by Lawrence George

Created on: December 20, 2009   Last Updated: January 10, 2010

Anyone who says they never tell lies is a liar. We all do. It's a very important part of civilisation. If we told the truth about everything, we would be fighting wars all the time, and violence on the street would be the norm everywhere.

I lie to myself, on the whole. I tell myself things don't need to be done when they do; that I look OK with my thinning hair centre-parted; that I will only have a "swift half" at the pub. I lie to myself about pretty much everything, in order to ignore the tough decisions about haircuts, waistlines and livers.

This kind of lying is bizarre because your only victim, yourself, knows for a fact that he is being lied to. Indeed, he can hear it happening.

I wonder if this causes all sorts of problems...

If a woman asks me "Does my bum look big in this?" I will generally not lie if the answer is "yes", because I find that immensely attractive. Sometimes my appreciation is taken for teasing, and the woman in question will get angry, but that just goes to show the moral labryinth one enters when one decides to tell the truth.

If I am asked whether or not I'd like to go to a party, I will lie and say I would love to but can't because of x, y and z. I hate parties. The truth (ho ho) is that parties are dull, embarrassing and often physically dangerous. I don't mind lying about this because I like to give the impression that I already have a massively full social life and therefore cannot possibly go. If I were to go to one, a whole new vista of lying would open up: I would have to pretend to be interested in people's lives, children and work while I am struggling to remember their names. A party is a kind of institutionalised lie, a lie machine, in which everyone tries to be someone they wish they were.

If I am about to be in trouble, because I haven't done some element of work properly, by the deadline, or at all, then I will lie.  I am a classic child-like liar in that doing it to get out of trouble is an instinctive reaction from me. I don't have a problem with this. The original task is almost certainly pointless anyway and what is to be gained by admitting one's own incompetence? Lying to avoid trouble not only allows mistakes to be forgotten, as they should be, but also allows one to learn from one's mistakes without anyone else being involved. Having avoided trouble narrowly, you can easily say that you "won't be doing that again..."

The work will get done eventually anyway, and nobody will have suffered, except the clot whose job it is to collect meaningless bits of paper with government-speak about "targets" and "promoting excellence" or whatever the jargon is today.

If I am asked "Do you love me?" then I will think carefully.  Not now, but in previous relationships I have said it simply and untruthfully to avoid a confrontation. I did like her, and enjoyed her company, but I didn't want an argument about love - and I wasn't sure what it was. Being older now, I will tell the truth all the time. On this topic, it is easier in the long run to tell the truth.

If I am alone with myself at night, staring at the stars, then I won't lie. Because the infinite space before me is a vast expanse of truth and it has no time for the fripperies of western, largely pointless, life.

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