Half-Truths and Brazen Lies: An Honest Look at Lying
HALF-TRUTHS AND BRAZEN LIES AN HONEST LOOK AT LYING by Kira Vermond Illustrated by Clayton Hanmer Owlkids Books
2 Contents Introduction 2 Chapter 1 4 What’s in a Lie How we decide if a lie is really a lie or something else in disguise Chapter 2 14 The Whys of Lies There are loads of reasons people tell fibs and untruths Chapter 3 24 Lies All around Us From the news on TV to the food we eat lies touch our lives in surprising ways Chapter 4 36 Spot the Liar Can you tell if someone is lying to you Do you even want to Conclusion 44 Index 46 Sources and Acknowledgments 47 INTRODUCTION Do you believe in telling the truth Sure you do Then you might as well admit it You LIE Relax Given the right conditions we all lie Everybody Friends teachers athletes movie stars doctors scientists gasp even your parents Lying is as much a part of us as our curiosity It’s central to human nature In other words we tell fibs corkers fictions falsehoods and tall tales because we just can’t help ourselves Here’s something else We lie a lot One study found that six out of every ten people lied at least once during a ten-minute conversation Most of them didn’t even realize they were doing it
3 Honest to goodness It’s strange that we treat lying differently from many of our other universal shared traits Unlike eating sleeping and crying lying is commonly held to be bad It’s immoral wicked But is it Here are a few questions for you Would you lie to protect a friend Yes No Would you lie to make someone feel better Yes No Would you lie once to avoid telling even bigger lies later Yes No Mixed messages How did you answer Though many lies are immoral hurtful or unethical some certainly are not There are experts who say lies are actually so necessary that society would collapse if we told the truth all the time Some types of lies help communities run more smoothly and make people happier You were probably taught that honesty is the best policy So why do your parents ask you to pretend you like all your birthday gifts even Aunt Dora’s knitted dinosaur sweater Does being polite mean lying And aren’t card players encouraged to bluff when they play poker Talk about mixed messages So lies good Before you get too excited it’s still uncool to spread false stories about other kids Or to tell your parents that you’re studying when you’re actually playing a video game These lies can be hurtful and they’re not so good for you either Luckily there are ways to tell the difference between good fibs bad lies and untruths that fall into a large gray zone Keep reading because there is much to learn about lies and deception Honest
