Why you shouldn’t lie to anyone you don’t plan to kill, and probably not even if you do

This post was inspired by a pithy statement from negotiation expert Chris Voss in the interview that I linked at the end of my recent post about Negotiation and Communication. He said:

”Don’t lie to anyone you don’t plan to kill…and even then it’s probably not a good idea.”

He recalled how his academic colleagues laughed at the first part of that statement … until they realized that he was serious. Keep in mind that he believes this after a long and very successful career negotiating with hostage takers, not kind and honest individuals. He now runs the successful consulting company Black Swan Group, applying his skills and teaching negotiation for business people.

Here I’ll summarize the reasons why, with examples of how very different individuals and cultures have come to basically the same conclusion.

The Bible

From my younger years as a fundamentalist Christian, I remember well that the Bible in several places condemns lying. Even I no longer believe in that fundamentalist way, I still very much appreciate the there is great deal of ancient wisdom in the bible. About lying specifically, here are two such examples:

“There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers.” –Proverbs 6:16-19

“The getting of treasures by a lying tongue is a fleeting vapor and a snare of death.”, Proverbs 21:6.

Any Rand, atheist author and philosopher

““People think that a liar gains a victory over his victim. What I’ve learned is that a lie is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one’s reality to the person to whom one lies, making that person one’s master, condemning oneself from then on to faking the sort of reality that person’s view requires to be faked…The man who lies to the world, is the world’s slave from then on…There are no white lies, there is only the blackest of destruction, and a white lie is the blackest of all.” –from her very influential novel Atlas Shrugged.

Yes, she had her quirks and some of her followers formed what seems to have been a cult. Nevertheless, she was brilliant and very serious about her Objectivist philosophy. She condemned lying because she reasoned that only honest communication has real value, and we humans need to communicate honestly in order to prosper.

Here are a few other examples.

Confucius

“Confucius said, "I do not see what use a man can be put to, whose word cannot be trusted. How can a wagon be made to go if it has no yoke-bar, or a carriage if it has no collar-bar?"
--Confucianism. Analects 2.22

Buddhism

“A liar lies to himself as well as to the gods. Lying is the origin of all evils; it leads to rebirth in the miserable planes of existence, to breach of the pure precepts, and to corruption of the body.”
--Buddhism. Maharatnakuta Sutra 27, Bodhisattva Surata's Discourse

Hinduism

“All things are determined by speech; speech is their root, and from speech they proceed. Therefore he who is dishonest with respect to speech is dishonest in everything.” --Hinduism. Laws of Manu 4.256

Sikhism

“Dishonesty in business or the uttering of lies causes inner sorrow.” --Sikhism. Adi Granth, Maru Solahe, M.3, p. 1062

... and of course,

Lying poisons communication, which is not in the best interest of even the person telling the lie. That’s why so many different cultures and individuals have reached this conclusion.

Most people recognize that politicians as a class are professional liars. That’s why politicians are generally held in such low esteem.

Andrew Napolitano summarizes so well how government lies systematically and consistently.

S. Lan Smith

Kamakura, Japan

June 05, 2017