Can you be polite without lying? A Slippery Slope

Introduction

Morality, religion and conventional wisdom caution us against lying. To lie is to speak falsely or to utter an untruth knowingly, as with an intent to deceive. We associate lying or telling lies with deception which is morally reprehensible.

However, it appears that we are all guilty of lying at one point in time or another. As such, we seem to indirectly condone lying. Are some lies more harmful than others? Are some of the reasons for lying justifiable? Can we be polite without lying?

Are some lies more harmful than others?

In determining whether some lies are more harmful than others, researchers have tried to classify deception as benevolent or selfish. In “Are Liars Ethical? : On the Tension between Benevolence and Honesty”, Maurice Schweitzer and Emma E. Levine show benevolent deception as involving well-intentioned lies, which we consider as moral.

On the other hand, they portray selfish deception as involving selfish or meaningless lies which we consider as immoral. They also distinguish between pro-social lies, which are falsehoods that we tell for someone else’s benefit, and anti-social lies. The latter are falsehoods that we tell strictly for our personal gain.

We may also categorise lies as white, black or blue. According to Wikipedia, a white lie is a harmless or trivial lie. For instance, this is a lie we tell in order to be polite or to avoid hurting someone’s feelings. We also tell a white lie to prevent a person from being upset by the truth. We also consider a white lie as a lie to be used for a greater good such as pro-social behaviour.

A black lie, on the other hand, is a lie which involves anti-social behaviour. With a black lie, the liar benefits from deceiving and the listener or some other group is hurt.

A blue lie, on its part, is a lie that we tell purportedly to benefit a collective or in the name of the collective good. According to University of Toronto psychologist Kang Lee, blue lies fall between generous white lies and selfish black ones. Lee notes that you can tell a blue lie against another group which makes it simultaneously selfless and self-serving. An instance is when you lie about your team’s cheating in a game, which is anti-social, but helps your team.

Other writers have referred to red lies and grey lies. No doubt the colours can go on and on.

From the above classifications and categorisations, it appears that we perceive some lies to be more harmful than others.

Justifiable Reasons for Lying

But why do people lie? Are some of the reasons for lying justifiable?

A major reason that people give for lying is to be polite or to avoid hurting another person’s feelings. It would be social suicide to say whatever that comes into our minds. We thus have to be circumspect and couch our words accordingly.

When a friend asks you how she looks in her new dress, you are more likely to say that she looks lovely out of politeness and in order not to hurt her feelings. This may be despite the fact that she may look fat and unattractive in it. Are we not guilty of encouraging our kids to lie when, for the sake of politeness, we ask them to express their delight to Aunt Sarah for her homemade cookies and to thank her profusely, even though we know the kids dislike the cookies?

People may also lie in order to save a situation. One may lie under a serious threat in order to avoid the occurrence of a terrible event. Examples are lying in order to protect a murderer’s intended victim and lying to save oneself from death or injury.

We may also lie in order to alleviate stress or avoid depression. We may motivate ourselves in order to boost our self-esteem and self-confidence or as a way of coping with problems and challenges by lying to ourselves that everything is fine. Whenever we do this when, in reality, everything is not fine, are we not engaging in self-deception? Is this form of lying justifiable because we tell the lie to ourselves and no other party is involved?

The above reasons for lying seem convincing in justifying why people lie. With respect to being polite to others, we appear to condone white lies. Although we generally frown upon lying, we perceive unfettered honesty as insensitive and discourteous. We make references to “being brutally honest” and “telling the bitter truth”, showing our displeasure with it. According to Lacey Rose in “Lying is Good for You”, we consider those who are too honest to be blunt, anti-social and even pathological. Does this imply that we cannot be polite without lying?

The Line between Politeness and Lying

Where do we draw the line between politeness and lying? Jeremy Adam Smith in “What’s Good About Lying?”, refers to Harvard psychologist Felix Warneken who poses the question of when it is right to prioritise another person’s feelings over truth. According to Warneken, in the instance of where a person prepares a badly-cooked meal for you, if the person is applying for a cooking school somewhere, the pro-social thing to do is to be honest and criticise the meal. You should do this so that the person can improve.

On the other hand, if the person just cooked the meal on his or her own, just for you, then perhaps it is better to lie and say that it tastes good, in order not to hurt the person’s feelings.

In the quest for politeness however, we are cautioned that lying can become a slippery slope. In “Is Lying Ever Justifiable? What to Consider When Thinking About Lying”, the PaulEkmanGroup notes that the more one lies, the more matters one lies about, the greater the likelihood that you will lie about other things until there are few areas of honesty left in your life.

William S. Paley gives a similar caution in his quote, “White lies always introduce others of a darker complexion.”

For his part, James E. Faust, an American clergyman, stated, “When we tell little white lies, we become progressively color blind. It is better to remain silent than to mislead.”

Conclusion

But is it possible to be polite without lying? According to Mary Wilson Little, “Politeness is only one half good manners and the other half good lying.” Do we lie more than we care to admit in our quest for politeness? Or, are we rather economical with the truth?

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