(English) ESSARP Forum
BDS students, Maureen Chudnosky and Victoria Croceri, participated yesterday Wednesday 3oth, in the forum at Northands organized by ESSARP.
The girls prepared the following speech on white lies.They debated this against Bede´s Grammar School.
OPPOSITION SPEECH
Topic One: “There is no such thing as a white lie. A lie is always a lie”
These are their words!
A white lie, is always a lie
Who hasn´t broken up with someone saying that they are confused? “It’s me, not you” when the real dreadful truth is that you don’t love the other person anymore. And if you told the truth you would be hurting your ex even more. So if the proposition wants truth, this is the truth. If it weren’t for white lies we would be totally alone and excluded from society, and even more hurt deep down inside. We wouldn’t have friends, boyfriends or any relationship whatsoever.
There is a huge step between a lie and a White lie. The difference lies upon the intention, the positive intention of it. A white lie is something you tell someone in order to protect them or avoid hurting their feelings. During this speech you will discover the other side of the coin, why a white lie is not the same as a plain, straight LIE. Beware…
A white lie is a harmless statement that can be used to save the occasion without harming anyone. For instance, a stranger calls your home asking for private information of a family member. No one would tell the stranger the truth because they would be afraid of something bad happening to their loved one. They would simply say that they don’t know. Everyone would do that and THAT is a white lie.
White lies are necessary and are everywhere…
With children for example, white lies are necessary for creating a safe environment and giving them the tools to be good. They are there when parents tell their children to be good or else Santa won’t give them a Christmas present. Parents also use white lies when children ask them questions when they are not mature enough to hear the answer like where babies come from. It is also true that sometimes we lie to be polite or politically correct and sometimes we tell our children at an early age the difference between these two.
Another important point is when omitting your thoughts. This clearly leads to a better environment, if everybody spoke up their mind we would be living in ww3. Cordiality is the synonym of white lies, teachers and parents teach us to treat others as you would like to be treated and to care for others, and white lies are a way of softening the occasion. Of putting yourself in the other person´s shoes…
Empathy is a key word when talking about white lies. They are white because they are pure, inoffensive, and harmless. Being nice with something you do not agree with is also a white lie. White lies save occasions for example when you are not sure about an issue and in order not to mess things up, you tell a white lie, until you are sure, white lies give you time to prepare a reasonable answer.
The aim of a white lie is to save a situation, to protect yourself or others. Sometimes white lies are a way of protecting our most private vulnerable side that we don’t want to share with the whole world. Everyone has secrets that should be respected and it’s more important to protect them than to expose them.
There is such thing as a white lie which in fact is more than a thing and less than a fact but saves us from human cruelty or rough truths, therefore helping us to get along with respect and softness, repressing the violent truth by saying something harmless instead or having more time to give it a second thought; it’s a cordiality to manners and carefulness towards others and ourselves.
Quoting Tennessee Williams in a Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche says: Women are 50% illusion but when a thing is important, I tell the truth. Stanley does not understand this white lie view of the world Blanche has, sometimes lies are a projection of yourself, you create the world you live in by illusion and reality, which in fact this fantasy world keeps you going without hurting others. Eg, Facebook profile. There are white lies, the problem is when you are a liar and can’t distinguish from a white an inoffensive lie from a harmful and malicious lie.