You are a liar.

You have lied about something, sometime, haven't you? In fact, if we include "little white lies" in this discussion, your lying is probably a weekly, if not daily, occurrence. If we could examine the whole of your life, there are almost certainly a few whoppers in there -- lies to cover your ass, maybe even a few mean-spirited lies that hurt someone.

Technically speaking (with maybe the occasional one-out-of-a-billion exception?) every last one of us is a liar.

But you're still going to be pissed if someone calls you a liar, and in most cases rightly so, if they do it with condescension, with an accusatory tone, as if lying defines your very nature.

Consider this something to think about with many of the other labels and blanket characterizations being tossed around DU lately, about DU members, about Snowden and Greenwald, about the president and other leaders, about the nature of governments and countries. Is it enough that you have in mind one or two issues or incidents (if you're even sure you're right about those one or two things) to apply a label to a person or a situation, a label that could be technically true, but only in the same sense that you're a liar, hurling that label about in a sneering tone as if you're just defined the very nature of that person or situation?

There are even things that happen frequently in raw numbers, far more than one or two incidents, where nevertheless these frequent events are not representative events.

Take car accidents, for example. Imagine if a poster on DU started screaming about our "deadly" roads and highways. It's certainly technically quite true. That poster could have a field day posting page after page of links to stories about deadly car crashes.

What then if that poster acts like you're an absolute fool if you don't stop driving NOW, after they've shown you THE TRVTH!? What if you try to explain how automotive safety has improved over the years, and for your trouble you get shouted down as a shill for the automotive industry or an apologist for the highway department?