10 lies

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/12/14/can-you-justify-these-lies/?_r=0

Are the lies in these 10 scenarios justified? Some of them, not others? What's your call on each, how would you gauge it? Justified / Not really but enough of a gray area/ Not justified / I don't even see it as lie / Anything else you can think of.

1. A man lies to his wife about where they are going in order to get her to a place where a surprise birthday party has been organized.

2. A young child is rescued from a plane crash in a very weakened state. His parents have been killed in the crash but he is unaware of this. He asks about his parents and the attending physician says they are O.K. He intends to tell the truth once the child is stronger.

3. Your father suffers from severe dementia and is in a nursing home. When it is time for you to leave he becomes extremely agitated and often has to be restrained. On the occasions when you have said you would be back tomorrow he was quite peaceful about your leaving. You tell him now every time you leave that you will be back tomorrow knowing that in a very short time after you leave he will have forgotten what you said.

4. A woman’s husband drowned in a car accident when the car plunged off a bridge into a body of water. It was clear from the physical evidence that he desperately tried to get out of the car and died a dreadful death. At the hospital where his body was brought his wife asked the physician in attendance what kind of death her husband suffered. He replied, “He died immediately from the impact of the crash. He did not suffer.”

5. In an effort to enforce rules against racial discrimination “testers” were sent out to rent a house. First, an African-American couple claiming to be married with two children and an income that was sufficient to pay the rent would try to rent a house. If they were told that the house was not available, a white tester couple with the same family and economic profile would be sent. If they were offered the rental there would be persuasive evidence of racial discrimination.

6. In November of 1962, during the Cuban Missile crisis, President Kennedy gave a conference. When asked whether he had discussed any matters other than Cuban missiles with the Soviets he absolutely denied it. In fact, he had promised that the United States would remove missiles from Turkey.

7. A woman interviewing for a job in a small philosophy department is asked if she intends to have children. Believing that if she says (politely) it’s none of their business she will not get the job, she lies and says she does not intend to have a family.

8. In order to test whether arthroscopic surgery improved the conditions of patients’ knees a study was done in which half the patients were told the procedure was being done but it was not. Little cuts were made in the knees, the doctors talked as if it were being done, sounds were produced as if the operation were being done. The patients were under light anesthesia. It turned out that the same percentage of patients reported pain relief and increased mobility in the real and sham operations. The patients were informed in advance that they either would receive a real or a sham operation.

9. I am negotiating for a car with a salesperson. He asks me what the maximum I am prepared to pay is. I say $ 15,000. It is actually $ 20,000.

10. We heap exaggerated praise on our children all the time about their earliest attempts to sing or dance or paint or write poems. For some children this encouragement leads to future practice, which in turn promotes the development–in some — of genuine achievement.

Number 4 happened to me recently at the hospital how lack of compassion some doctors are. when they stated the little baby 3 years old died on impact by the car accident that happened. The baby died on impact broke the neck and was waiting for mulitple neuro surgerons to declare something. Some doctors tell the truth about it was quick and not in pain telling the mother this.. Crazy.

1, 2 and 5 are justified. The rest, some a little too morbid for me to deal with at the moment but I get back to them when I can think clearly.

why lie with no.1?? just tell your wife, i'm gonna take you somewhere but I can't tell you. why say it's going to somewhere she thinks they're going to. She's just gonna get her heart set on that place.

2. just don't say anything, why say they're ok?? that's lying bald face to a child. just tell him he needs to rest. or just tell him soon. I don't like that.If I were the child i'd have deep resentment for the doctors and nurses. sure i'll get over it and understand but it isn't good.

3. why tell your dementia father you are coming back tomorrow if it's only next week. Jeeez.

4. i'm sorry but no freaking way. I'm gonna hate on the doctors and nurses who told me something else. like no.2 i'll get over it but the initial finding out is terrible. it's like putting the blinders over my eyes and in my dreams I dreamt the truth, that he died a horrible death and this horrible feeling that people were just sugar coating me.

i'll look at the other stuff but I have to put myself in the OTHER person's shoes. What if you were that person? would you like it done to you? I don't think so.

Posted by Feral_doe

Posted by lisabethur8
3. why tell your dementia father you are coming back tomorrow if it's only next week. Jeeez.

Because it's what calms him down where you're about to leave.

He won't remember that you tell him that. But at least he won't get agitated to the point of being restrained.

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I guess it depends on the individual and their state.

i'm going by experience. and from other individuals, when my mother in law and husband's family members visited grandma at the hospital (she had dementia) we wouldn't lie to her at all. We would say exactly what day we'd come even if she forgot.

edit - same with my grandma, before she passed, we just didn't do that. but I think personally it depends on the state of the individual if they're hysterical.