This review is not very charitable, because I think the meaning of the post is different than how they present it.
The things it describes at the beginning are clearly true, with plea-bargaining being institutionalized lying, but this is, in the end, a poorly written plea to not say so. It’s not that I don’t see a point. It would be nice to be able to simply describe things as they are without it being a fight, but that isn’t how things would work out. Words like ‘lie’ and ‘fraud’ have their extremely negative connotations because they are extremely negative things. Anything that is a synonym for them will pick up the same connotation, because people will still hate them. (I have previously determined that I would not be able to make a plea bargain, because I would not be able to admit I did something that I didn’t. I may, of course, be wrong about that since I haven’t experienced it.)
If it did succeed, that would not be a good thing, and would encourage people to lie more. (Social shame and punishment is what keeps the major offenders from being even worse. We may let far too many get away with deceit, but that is hardly a good reason to make it easier and less punishable.)
I am reminded of something I heard about a simulation of corruption; even in a highly corrupt society, sufficient punishment for caught for corruption can cause the rest of society to stop being corrupt on rare occasions, since people keep their heads down when it seems likely they will get caught if they keep it up, and this makes it easier to find and make examples of the remaining corrupt actors. Once corruption ceases, it may be quite a while before it becomes corrupt again (though it will eventually in the real world.)
This is far from the first post trying to remove the shame from being a known liar, and it is far from the last. I wish it was though.
On a quality of writing note, it seems to end without having made a sufficient point. (Everything is very surface level, hiding the details of how their suggestion would work in practice. I suspect they know that, but it could just be the previously mentioned lack of charitability.)
This review is not very charitable, because I think the meaning of the post is different than how they present it.
The things it describes at the beginning are clearly true, with plea-bargaining being institutionalized lying, but this is, in the end, a poorly written plea to not say so. It’s not that I don’t see a point. It would be nice to be able to simply describe things as they are without it being a fight, but that isn’t how things would work out. Words like ‘lie’ and ‘fraud’ have their extremely negative connotations because they are extremely negative things. Anything that is a synonym for them will pick up the same connotation, because people will still hate them. (I have previously determined that I would not be able to make a plea bargain, because I would not be able to admit I did something that I didn’t. I may, of course, be wrong about that since I haven’t experienced it.)
If it did succeed, that would not be a good thing, and would encourage people to lie more. (Social shame and punishment is what keeps the major offenders from being even worse. We may let far too many get away with deceit, but that is hardly a good reason to make it easier and less punishable.)
I am reminded of something I heard about a simulation of corruption; even in a highly corrupt society, sufficient punishment for caught for corruption can cause the rest of society to stop being corrupt on rare occasions, since people keep their heads down when it seems likely they will get caught if they keep it up, and this makes it easier to find and make examples of the remaining corrupt actors. Once corruption ceases, it may be quite a while before it becomes corrupt again (though it will eventually in the real world.)
This is far from the first post trying to remove the shame from being a known liar, and it is far from the last. I wish it was though.
On a quality of writing note, it seems to end without having made a sufficient point. (Everything is very surface level, hiding the details of how their suggestion would work in practice. I suspect they know that, but it could just be the previously mentioned lack of charitability.)