Originally Posted by
Ben Kenobi
Ridiculous analogy, IMHO. Here you are discussing bartering, or in a legal context, negotiating a simple contract. Neither party is being completely forthright in this example. The manager is the real fool because he is gambling on two issues; 1) that the customer will be honest, and 2) that the customer has the minimum price that the manager will accept in exchange for the watch. What if the customer only had $200? Would the manager then renege on his "offer" to exchange the watch for 'whatever the customer had on him at that moment'? My guess is yes, or the manager wouldn't be in business very long. As to the lie about the $2000. In the context of negotiations, when the customer say's he only has $1100 he is not telling a "bold faced lie" from the standpoint of what he is willing to pay for the watch. What if the customer had $6000. Is he obligated to tell the manager that? I don't think so. And even if he did, no contract has been formed that would obligate the customer to fork over $6000 for a $2000 watch. I know it's semantics, but to say that the customer's offer of $1100 for the watch when he in fact had $2000 in his pocket is a "bold faced lie" mischaracterizes the "context" of the circumstance.
You're at least thinking about this analogy and sorting it out one way or the other. Others here resisted mightily, preferring instead to make a grab for high moral ground, finding my analogies offensive and my morality lacking. JB says I am what the ancient philosophers called a
sophist, one who makes up truth as they go using tricks and semantics.
What I was trying to show was, context dictates the appropriate morality.
Let's do another analogy. Is it immoral to to hold back facts, or even to lie at times if the context warrants it is the subject of this one. All of us on this thread are seated at a card table holding hands of playing cards, and the hand you were dealt happens to include an ace of spades, let's say. One of the other players then says, "who has the ace of spades?- I really need it". And then look deadpan back at them and say nothing. You might even debate in your mind to say "I do not have it". So, are you a liar by omission? Of course not, the context is a common card game. You said nothing, and although you lied by mission in the absolute sense you were right for doing so because the context was a common card game.
Does this help?
A sensible person will hopefully agree, context applies.
Now for the discussion of whether a job application is the right context to exercise your right to privacy in regard to your warning letters, or absence thereof, I think it can be argues they are private, much like that ace spades at the card game. It's not a card game, but what it is not, is a public item that you should disclose automatically in the name of honesty. At best it is an optionally disclosed item, depending on whether you really want the job and several other things.
I said it is illegal for them to even ask earlier, and I freely admit I really do not know if that is correct or not. I also said I am not a lawyer, and that's a factual question to put to a lawyer, not me. I do know that certain types of questions are illegal to ask on a job application, or at best they are optional material for the applicant to decide if they wish to answer.