Humans lie all the time without a second thought. People lie to evade consequences and extended explanations; in other words, lying generates a smoother way forward because it lacks both confrontation and shame. Stephanie Ericsson, in her essay, The Ways We Lie, argues “When someone lies, someone loses”(1) through various examples and situations. In contrast, both Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and John Steinbeck’s East of Eden provide numerous examples that dispute her claim. Consequently, one can determine that Stephanie Ericsson's statement that “When someone lies, someone loses”(1) and the mentioned works contradict each other. When used properly with good intentions, lying can have positive effects and merits.
