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Why is lying immoral?
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Post by
Queggy
Arathian do you think breaking the law is all right as long as nobody notices that you break it?
will that affect anybody negatively?
Yes.
If you murder someone, bought aren't caught and convicted, does that mean that person is still alive? No. It doesn't.
To put it in context about lying -
Your manager at work gives you and your coworker Steve a project. Unfortunately, you slack off and make Steve do all the work. Steve can't handle the work load and doesn't finish the project in time. Your manager asks for the completed project, and you can't turn it in. You lie, saying that Steve wouldn't help you do it and that's why it wasn't finished. Steve is a kind guy and takes the blame for you.
Unfortunately for Steve, this was that proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. Your manager has been looking for an excuse to fire Steve for awhile now, and since Steve took the blame, he now has an excuse to do so. Steve is fired, and in today's poor economy is unable to find a job. Mrs. Steve is forced to work double times at the local supermarket in order to pay for Steve and little Tommy. Tommy catches the flu, but Mr. and Mrs. Steve don't have the money to get medicine. Tommy dies. Mr. and Mrs. Steve become divorced after little Tommy's death. Mrs. Steve becomes a prostitute, contracts AIDs and dies in 5 years. Mr. Steve becomes an alchoholic, and hangs himself in the attic.
All because of one lie. But hey, you didn't get caught, so it's alright! Right?
EDIT -
You edited your post while I was typing. QQ. But still, you can never be sure whether or not your lie will affect someone negatively or not, which is why it's always better to
not
lie if you can help it. I mean, in the example I provided, you're not breaking a law per se, but it still causes harm.
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Post by
pezz
queggy,seriously aren't you bored writing so sophisticated examples? D:
anyways :P, i don't ever blame someone, and you know why? Because one way or another it will
always
have either short or long term consequences. And this is one of the things i don't do.
BUT, let's take one other situation:
I cheat in the exams (i have done this only 3 times so far,i usually study well :P). Teacher semi-finds out, but wants to make sure. He calls me.
1)If she just think i might have cheated, but no idea from whom or how, i'll lie. I'll plain ol' lie "no miss, i just didn't knew the previous subject, that's why the 1/5 and here the 5/5".
2) she calls me and the guy i copied from to ask who has copied from. There i just say the truth
3) situation 1, but teacher is a persistant idiot and just can't let it go. Because of who-knows-what he discovers that. He calls the other pupil to punish him. Now, this ^&*!ty situation has happend to me (yay for my ancient Greek teacher). When i found out i just went,talked to her, apologised, took a nice 0 and end of story
see what i mean here? Lying by itself when it won't hurt anyone isn't bad
(and plz,don't start the bs about copying being bad, you all did it :P)
. Lying and hurting someone is bad. When you couldn't have possibly predict the consequence you have two choises:
1) if you can fix it, do that, even to your personal expense
2) if you CAN'T fix it, speak with the said affected person and find a way to pay him back.
The bolded part is a fairly rude assumption, but that's irrelevant.
You aren't only lying to a professor though, are you? Every prospective employer sees some of those grades. (Let's assume we're talking college/last couple years of high school here. I still disagree with cheating below that level, but let's face it. No one cares if you get a C- on a sixth grade social studies test.) Let's say you make a habit of cheating, and your grades don't reflect your understanding of what you've studied at all. But a prospective employer doesn't know that. You get hired, and suddenly you're in a position where
you have no idea how to do anything you're expected to do.
Another hilarious assumption here: what you study somehow relates to what you do professionally. Because you didn't like the idea of putting a small amount of effort in years ago, you are now a (potentially severe) liability to a company that is paying you money. Your choices are either finally man up, admit you're in over your head and have been for a long time, leave the company, and find work you're suited for, or continue lying and passing the buck and living in fear the rest of your life someone will figure out you haven't had a clue what you were doing for decades, all the while getting stuck in a pattern where you throw good people under the bus because you can and you're terrified of consequences. How long can you really live like that? And do you want to? And what happens to a company full of this kind of person?
And there was a point earlier in this thread a month ago before it was mini-necroed about why a parent would tell a small child, if pressed, that lying is always a bad thing: Children don't have the capacity to make the sort of complicated value and situational judgments that are required to attempt to distinguish 'good' lies from 'bad' lies, if such a dichotomy exists.
Post by
conas
Arathian do you think breaking the law is all right as long as nobody notices that you break it?
It should depend on the law, I can give you 2 examples:
1: You kill or rape someone=bad
2: In some places nudity is against the law (even inside your own House)= Is it wrong to break that law?
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229791
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Post by
TheMediator
Not hurting anybody? I could burn down your house, it might not hurt you if you're not there, but it is going to be detrimental to you. Most things that are criminal are criminal because there are detrimental effects to other people.
I don't agree with all laws though (alcohol being legal and marijuana being illegal is in my mind like saying that its ok to rape someone but its illegal to have sex), but you can't just say "Eh, laws are junk, I'm going to do whatever I want", because if everyone did that, society would break down.
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229791
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