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John Kennedy
ENG 113 Written Composition
Personal Essay: This I believe - Final Draft
September 19, 2022
The Bitterest Truth is Better Than the Sweetest Lie
I believe truth to be the main driving force for the creation of a good society
and the creation of a normal environment in which people will live in harmony. A lot
depends on the truth, because when you hear too many lies, you no longer understand
whether you are living in reality and cannot recognize the truth from a lie.
As a child, I lied to my parents a lot, thinking that if I hid the truth from them,
they would think that everything was fine with me. However, the thing was that I was
lying to myself because by telling lies to my parents, I was only making the situation
worse because, no matter what, the truth would still come out, but it was not in my
favor. For example, in the 5th grade, I skipped classes and got bad grades at school,
but when asked by my parents about my success at school, I answered that I was one
of the best students in the class. Nevertheless, my parents were called to a parent
meeting where they learned the whole truth. After realizing my guilt, I realized that if
I had told my parents the truth right away, they would have given me advice on how
to study well and would have helped me with my studies.
The story that knocked me out is the story of Chornobyl, as because of the lie,
many people died and injured. The story takes us back to 1986 to the Chernobyl
nuclear power plant, when the fourth power unit exploded as a result of research.
Arriving at the scene, Director Bryukhanov already knew that it was an explosion and
not a simple fire, but in order to avoid panic, he lied that the roof of
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the fourth power unit was on fire and that there was no threat to people, although at
that moment a million kilotons of radiation was going into the air. People lived in a lie
without even realizing that they were breathing radiation a thousand times greater
than normal. People lived in a lie without even realizing that they were breathing
radiation a thousand times greater than normal. So was this lie worth people's deaths?
The truth would have saved them and saved time to solve the problem, but it's not that
simple. Most people tell a lie and think that they will gain some time to do everything.
This experience taught me that a lie is a debt owed to the truth, and that the debt must
be paid sooner or later.
When I read the news, I am so immersed in world events that it makes me
vulnerable to propaganda because information can be controlled by people. It goes so
far into the subconscious that you even start to believe it, even if all this information
is a lie. Therefore, I have to follow the rule of "trust but verify" to avoid manipulation.
When I was little, I was always told that I would not grow up if I was mannerless, but
I could not realize at a young age that as a child you do not yet realize that it is a lie,
but with time you understand that it is simple manipulation.
Consequently, I am always trained to tell the truth because only the truth
makes the world real and not the projection of lies in which we unfortunately live. I
believe that truth conquers falsehood in the same way that good conquers evil,
because the power of truth implies actions that are done with sincerity and humanity.