A question like "Which has a greater impact on society, truth or deceit?" is rather vague but nonetheless easy to answer because obviously, deceit has way more impact than honesty. I say this because people find it much easier to lie than, to tell the truth. The art of deceit is a powerful tool and if you master it you can fool even the most untrusting person. People are greedy and for many lying and manipulating is an important part of gaining more money, power, respect, etc. This mentality has had huge impacts on society. For example, the Watergate Scandal in 1972 in which some of President Richard Nixon's Re-election committee members broke into the Democratic National Committee Watergate headquarters and tapped the phones and then stole important documents. After the connection to Nixon was revealed he resigned from office. Read more HERE. Another example of a President lying to the public comes from Ronald Reagan when he stated that "We did not- repeat- did not trade weapons or anything else for hostages- Nor will we." This statement went against covert operations that had been going on for years prior to. Read more HERE.
Another reason deceit plays such an important role in our society is that it's one of the only things we see. The media controls what the public views as important and relevant, through the attention a topic gets. The media focus on illegal drug abuse in the late 1900s and early 2000s caused the U.S. to lose billions in a hopeless war on drugs. As I learned in the Culture of Fear the real problem with drug abuse in the U.S is legal prescription drugs. I have learned lots about the media from the book the Culture of Fear. Some of it including their disregard for accurate information. One example from the book is a mass media story about Cindy Gracia a 10-year-old girl that was pregnant. In reality, she was 14 years old and her name was actually Adella Quintana. Like I stated earlier people want money and if a story is good and it will give them ratings they run with it as long as they can for a pretty penny. One thing that all Americans and all people do that makes deceit have more impact on society is the fact that we push our blame from one group to another and fix none of our problems. Liars, the misinformed, and the ignorant all contribute to the lack of truth that is available in our society. When it comes down to it we can't really be sure if lying is more powerful than the truth because it all depends on each person's perspective. We can for sure say that if we continue down a road where we lie to make further progress we will get to a breaking point. This breaking point is a social collapse. Once to this point were finished. The sad thing is we can already see it happening in the world today in both internal and external conflicts. Internal conflicts like the Charlotte Riot on September 20th, 2016 and Anti-Trump riots since his election. External conflicts like the war in Syria and Iraq or the unrest between the U.S and North Korea.
