2 - Where lies are expected

Summary

A DIVERSITY OF DOMAINS

Miss Shute, a character in the late nineteenth-century collection of short stories, Some experiences of an Irish R.M. (Somerville and Ross 1944:97), draws attention to the difference between deceit practised in the process of buying and selling a horse and deceit perpetrated during a game of cards. She asks:

No one will ever explain to me … why horse-coping is more respectable than cheating at cards. I rather respect people who are able to cheat at cards; if every one did, it would make whist so much more cheerful; but there is no forgiveness for dealing yourself the right card, and there is no condemnation for dealing your neighbour a very wrong horse!

With a horse sale, and not only in Ireland, lies are expected; they are not thought to be reprehensible, whereas cheating at cards is. Miss Shute played whist, not poker, but even in poker misdealing the cards is condemned even though bluffing an opponent is applauded. Yet even horses do not provide a carte blanche for every lie. In Australian racing circles volunteering a racing tip that is not offered in good faith is regarded as reprehensible, whereas responding to a request for a tip with deceitful advice does not attract moral censure. Card games and horses illustrate the way in which attitudes towards lying vary across social domains.