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I think what GP is saying is that white lies are not necessarily betrayal. Betrayal is when someone violates your trust somehow. [0] You can see some examples o

I think what GP is saying is that white lies are not necessarily betrayal. Betrayal is when someone violates your trust somehow. [0] You can see some examples of lying in the wiktionary definition I linked. (see the last two definitions) However, both these definitions involve the lie causing some negative consequence. A white lie is specifically a lie done to spare someones feelings. It's possible that the white lie can cause negative consequences, but that is not always the case. To take a concrete example, consider the classic white lie "no, that dress doesn't make you look fat". It is possible that this could cause someone to wear an ugly dress, but the person probably looked at themselves in the mirror too, so they probably will end up choosing a dress that doesn't look awful. In this case there is no negative consequence associated with the white lie unless person wearing the dress is unable to accurately self assess. (which is something the speaker hopefully would know about the dress wearer) You could define being lied to as a violation of your trust. In particular, I think autistic people often can't pick up on social cues, and so rely more on people speaking the truth to them. However, that doesn't mean white lies are betrayal for everyone. If you in particular feel like white lies are betrayal, you might want to tell people in your life that so they know it's important to you. They won't automatically know and it isn't automatically important to them. [0]: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/betray#English https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/betray#English

aleph_minus_one 2y ago
> Betrayal is when someone violates your trust somehow. Which white lies do.
- genrilz 2y ago
  I believe you when you say that white lies violate your trust. I'm saying that that experience isn't universal though. Different people define violations of their trust differently. Thus my suggestion at the end to make sure that the people around you know that this is part of your definition. (Though you might have already done this)
salawat 2y ago
A lie is a lie, and GP's point still stands. In effect, you're proving their point by doing everything possible to justify a state of affairs for a preponderance of people whereby it's okay to water down the reality of the situation to "spare them an emotional reaction". I can understand where GP is coming from. A lot of my professional career even exists because someone has to cut through the massive layer of bullshit and distortion people generate in an org to be able to make substantive statements about what is the truth, born out by quantitative data and observation. After a while in the field, you really start to lose your appreciation for other people walking around "sparing" one another from the Truth.
- genrilz 2y ago
  I agree that in professional settings, it's usually best for the efficiency of the company to be direct about everything. I also generally prefer that people provide accurate feedback about how I am doing in interpersonal relationships. I do think that "sparing" someone from an emotional reaction is sometimes a reasonable thing to do in an interpersonal relationship though, depending on the relationship. Back to the dress example. Let's say the dress wearer is my girlfriend, and I have been asked the question "does this dress make me look fat?". Let's also assume I do think this particular dress makes her look fat, but generally find her attractive, and know that she has body image issues. If I answer "yes", or even "that dress isn't particularly flattering on you", she might interpret that as "He thinks the dress makes me look fat" -> "I am fat" -> "I am ugly", which is not actually what I think and not what I want her to think of herself. Even if I try to reassure her that I don't think she's ugly, she might think that my reassurance is a lie. People with insecurities don't always think logically about them. I think "You look beautiful" would probably be the most ideal response, (in that is both true and doesn't cause her to spiral) but if I didn't have time to think about my response, "No, it doesn't make you look fat" feels like a better response than something else which would cause her to spiral. If I feel the need to actually help her choose the right dress, I can back that up by pointing out exactly how some other dress that looks better on her actually looks good. Of course, if I feel like she could take it well, then pointing out exactly how the bad dress is bad might be helpful to her. However, I feel like keeping her from spiraling is more important then informing her of every detail of my taste in dresses. Obviously, I made this scenario very concrete, but I feel like you can't really decide if it is a good idea without that very concrete knowledge. Which is one reason why white lies might be a bad idea in professional settings, where you don't necessarily know how people will respond to things in the first place. (Because you might not know them well)

aleph_minus_one 2y ago

> Betrayal is when someone violates your trust somehow. Which white lies do.

genrilz 2y ago
I believe you when you say that white lies violate your trust. I'm saying that that experience isn't universal though. Different people define violations of their trust differently. Thus my suggestion at the end to make sure that the people around you know that this is part of your definition. (Though you might have already done this)

salawat 2y ago

A lie is a lie, and GP's point still stands. In effect, you're proving their point by doing everything possible to justify a state of affairs for a preponderance of people whereby it's okay to water down the reality of the situation to "spare them an emotional reaction". I can understand where GP is coming from. A lot of my professional career even exists because someone has to cut through the massive layer of bullshit and distortion people generate in an org to be able to make substantive statements about what is the truth, born out by quantitative data and observation. After a while in the field, you really start to lose your appreciation for other people walking around "sparing" one another from the Truth.

genrilz 2y ago
I agree that in professional settings, it's usually best for the efficiency of the company to be direct about everything. I also generally prefer that people provide accurate feedback about how I am doing in interpersonal relationships. I do think that "sparing" someone from an emotional reaction is sometimes a reasonable thing to do in an interpersonal relationship though, depending on the relationship. Back to the dress example. Let's say the dress wearer is my girlfriend, and I have been asked the question "does this dress make me look fat?". Let's also assume I do think this particular dress makes her look fat, but generally find her attractive, and know that she has body image issues. If I answer "yes", or even "that dress isn't particularly flattering on you", she might interpret that as "He thinks the dress makes me look fat" -> "I am fat" -> "I am ugly", which is not actually what I think and not what I want her to think of herself. Even if I try to reassure her that I don't think she's ugly, she might think that my reassurance is a lie. People with insecurities don't always think logically about them. I think "You look beautiful" would probably be the most ideal response, (in that is both true and doesn't cause her to spiral) but if I didn't have time to think about my response, "No, it doesn't make you look fat" feels like a better response than something else which would cause her to spiral. If I feel the need to actually help her choose the right dress, I can back that up by pointing out exactly how some other dress that looks better on her actually looks good. Of course, if I feel like she could take it well, then pointing out exactly how the bad dress is bad might be helpful to her. However, I feel like keeping her from spiraling is more important then informing her of every detail of my taste in dresses. Obviously, I made this scenario very concrete, but I feel like you can't really decide if it is a good idea without that very concrete knowledge. Which is one reason why white lies might be a bad idea in professional settings, where you don't necessarily know how people will respond to things in the first place. (Because you might not know them well)