If your friend lies to you,what will you think about him/her

Depends on the lie..

“I didn’t sleep with your girlfriend.” is different from “I didn’t eat the last piece of pie that was in the fridge.”

The last one I wouldn’t really care about.

A particularly heinous lie is harder to get over than a lesser one but I am of the feeling that if someone lies to me it is an indication of their integrity in general. That is, of course, outside of the realm of things like “oh, was today your birthday?” when you know you got them something but you’re just playing around.

A lie for convenience or to purposefully deceive me is going to make it very hard for me to trust that person again and will color how I view the likelihood they will make good choices in the future (ie stealing, cheating, etc.). Of course, as human beings, we must realize that we will all slip from time to time.

Mmm, I also give breaks for lies if I’m asking about something they don’t want to talk about and I don’t need to know. I usually try to disarm that by disclaiming that they don’t need to talk about it as I inquire, but sometimes it’s easier to just ask and accept an answer that might be inaccurate but really means, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Major lies are relationship enders. (If you did sleep with my girlfriend, how am I supposed to trust you again?) Lies of convenience mean you’re untrustworthy, which quickly demotes you from “friend” to “casual acquaintance” or “guy I used to hang out with before I figured out I couldn’t trust him.” (If you “had a flat tire” when you were really blowing me off for something we were supposed to do together, why should I bother making more plans with you?) Minor lies are just baffling. (If you did eat the last piece of pie in the fridge, why lie about it?)

In short: it’s a bad thing. The more serious it is and the more it happens, the worse it is. It shouldn’t ever happen at all.

Zaku, yeah I can definitely see cutting some slack there as well.

It would be hard to trust him, and even care much about him, if he lies. I much prefer to be friends with someone who will ‘fess up to the uncomfortable truth and try and work that out rather than waste my time with a person who can’t embrace the challenge of being honest.

I think it’s within human nature to CYA. The problem stems from when and with whom to modify that behavior. Some people place a far greater emphasis on friendship that do some others, but the bottom line in any relationship is this—people will disappoint you from time to time. We often put special people in our lives on a pedestal and hold them to unrealistic standards or expectations that are impossible for them to achieve (e.g., never lying to me). People are people and to err is human, so the real question becomes: can I live with who this person really is and what they are capable of doing?