that when the relationship got serious and committed he couldn’t help but throw my past lies in my face, especially during an argument. So after 2 years I have learned to always be honest regardless of the outcome. And so far it has worked to my favor.
Lying is morally forbidden under any and all circumstances. These are words that Immanuel Kant believed and preached. Kant did not believe a person should lie even if good consequences could result from the lie. According to Kant we are morally obligated to be honest. He was a man who was set in his beliefs and lying was simply not tolerated. Kant did not believe that there was any morally correct way to lie. He held that even in extreme cases of an “Inquiring Murderer” we must still tell the truth. Even if lying to that “Inquiring Murderer” could save someone’s life, telling the truth is the morally right thing to do.
Telling the truth teaches one person self- respect for themselves and others as well. Telling the truth also sets a good example for others to do the same thing and make a “chain reaction”. People can make a “chain reaction” by passing on what they have done from one person to another, and before you know it, everyone is changing greatly, and the world is progressing tremendously. Lies are told all around the world, and they are told every day. One lie can often lead to another lie and cause you to be caught up in one big lie that will be hard to get out of if people do not tell the truth. If a person thinks that is okay to lie, they better think again, the truth always comes out no matter how hard a person tries to keep it in, or how much someone thinks that they can get away with lying. No person can keep in or hold a grudge with what they have done. After all, telling the truth is the right thing to do, and everyone should do it. Telling the truth is always much easier than the trouble of a