Is pretending the same thing as lying?

Sure it’s lying but lying isn’t always bad – and I don’t mean the stuff about the Tooth Fairy, I mean lies that have saved someone

If pretending and lying were the same there would be no need for two separate words. Pretending is one thing.. lying is another.

If you are pretending to tell the truth.

What do you mean there’s no Santa Claus?

Nah, it’s a nice thing. The parents don’t mean to cause any harm, and I always thought Christmas was better when I thought Santa brought the presents down a chimney.

Children learn to lie very, very early in life – even before they are competent with language. It is human to deceive.

However, perhaps a definition of terms may be in order. Santa and the Tooth fairy are cultural tales, not lies, and they have symbolic meaning.

Jokes and nonsense answers here are for pleasure, and do not deceive, nor are they intended to deceive, so I’m not sure I understand what makes them “lies”.

I think so, yes

Pretending is acting out one’s imagination. We all learn and grow a great deal from pretend play. Young children lie not to deceive – they’re learning the difference between their imagination and reality. Lying is a conscious attempt to deceive another for personal gain.

I can pretend to lie. I can also lie about pretending. I can even fib about my lie about pretending or pretend to fib about lying. Bah….

Pretending can be mutual, and can be fun. Lying is usually one sided, and done for the benefit of the liar.

it is.

Nope, but telling a child that a fat man in a red suit comes into their home and gives them presents if they behave is not “pretending.” That’s just a euphemism you’re using. Any decent definition of the word “lying” will encompass the act of intentionally telling children something that is not true.

Santa does not exist.
You know that Santa does not exist.
You tell someone that Santa does exist.
That is a lie.

@Ivan That’s a definition, not an answer.

@pdworkin

We’re comparing two English words, I think definitions are relevant.

Exactly! Read my post above.

@pdworkin Jokes = lies when they told as if true, as in nearly all ethnic jokes which rely on stereotypes, joke answers given here on Fluther which appear to be real answers and can be understood either way. I used to wonder how people could insult their mothers by saying such horrible things about them in the “Yo mama” jokes, until I realized it was all supposed to be funny.

If pretending involves telling a lie, yes. I also happen to be of the persuasion that a lie is not the absolute world’s worst thing and should be avoided at all costs no matter what so help you God.

You can redefine anything that doesn’t stick to clear empirical evidence as a “lie”, but that is not the normative definition. Perhaps it would clarify things for you if you were to consult a dictionary.

it’s all in your purpose.

is an actor lying? in the purest sense, yes. but without any intent of harm. and you know he’s not a lawyer, doctor, etc.

is a con artist lying? yes. but you don’t know, and his intent is almost certainly to harm.

Websters:

Lie
1 : to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive
2 : to create a false or misleading impression

@Ivan I always see Santa. He always wants my money!

@pdworkin @Ivan Thank you. A dictionary definition is a good jumping off place, but with so many choices to make, even in the dictionary, it is useful to find out what other people think about it, in other words how the words are interpreted by the general population.

Both have a basis in falsehood.

Like I said before, Ivan’s usual thought process is out of place on a subject like this. Yes, it meets the definition of lying but it is not lying, it is a playful game that takes place and is ended at the appropriate time.

“it meets the definition of lying but it is not lying”

DOES NOT COMPUTE

That is a perfect response, because your brain is like a robot, you can only think in one way.

Why a personal attack in a discussion thread?

where?

You made a small mistake there, joe. Let me fix it for you.
it meets the definition of lying and therefore is lying
FIXED

Thanks for looking out but I said exactly what I meant.

Yes the pen is blue, but it is not blue. When I was growing up, everyone said that it was red, therefore it is red.

Well, joey, you are wrong.
Otherwise, you would just have invalidated the entire biological taxonomic system, science in general, the judicial system, everything.
Would be a great defence in court: “Well, sure all evidence points to my client being the culprit, and he even confessed it, but he is not guilty.”

People, people, people, what am I going to do with you? Pretending and make believe match the definition of lying, we can agree on that, but are we really going to be that dumb? If you honestly think that telling a child a fairy tale or wearing a costume pretending to be a pirate and playing games with a kid is lying then well, I don’t know what to tell you. I mean for pete’s sake, are we going to say that Halloween costumes are lies? TV show characters are lies? books are lies? No, we obviously know these things are just pretend, which is different than lying because we are aware of it falsehood, just as every child soon finds out their favorite stories were all pretend, so will they find out Santa/etc. was too.

“Halloween costumes are lies? TV show characters are lies? books are lies?”
yes they are lies.
A special subset of the greater group of lies, together with “white lies”, lies that are socially accepted, but lies nonetheless.
Sure the intentions are different as well as the results (mostly) but that does not in any way change the fact that they are lies.

@J0E

We aren’t talking about any of that stuff. We are talking about telling a child that an imaginary character exists. That isn’t a game, that isn’t “pretending”, that is a lie.

“which is different than lying because we are aware of it falsehood”

The fact that we are aware of its falsehood is precisely what makes it a lie! That’s what lying is, telling someone something that you know is false.

I have a similar issue with “cold”. Yes, ice is cold, so is my swimming pool. There is a huge difference between the two. My son says “turn up the heat, it’s cold in here” and I am sitting here fanning my face because I am feeling warm. Too subjective.

Pretending and telling stories to our children is also very subjective.

“That other stuff” are all comparable examples, if you are calling Santa a lie then you might as well call it all lies.

I guess we might as well throw out the entire genre of fiction, because who wants to read a bunch of lies!?

Who says a lie is always a bad thing?

That’s the only reason why people don’t want to call it a lie, because the word “lie” has negative connotations.

@DominicX Exactly, that is why we use words like “pretend” and “make believe”, they have different names because they are different.

they are nothing more than euphemisms for the same thing.

At Halloween the pretending is not meant to be malicious or to take advantage of anyone unlike the pretending of a con-artist. I suppose intent goes a long way in this distinction.

@ragingloli That is where you’re wrong.

Lying = negative effects and/or intent

Pretending = positive effects and/or intent

Pretending is fun, fantasy and whimsical. Pretending is not meant to hurt anyone.
Lying is telling untruths to gain or to hurt.

@joe
no.
lying is independent on negative effects or intent. lying is saying things or presenting situations that are not true. Lying can have both positive and negative effects and intent.

I seriously don’t know where everyone is getting the notion of “pretending”. If you and your kids want to play make believe, go for it. When you’re playing make believe, your kids don’t actually think that they’re pirates. They do, however, actually think that Santa Claus exists. That is the difference.

@Ivan
which means that even under joe’s “definition” it would be a lie. The kid believing something that is not true = negative effect

@Ivan Since I started this discussion, I have polled the adults and the children in my extended family, and they all agreed that neither they nor their children ever actually believed in the story. It was always clear by body language and tone of voice that it was all a pretend, joking story.

@YARNLADY

As I said, your family is not representative of the norm.

Pretend is about wishfulness and hope for a better day in a whimsical way. Lying is about hurt and harm or at best to deceive for an agenda.

@dannyc lying isn’t always about hurt, it can happen because the person lying believes it will help, for example

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Such as “No honey, those pants do not make your butt look bigger.” :)

@chyna yes or something less superficial

it is lying, by definition, in the case that you’re referring to.
that being said, i don’t think that all lies carry a negative impact.

Sure we all lie. We can probably say much about the relative health of our society by the institutionalized lies we swallow like pablum. I imagine that someday we wil be abhorred by the insanity of our civilization, our humor and our ignorance. But at present while immersed in an altogether insane society it behooves us to be crazy.
That’s just wisdom.

lying typically implies withholding information for purpose of harm or for a bad reason. pretending would usually be for a surprise, something pleasant. pretending doesn’t infer harm

It’s one type of lying. To me the term lying is more general. As there are white lies, there’s also “white pretending”. Do you like the food I cooked? And you just keep eating…

@mattbrowne I’d call that a lie

@Facade – Depends on the context. There are situations where you can’t say “I don’t like your food”. You might come up with an excuse which I would again see as a white lie.

Why can’t you say that you don’t like it? I would.

@Facade – Always?

@Facade
even with a gun pointed at your head?

Refraining from speaking one’s opinion is not necessarily a lie. It’s just being thoughtful. Relationships are full of this and I dare say many people prefer “lies” anyway.

Hmmm well i guess it would depend on the context that the pretending was used. If it was used to be someone your not inorder to do something harmful or unlawful yes it would be considered a like. But usually pretending is using your imagination such as children pretend to be batman, robin, superman, and as for adults there are ways to pretend in adult ways also. But when a le is told it usually is used in a different context. To decieve or possibly hurt. Even children lie for example my younges son recently told myself and my fiancee that he didn’t try to burn his older brother and his girlfriend with a candle. When caught in the lie he finallly admitted he lied but that he was afaird of getting a spanking. And as i have told him many times before lieing cause him even more problems than admiting the truth.

@ the people who say it is the same, does that mean when you give a child a hunk of plastic and say it’s a dinosaur, you are lying? How about when you say “ride your horse” when you want him to get on his toy horse? Are we lying when we point at a picture and say “This is Grandma.”?

@YARNLADY
yes.
it is a figure of a dinosaur, not a dinosaur.
and it is a picture of a wrinkly old woman, not a wrinkly old woman.

@ragingloli Only if you stretch the concept of lying way beyond it’s normal boundaries. If leaving out the “understood” word in a sentence (as in this is a picture of grandma) is the same as lying -to you – it’s no wonder you think the world is full of liars.

I think this gets even more confusing when you are living with who I believe is a Pathological Liar.

A guy I know will lie about anything, withholds information, makes stories up (which are incredibly nonsensical) and will tell children fact’s interspersed with ‘nonsense’.

I have argued with him several times that by behaving like this, I cannot trust him. He cannot change (he is in his 50’s).

My son, asks me at times whether Tony is telling the truth or not, and I ask my son what does he think. He is six years old and will say “I think he’s lying”.

It’s a shame that my son has been introduced to this idiot because before then, he didn’t have any concept of lying. Now, he will lie to me as well (like says he’s brushed his teeth when I know he hasn’t).

I know he was going to learn about lying sooner or later, but I just wish it wasn’t by this ‘professional’ liar.

Him and me argue (this man) about lying and in his case, he doesn’t know the difference between lying and pretending.

To me, there are all sorts of lies. Sometimes people lie and then when they are found out will say that they were only joking (e.g. silly example – “someone’s at the door”, you go to answer it and there is no one. Lie or Joke ? If it wasted your time and you didn’t see the funny side of it ?? And after continuous ‘joking’ like that, would you TRUST that person to tell you the truth). So in that case, what started out as a JOKE, ends up being a case of mistrusting that person’s word at a later occasion.

To me, allowing, even participating in a child’s natural make-believe world is not lying. To me, lying is “I’ll be over to pick you up on Saturday,” and you don’t show up, or “We’re going to the zoo on Saturday, and I PROMISE this time,” and you don’t. Two completely different things. One is fun, the other is very, very hurtful and seriously affects the child’s ability to trust.

@Ivan Ivan. As a kid, when you were playing house or pirate, for that bit of time you really DID feel like a pirate or a wife or whatever! That’s the beauty of make believe! That’s what you lose when you grow up, that ability to feel like that’s REALLY what you are! Wait…I never lost it. I’m still Cat Woman. Meee yooooowwww.

Why did this question have to resurface, I get pissed off just reading it again.

@J0E Blame @Val123 Val likes to stir up shit. ;)

@Val123
Hey! What did I tell you about climbing on the furniture? Down!

@SeventhSense But the furniture is so purrrrrfect for me! Meyow!

@jonsblond I do not! Tell him Joe!!!