Paltering
Thought for the Day
27th June 2025
Good morning. I was introduced to a new word this week. Peter Kellner, the political analyst, in his Substack post wrote about paltering, meaning to tell a narrow truth in order to mask a big lie. He gives various political examples but a light hearted one would be if someone asked me how my tennis game went and I replied that it was a great second set which I just won without mentioning the fact that I had actually lost the match, that would be paltering. Something true would have been said in a way deliberately to hide the real truth, which Peter Kellner regards as one of the great enemies of politics today.
In a world beset with conspiracy theories, fake news and allegations of fake news, and AI generated stories and images, it is more important than ever to try to get a grip on what is true. For truth is fundamental to what it is to be a human being. Unless we can assume that most people most of the time mean more or less what they say, human communication would be impossible and therefore human life as we know it simply could not exist. I would go so far as to say that if I define myself as a human being I commit myself logically and morally to be a truth seeking, truth telling being.
Of course it is not as easy as that. As a young teenager I was in a play called ‘Nothing but the truth’. The plot was quite simple. Someone had accepted the challenge to go for 24 hours without telling a lie. It is not difficult to imagine all the difficulties and dilemmas which emerge. You are faced with someone who is very vulnerable for example. What they need is encouragement, something positive, not cruel candour.
Then of course every news source has its own point of view, its particular selection and weighing of the facts. The good thing about our society of course is that there are different sources of news, to balance one against the other, as well as the BBC which is committed to carefully scrutinising all the evidence and reflecting different stances on controversial issues. But this leaves us the hearers, readers and watchers in a very responsible position. We too have to scrutinise and judge. The ten commandments don’t actually mention the words truth or lie, but the ninth commandment conveys what these terms mean very powerfully when it says ‘Do not bear false witness against your neighbour’. Deliberate lying, and indeed paltering, is false witness, an offence against others and ourselves. It goes against the essence of who we are as truth seeking, truth telling beings.