The Ways We Lie Essay

"We lie,we all do.We exaggerate,we minimize,we avoid confrontation,we spare people's feelings,we conveniently forget. We keep secrets,we justify lying to the big-guy institutions.Like most people,I indulge in small falsehoods and still think of myself as an honest person.Sure I lie,but it doesn't hurt anything.Or does it?"This is said by Stephanie Ericsson in

The Ways We Lie.I do agree with her.If your lies are not bad for yourself or others,why should they be banned?

First of all,the white lie assumes that the truth will cause more damage than a simple, harmless untruth.Here I just give you two examples.First,telling a friend he looks great when he looks like terrible can be based on a decision that the friend needs a compliment more than a frank opinion.

Second,the sergeant in Vietnam who knew one of his men was killed

The Nary command in Hawaii assumed Pearl Harbor was invulnerable -the Japanese weren’t stupid enough to attack the United States’ most important base. On the other hand, racist stereotypes said the Japanese weren’t smart enough to invent a torpedo effective in less than 60 feet of water; after all, U.S .technology hadn’t been able to do it. On Friday, December 5,normal weekend leave was granted to all commanders at Pearl Harbor, even though the Japanese consulate in Hawaii was busy burning papers. With the tight, good-ole-boy cohesiveness of the US command in Hawaii the myth of invulnerability stayed well