Despite my tone, I’m not being flippant. Please tell me how you are defining “morally wrong.” When I call an action “morally wrong,” I mean that it causes a greater amount of avoidable harm to others than it helps. What do you mean when you use the term?
I’ve already ranted about Kant on this board this year, so I won’t repeat it. But I will argue, even by the literally idiotic terms of the categorical imperative, he was wrong. If I lie to Person A to prevent undue and avoidable harm to Person B, I am not treating persons, in general, as means rather than ends. I may be treating Person A as a means rather than an end, but so what? It’s impossible to always treat every person in an interaction as an end rather than a means, because sometimes persons have competing interests. What’s best, in my view, is to do the greatest good for the greatest number.
And again I ask: why is telling the truth “morally right” IN THIS CIRCUMSTANCE? What is so magical about truth that it outweighs the right of the Jews to live?
No, the truth of the matter is that no action has moral value, one way or the other, until it is given a specific context.
Stepping away from the lying issue, I’ll give an example.
Let’s say that I go home and my wife and I, out of love for one another and a desire to make a family, decide to make love in the hopes that she will become pregant. The decision to have sex is consensual on both our parts, and no one is harmed by it; and new life may be created. Thus in this context, having sex is a moral good.
Now imagine that I am single. I meet a woman in a bar who is also single, and we share a mutual attraction, but neither of us have any desire to ever see the other again. Neither of us lies about that. Using appropriate protections against pregnancy and disease, we go to a motel, have wild monkey sex, and depart. In this case, having sex is morally neutral.
Now imagine that I see a woman on the street whom I find sexually attractive. I follow her home, break into her apartment, and rape her. I have caused harm to her in a fashion that is unjustified (as I have no right to have sex with another person without her consent), so that is a moral evil.
You see what I mean? Only by putting the act in context can we ascribe goodness, neutrality, or evil to it. This is as true of communication–i.e., decicding to tell the truth or to prevaricate in response to an inquiry–as of sex, or fighting, or anything else.
Going back to the Nazi example: assuming that you know the Nazis intend violence and oppression to the Jews, and given that that violence and oppression is unjustified, then the act of responding in any way other than one intended to deceive the Nazis is evil. Yes, that INCLUDES not answering. Not answering is simply saying “Yes, Anne Frank and her family are hiding in the attic” but pretending not to. Not answering is an attempt to evade moral responsibility for the consequences of one’s actions. The ONLY moral choice there is to make the best effort you can to prevent the evil you know will result from the Nazis’ knowledge.
A third time I will ask: what is so special about truth that it outweighs all other virtues in every circumstance?
I don’t agree. Context is certainly important but my take would be that sometimes the choice is actually he lesser of two evils. Because we cannot see what the outcome will be for different choices we make them and take responsibility for the whatever happens. Often it’s a mix of good and bad and we have to decide which is the greater good.
even the Nazi case is not all that obvious. What if turning over the Franks would save your own life and the lives of your family? Are we morally obligated to sacrifice ourselves? We couldn’t know the outcome for lying or telling the truth with any certainty.
I submit that there are certain acts, certain qualities, that consistently move mankind forward and by making a commitment to explore and understand how they apply to real life in day to day situations we participate in that movement. By justifying and avoiding these qualities we participate in stagnation or worse.
Honesty, honoring the truth, is one of these qualities. However, life being what it is sometimes the choice is the lesser of two evils. If you lie to the Nazi’s with the intent of saving lives then you are sacrificing honesty for the sake of mercy and compassion.
My objection is that society in general justifies dishonesty far to often in unnecessary ways and IMO that’s a loss for us as people.
The problem there is that you are again bringing the issue of context back. It may be the wrong choice to save the Franks if doing so will cause the deaths of more people.
I’m not going to answer the bulk of your post directly because there is no need to do so. A moral action is not determined by the expected consequences but rather the maxim under which the action was taken. You’ve basically posed a series of questions in which you want me to, using your system of moral evaluation, decide whether I agree with you or not. If I believed morality was contextual this would make sense, but sense I don’t you’re essentially saying “if you would but concede that my position is totally right, how would you feel about these scenarios?”
I do not believe morality is contextual, if morality is contextual then anything could be moral–the only limitation is coming up with a hypothetical situation ludicrous enough to support the act.
For example ethicists of most stripes would agree that genocide is immoral on the face of it. But imagine a scenario in which 51% of the human population could be gifted with eternal life, an end to suffering, eternal peace, happiness and general paradise on Earth with the only cost being the mass extermination of the other 49% of the human population. Under a strictly utilitarian viewpoint I think an essential paradise for humanity for all time would have to “outweigh” the fate of the 49%; I expect utilitarians have some sort of weasel-wording they can use to escape the results of this logic but I think it’s an inevitable conclusion that one can reach by using a “contextual” system of morality.
I don’t engage in “consequence weighing” when determining whether an action is moral or immoral. I don’t control the expected consequences I only control my own actions–so how can the consequences be part of the moral decision? If I tell a murderer the truth I don’t know what he will do. Certainly he may use that information to commit a murder but it’s also possible that the intended victim has already escaped. If everyone lied then the murderer would not believe my lie in the first place, so it would serve no purpose.
In your three examples of sex acts, they are not at all an example of three similar acts all given moral weight only by the context. To my reasoning they are three distinct actions that can be evaluated case by case.
To decide whether an act is moral or not I would argue that you have to look at how the action would be universalized. Note I am not engaging in a consequences-based evaluation but simply exploring whether or not universalization leads to illogical outcomes. [As a classic example from Kant on theft, if everyone stole then property as a concept would not really exist and thus stealing as a concept would have no meaning. From this you can conclude that there can be no logical maxim to support theft.]
In the first example a man has sex with his wife for the purpose of procreation. Let us look at what would happen if everyone had sex with their wives for the purpose of procreation.
Well, in this case that isn’t a far stretch. Most people over the course of history have had sex with their wives for the purposes of procreation. It is even arguable that the whole basis of the concept of marriage stems from this.
I can find no moral wrong in universalizing this action.
To look at it from the other direction, what is my alternative? I suppose the alternative must be to never have sex with your wife for the purposes of procreation. That is easily something that I can say we do not wish to see universalized, or it would in a few generations lead either to extinction or and end to the concept of marriage–not something I would want to see as universal.
In the second example a man has sex purely for the purposes of sexual pleasure. This one is more complicated morally, but I’ll definitely have a go at it. What if everyone had sex with random strangers solely for the purposes of sexual pleasure? I’m not sure any logical inconsistencies immediately come to mind, or at least none that I can come up with briefly–although I do not doubt a more erudite deontologist could produce something.
What we can say is quite simple though, in this case you are using another person purely for your own sexual gratification. You’re using someone as a means and not an end. Just because they are doing the same with you does not absolve either of you of your duty to other persons. I’d argue there is a universal duty not to treat people as pleasure objects regardless of how others are treating you.
This is a glaring example of where my morality collides directly with “what feels natural, what feels good.” It is often the case, though. I think that the human animal has many natural impulses many of which are either immoral or amoral. There are many things that separate us from the rest of the animal kingdom but one of the most profound ones is we have the ability to consider the morality of our actions. That very ability means that a great many things that our lesser animal associates can do without shame would to us be viewed as immoral.
As far as “what feels good” that is a big root of the problem with other systems of morality. I generally feel that people who engage in “contextual” morality systems are simply trying to justify their own personal ethics and actions because you can always paint and repaint the context such that virtually anything is “good.” It’s all a matter of interpretation and there is a great deal of subjectivity in defining what is the “greater good.” My own personal morality is a relatively harsh one. But here is the crux of it for me, I view myself as a relatively immoral person who often does immoral things. I don’t try to justify these immoral acts or try to redefine what is moral and what is immoral to suit my own behavior. To do so would be hypocrisy–I know that many things I’ve done in my life are immoral and I don’t believe a valid way of fixing that is to simply change my morals.
The third example is so easily viewed as an immoral act as to not be worth further exposition.
As far as I can tell the only values that honesty has are:
people like you less if you lie to them and they know it, resulting in them treating you worse.
people trust you less if you lie to them and they know it, resulting in them distancing you from opportunities.
and, of course,
information is conveyed more completely and correctly when you’re honest.
Now, we’ve already noted several cases where 3 is not an objective moral good. That leaves only the first two values, both of which I would describe as selfish goods, not objective goods. And it’s not always good to be selfish, such as in cases where you are being interrogated by an enemy or something. Which leads me to ask, on what basis does one judge this to be an objective good? Sure, in most situations, there is selfish good to being honest (or rather, to convincing people that you’re honest), but ‘most’ is not the same as the ‘all’ required to qualify as “objective”.
Which cases are you referring to? I haven’t read the whole thread. Regardless of scenario’s we put forth we can’t really predict outcome. We choose hoping for the greater good but that isn’t always what happens.
I don’t see it as selfish. Realistically speaking, taking good care of ourselves is making a positive contribution to society. I think positive acts such as honesty, encourage the positive acts of others by example. That makes it a personal choice but also a positive contribution to society as a whole.
Honesty doesn’t always require a complete divulging of all known details. It depends on the relationship of those involved. Factual truth is often only part of the equation and other qualities come into play when a course of action is chosen.
And who decides the validity of these maxims? Why, again, is lying ALWAYS wrong? What in the nature of lying makes it entirely evil?
No, in the second action a man and a woman have sex purely for the purpose of sexual pleasure; each has the same goal. Why is this any different, morally speaking, from my going to a restaurant for lunch and ordering chicken casserole strictly because I love the way it tastes? I am using the waiter and chef purely for my own purposes, no? Moreover, they are using ME strictly for their own purposes–to make money. By your measure, everyone in the transaction is acting immorally.
Any of the cases in the thread, really, and many, many others. “How are you?” “What do you think of the food?” “Are there jews in the attic?” “Do you think I’m fat?” “Are you listening to me?” “What are the nuclear launch codes?” “Daddy, do you like it?”
I dunno about you, but I can predict the outcome of lots of things - and hiding behind uncertainty is hardly a way to argue for a clear objective moral good.
Sure, society generally fares better when we’re not all lying scumbags. However, in many cases (some mentioned above) the unvarnished truth is not the best way to encourage smooth relations with others and thereby take care of ourselves and make a positive contribution to society. White lies can be the lubricant that keeps the societal machine running smoothly, which fact seriously undermines the societal argument for honesty being an objective moral good.
Right. Of course, I think that to draw a moral distinction between deliberate evasion without lying, and deliberate evasion with lying, is an unfounded decision. The issue at hand is deception - if you can do that with artfully worded truths, it has exactly the same effects (including regarding people’s opinions and societal effects) as by lying through your teeth. In my opinion, claiming some sort of moral high ground for doing one and not the other is itself morally suspect.
I’ve already explained why lying is always wrong, I’m sorry if you don’t like my answer but repeating the question will not change the answer.
As for who decides the maxims, there are clear guidelines that have been laid out by deontological thinkers that you could explore if you wish. Obviously no moral system is unassailable and such questions exist about any such system. Even a purely egoist ethical system calls into question whether or not someone can truly know what is in their own self interest. Just because you can question my system does not invalidate it. Your system is no more unquestionable than mine.
Who determines the definition of things like harm? Who determines what is the greater good? These aren’t simple cut and dry questions with simple cut and dry answers.)
While ultimately I think Kant did a good job at defending his ideas and laying out a logical framework for them I do differ from Kant in that I don’t believe you can meaningfully construct a system of morality that no one can question or find any fault with. Where I take a radical departure from Kant is that I believe in willfully acting immoral at times.
I buy into deontology because it’s what seems the most logical to me, I don’t really think morality would be meaningful if it is contextual since that means there are no true moral guidelines. When you make it contextual with the caveat that the “morally evil” actions are those that cause more harm than other alternative actions it’s possible, through clever argument about what constitutes “harm” to more or less successfully argue either side of any decision in any context. There is no universal way to analyze even some of the simplest contexts you could come up with.
I don’t dismiss utilitarianism out of hand, I simply disagree with it.
Kant says it best:
It’s fine to help further the ends of others, in this case you are helping to further the ends of the restaurant owner, the chef, and the waitstaff–namely they desire to earn a living. You on the other hand desire to have a meal, both your ends and the ends of the waitstaff can be satisfied at the same time. Sure you are treating them as a means but that is perfectly fine under the categorical imperative if you simultaneously are treating them as an end.
There is nothing wrong with pursuing one’s own happiness. And obviously when dealing with others in a society there will come times when you must use someone as a means; that is fine and no one has ever said different. The problem arises when you use someone solely as a means and do not also treat them as ends in and of themselves.
In many social cases I think an effort at honesty helps us examine the situation and find acceptable ways to remain honest and still observe social consideration.
In some cases I suppose. I was thinking of the Nazi example. Lying to them in no way ensures the safety of those in the attic and may also put more people at risk. Honesty demands an honest answer. What are the nuclear launch codes? “I refuse to tell you” is an honest answer." etc.
I disagree. Once we accept white lies as perfectly acceptable then other lies become acceptable as well. Salesmen lie to customers and customers lie to cashiers, and on and on. The truth doesn’t have to be unvarnished and honesty doesn’t have to be brutal. Learning how that works and how to operate that way daily has a much better outcome for society than accepting casual lies, IMHO.
How could it be morally suspect given your overall stance? Being selective in sharing information isn’t always about deception.
If I tell my child the crude picture she colored is beautiful I’m not lying because the beauty of that gift isn’t found in the quality of the art but the love in the gift and the effort.
I just got a copy of a book my nephew wrote about coaching basketball. He and my sister know I don’t care about basketball but I can still appreciate the personal effort he put in and how pleased and proud they are, so I thank them sincerely recognizing that rather than mentioning my lack of interest in basketball.
That’s the kind of thing I mean about making the effort to be honest in day to day life and deception isn’t involved in either case.
Someone gets a hairstyle that I think looks goofy. That’s a totally subjective opinion on my part and there’s nothing about honesty that demands I share it. When I’m asked I might choose “daring” or “unusual” rather than goofy. That’s not about deception either. It’s about wisdom and consideration. To say it looks great because of social niceties would be deception.
My own experience is that there are lots of good options for honesty left unexplored when white lies are too easily justified.
I need to amend my last post as I didn’t entirely finish my train of thought.
Under my explanation as to why going to a restaurant is not immoral, the exact same explanation could explain why a one night stand is not immoral. With one important exception, at no point in going to a restaurant do you treat the people you are dealing with as objects, they retain their humanity. There is a universal maxim to always treat others as human beings worthy of respect.
It is the important distinction between what allows us to morally enjoy the services of a waiter (who is being financially compensated for serving us food) but not being able to morally justify owning a slave.
Our positions appear to be very close: I’m not sure whether there’s much substantial difference.
I define lying narrowly so that I can mostly maintain the injunction, “Never lie”, in practice. On top of that though, there are a range of behaviors that are unacceptably dishonest; your “Lies of omission” are one example. Thanks for the reply.
That’s the rub isn’t it? Nobody has figured out a moral system which lacks deep problems. And I’m unaware of any attempt to credibly compare these various moral schemes (though I hasten to say that I am not particularly familiar with philosophical literature).
Incidentally, most utilitarians fall back to some sort of rule-based framework, with varying nods to opt out clauses. And your example is a little on the fantastic side, though with work I trust a more realistic one could be constructed. Then again I would say that, as I have utilitarian leanings.
Look. It’s a dictatorship. Not only must you lie to the stormtrooper, you should say voice opinions that don’t believe and offer him a bribe. The erosion of trust and morality is intrinsic to totalitarianism. And the best way to fight it is to choose your battles wisely.
I don’t think this slippery slope follows. Nobody thinks that one person telling his wife that he likes her hair to make her feel better justifies a salesman lying about what’s in the contract, any more than people think that one person using a knife to cut up an apple justifies another using a knife to cut somebody’s throat. Like everything else, the morality of lies varies by the situation.
Deception is morally suspect in every situation. Of course, just because it’s a suspect, doesn’t mean it’s guilty. Which is kind of my point - sometimes it’s better to decieve and impede, even though sometimes it’s not. It depends on the intent and the effect.
In all of the examples you just gave, I consider your responses to be white lies. You know what they are asking, that it’s for your actual opinion about the actual item, but you pretend they are asking whether you are happy they gave you anything at all. If the truth is “I hate the item but I appreciate that you gave something, anything at all, to me”, then then “I like the item” is, indeed, a lie.
Similarly, if you think someone’s hairstyle is goofy, and that’s the word that prints itself in giant letters across the inside of your head whenever you think about it, then saying you think it’s “inventive” is a lie. Even if you can come up with other words that also in some way describe it, but which aren’t what you actually think about it.
In my opinion, this again proves my point - that lying and similar forms of deception are not objective wrongs by any measure, and that they are indeed the lubricant that keeps society running smoothly (assuming you use the lubricant in the appropriate circumstances and don’t drown the machine in it).
Begbert directed this at cosmodan, but I’d like to give my view all the same.
I don’t believe this and I wonder whether begbert believes this. You can believe that morality is contextual, but also think that is a matter of habit and social mores. So if dishonesty is tolerated in one sphere, it is likely to be tolerated in another.
It depends on how you define lying. Really: it does.
I use the dictionary definition, from dictionary.com: “Lie: a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood”.
Your hairstyle is… interesting Wanda. (It’s also hideous and quite frankly baffling, but there is nothing false about my first statement. So it is not a lie.) I am under no moral obligation to spout every thought that appears between my ears, quite the contrary. Indeed pointless cruelty is a vice. Furthermore, I am under no obligation to give a complete answer to any and all questions that are posed.
Caveat: cosmodan appeared to use a broader definition of lying earlier. And under circumstances, other people can have a right to know - examples include courts and spouses under certain situations.
That’s interesting. I can’t imagine what it might be like to live in a society where just being heard expressing an honest opinion might land you in prison or worse.
Still, when the situation is very difficult people still have a choice about how to handle it.
Not really an equitable comparison is it? I think it is a slippery slope and I see it all the time. Not everybody does it in all the same situations. Once we accept that casual lying is okay I think it can reach into other areas and people tend to think “Everybody Does it so it’s really not bad”
I think intent and effect do matter. Making the effort to not lie even casually, and still paying attention to intent and effect, is part of the point. It forces us to look at things in different ways which IMO leads to a more positive long range outcome.
I completely disagree. It’s part of what I just said. The desire to be truthful and still be considerate of others in communication requires more of us as individuals and we begin to see things differently. So I truly, and honestly see the beauty in the crude picture, I honestly understand and appreciate the hard work that went into a book about a particular subject I’m not enthusiastic about. I sincerely place those things on a level of importance above my own subjective take on things, so my expressions are completely honest and the effort of seeking honesty while remaining considerate has helped me to see things in a new and IMO better light.
Again, in polite society there is no moral obligation brought on by a commitment to honesty that requires me to express a purely subjective opinion when I know it might hurt someone. By saying “original”, or “unique” I’m not offering anything false. Because I know that things like style are so subjective I might say, “Well it’s very daring, not really my kind of thing but if you like it that’s what’s important” IMO the people who don’t know the difference between their opinion and the truth and offer their opinion in a non tactful way are being ignorant and don’t get honesty points from me.
In polite society a tactful answer like “unique” would probably be accepted. In a closer relationship if pressed I’d give an honest opinion as tactfully as I could and admit I didn’t like it. I work under the assumption that I owe it to people I am close to, to show them the respect of honesty. I want the same from them.
Honesty doesn’t exist in a vacuum. I believe honesty is consistently positive but their are other positive qualities in the mix. Learning to balance them is part of human growth and takes effort.
We disagree. I think the higher good of personal and societal growth are better served by a commitment to honesty. Not only for the sake of honesty alone but for what the effort brings to us.
A common problem with situational ethics (whatever name you choose to call it) is that you often overestimate your own ability to judge what the situation really is and/or what the results of a particular action will be. I do not believe that lying is inherently bad, but I do believe it is always the wrong decision. It’s not that it always does more harm than good, it’s that you have no way of being sure in any real situation. From the limited perspective of a human being, the only thing you can predict is that the truth is more likely to do less harm and more good, which makes lying the ‘wrong’ choice even though lying is not itself inherently ‘wrong’.
In the example of the OP, an obvious thing which everyone skips over is the question of wether the agnostic/rebellious teenager is actually correct in her beliefs. Lying may avoid conflict, but it may also avoid discovery of the truth. I’m not saying her beliefs are wrong, just that it’s WAAAAY too easy to tell yourself everything you want to hear if you lie to others to avoid conflict.
The only situation I can think of (without omnicience) where lying isn’t ‘wrong’, is if you’ve promised to lie. Then your stuck with either lying, or breaking a promise, which I guess is probably worse.
Martin, in the plain Jews-in-the-attic scenario, how does one know that in not lying, one is acting from duty rather than in accordance with duty? That perhaps one is getting utils from the appearance and belief that one is acting according to the CI, so therefore the act is not worthy of moral credit. Couldn’t the act of lying, abhorrent as it is to one’s psyche, be considered so ghastly an affront to one’s interests that an act to protect the Jews stems from duty?
I do completely believe this, and if you don’t, I wonder how you can possibly reach that conclusion. I do not believe for one instant that anyone seriously thinks that if you tolerate a man telling his wife that she’s not fat, that you’re somehow magically going to be forced to start tolerating conmen. That’s ridiculous.
Right - I have a tendency to conflate other forms of deliberate deception in with lying, because I can’t see any moral justification for considering one form of deception better than another. I believe I stated this explicitly.
If your intent is to decieve, I don’t see how it makes a lick of difference morally speaking whether or not you take the care to select weasel words and ambiguous phrasing to do it. Sure, it allows you to pretend at some kind of moral high ground, because though you deceived, you have this ‘out’ which magically makes it better, but I’ve yet to see or hear any rational argument that it actually is a moral high ground. You’re still being deceptive and with exactly the same results either way.
Okay, how is it not an equitable comparison? In both cases something (a lie/a knife) is being used to accomplish two different ends, one of which is intended to have, and has, a positive effect, and one of which is intended to have, and has, a negative effect. The only difference is that using a knife is not deemed as being inherently evil just because it has uses, whereas you are declaring that using a lie is bad, regardless of intent or effect.
What part of this comparison is inequitable? Other than that it doesn’t support your conclusion, I mean.
And also, in all seriousness, where do you get this bizarre idea that if any lies at all are used, that all lies will suddenly become acceptible? Where, exactly do you “see it all the time”? And how do you distinguish it from people who start out with the intent to tell malicious lies, and infer that benevolent lies are also permissible as a result? The comment “everybody does it so it’s not really bad” only makes sense if they’re saying that everybody else lies * maliciously*, so they might as well lie maliciously too. Absent you providing some reason to, it doesn’t make a lick of sense to assume that they’re using white lies as the justification for malicious ones.
So you assert - but is there an objective reason to think that using weasel words and ambiguous phrasing really leads to a more positive long range outcome than engaging in political niceties? 'Cause I think that you’re assuming that without evidence because it sounds nice and supports your predetermined conclusion.
Whatever helps you to sleep at night, I suppose. But I’m not sure it’s a good thing when you have so put yourself in a mindset to protect your self-image as a perfectly truthful person that you automatically mentally editorialize the meaning of people’s questions in order to create for yourself the ability to say the kind answer without admitting to yourself that it’s not a truthful answer to the question that they are actually asking.
In a situation like this, I personally tend to be perfectly honest - I avoid expressing my opinion at all. As you note, there’s no requirement to express your opinion left and right. But if somebody did try and press an answer out of me, I would not weasel-word it. I would lie - in fact, I have a standard lie for this sort of situation: “I don’t really have an opinion about it.”
(Another favorite lie of mine, I use it all the time, is “I don’t have a preference; you pick.” Very useful in keeping me on even footing with those people who are so polite they try to always accomodate your preferences at the expense of their own. Yes, this actually has become a problem for me.)
Right. And in a balance, sometimes one thing takes precedence over another, depending on other factors that are weighing in. So, sometimes it’s more positive to lie.
Slavish devotion to honesty, or even “honesty”*, certainly doesn’t make this balance impossible to maintain, but there’s no reason to believe it’s the only way, or best way, to keep things on an even keel.
as I mentally describe of the practice of making sure your deceptions are technically within the letter of the law, a practice I see as demonstrably problematic when it extends to other aspects of society…
And I think this isn’t known - or knowable. Yes, we know if everybody is all lying scumbags it’s a bad thing, which shows that as the level of lying increases towards infinity society is increasingly damaged, but for all we know as the level of lying approaches zero the effect on society could level out - or even begin to reverse the trend as honesty becomes perfect and the societal lubricant of diplomatic lies is removed.
Oh, come now. Sometimes it’s pretty obvious that the truth will hurt. If you can’t contrive a way to keep your yap shut in such situations, then it’s not too hard to figure with reasonable certainty and reliability that deception, even lying, is the better way to go.
I don’t think you need to worry about that - I’d suspect that anybody who might feel that they should lie to conceal their agnosticism to protect themself from being harrangued and oppressed is unlikely to have a shortage of exposure to religion. In fact, by lying they will have a greater exposure to benign religion, in that they will probably still attend church and go through the motions, in order to support the deception. Whereas with an honest stance you’d expect all exposure to religion to be argumentive and negative.
And people tell themselves everything they want to hear even if they’re not lying to others about it. Even when other people are actively arguing against them. People are real good at that.
So, breaking a promise is worse than letting Anne Frank die? That’s some weird situational ethics you have there. (Though it is at least consistent; breaking a promise turns the promise into a lie, so lie vs. lie would be an even battle.)