--- author: '' category: '' date: 2010/07/02 14:58 description: '' link: '' priority: '' slug: BB894 tags: '' title: The good lies type: text updated: 2010/07/02 14:58 url_type: '' --- Many years ago, I **loved** Homicide: Life on the streets. If you don't know about it, it was a series about Baltimore police detectives. It had some awesome writing, and one particular scene stuck in my mind until this day. There was a thin detective called Munch (who looked like an Edvard Munch painting anyway), and he was interrogating someone for whatever reason. And then he gets angry, very, very angry, and this is what he says: "You're saving your really good lies for some smarter cop, is that it? [...] I've been in murder police for ten years. If you're going to lie to me, you lie to me with respect." I have never forgotten that line because it speaks to me of one of the biggest annoyances in life, when people tell me transparent, obviously wrong or false things just because they expect me to go along, because calling them out on it is too much work, or impolite, or a waste of time, or make me look bad, or whatever. And you know what? A big part of the time they get away with it, and that's fine. They get away with it because I also read `xkcd `_, and there is this side of the story, too: .. image:: http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png Alternatively, there are those who don't know what they are saying is crap. I am wrong in being pissed at them for treating me like a moron that won't notice the crap, when they themselves *have not noticed it themselves* and deserve guidance. My last post was about such arguments when applied to the specific debate on gay marriage, but I could do the same thing with almost anything that's worth debating, and I bothered to write down a bunch of oppositions to gay marriage with explanations on why those are useless, and while I did that in part as stating my position *for* gay marriage, it is also because I *want* reasoned debate. I *want* good ideas from the other side. If they don't come hitting hard, what's the point? Where's the thrill in a duel of brains against unarmed adversaries? I share Munch's indignation! So little do you care about truth that you push lies that don't even *look* like truth? Such feeble fakery that it flies away with a breeze? So little do you care about yourself, that you show the indignities of your mind in public? Respect me when you lie! Use the good lies! If the other side can't push forward a cogent postion, why is there a debate? Are we fighting against nothing, against inertia, against custom, against no rational thought? Are we fighting against *nothing*? That's just sad, because there is people on the other side, and it means **they** are fighting **for** nothing. Are you goddamn pushers of void? Advocates of hot air? Yes, these people piss me off. Yes, I should take things easier. Yes, I look silly a lot. No, I don't give a damn.