Sweet Little Lies

We are all a bunch of little liars. Face it, you’ve lied, I have lied, we have all lied about one thing or another. These days it seems as though lying is becoming more acceptable than actually telling the truth. For a country’s whose first president was infamous for never telling a lie, we sure have become rather lax and complacent when it comes to submitting to the fact that people around us are lying all the time.

There are many reasons why people lie: fear (someone lies because they have done something wrong or don’t want to hurt someone else’s feelings), manipulation (people lie in order to get someone to do something for them) and pride (to create a favorable image of oneself.) We’ve all told white lies for one reason or another while some of us – pathological liars – tell lies all the time uncontrollably and for no reason whatsoever. Whatever the reason, lying has become a way of life in 2017 America – and calling a liar out on their misdeeds often leads to the person actually telling the truth to be viewed as fake, calculating or vindictive.

Most of us are glued to our phones. The internet and social media have offered us an outlet to connect with each other in a way that’s not only effortless but fast. It also gives us an outlet to hide behind the facades and personas we’ve created for ourselves. The image that we project on social media is that of one’s best self so it’s not uncommon for friends and family members to come across as more successful or attractive on social media (Real talk: Instagram filters are the best way to lie to people, they make a lot of us look a hell of a lot better than we actually do.) Dating websites, hookup sites and apps take it to the next level – not only are we presenting our best selves, it’s heightened to the another degree (especially when you are a gay man – come on guys, we’ve all been with someone who’s lied about the size of their dick and I still to this day have not met someone who has actually measured the size of their penis with a ruler.) People lie about their age, ethnicity, height and weight because they want to present the most appealing version of what they think someone will like and if they’re called out on it, it’s easier than ever to completely block someone and act as if they never existed. I recently went out with someone who claimed that they were 5’9’’. However, when we met, he was at least two inches shorter than myself and I am 5’8’’. I judge people, not on their height, but on whether or not the information they are providing me is the truth. When I met this person I thought to myself:

“He has clearly lied to me about his height, as if I wouldn’t have noticed when we met. But, if I call him out on it, then I look like an asshole.”

But why exactly am I an asshole for calling someone out on a lie? This person wasn’t truthful to me and I represented myself honestly so why should I be worried what this person thinks of me? Is it because we are lied to so often and so frequently that people who actually tell the truth about liars have a harsher light cast upon them? Let’s not offend the liars; they may get their feelings hurt. When we don’t call people out on lying, we perpetuate the delusion of themselves or their lie and essentially tell them, it’s OK to lie.

I once dated someone who lied so much that by the time he had abandoned his life with me for a new one, he had lied about cheating on me, stealing from me, his education, his living situation and anything one could think of to lie to someone about. If I hadn’t seen his birth certificate, I would have thought he was lying about his name. When approached about his lies, it was I who was in the wrong for getting upset and confronting him about his inability to tell the truth. When he finally tired of the questions and being asked for the thousands of dollars back that he had borrowed from me, he changed all of his contact information, seemingly disappeared and moved on to his next target. When I would bring this topic up to friends, very often their response was:

“This kind of thing happens all the time.”

Does it? Really? Are we at a point where we normalize people all-but going into the witness protection program in order to get out of being confronted with their constant lies and taking accountability? My father was an attorney for over thirty years and would often regale me with stories of people who would lie under oath and get caught. How many of those people were fined because of perjury or sent to jail? None. Because, while it is instilled in us that we should always tell the truth, the sad truth is that there are very few, if any repercussions for those of us who lie and get caught. Perjury is a crime, but it’s a pain in the ass and very time consuming to convict someone of it and courts are so accustomed to people perjuring themselves on the stand that most judges just let it slide. While I was stuck paying my ex-boyfriends bills long after his disappearance, he was off on tropical vacations and living in a luxury apartment building with a pool on the roof. Allegedly, calling him out on his lies was somehow my fault which led to his vanishing just as the many cases in which someone had perjured themselves resulted in my father loosing in court.

The most constant and relentless example of someone who constantly lies and seemingly gets away with it is our current president. Donald Trump has repeatedly lied over and over again about facts and when called out on it, claims that he was presented with misinformation or that whoever is retaliating is “fake” or “wrong” in order to defend himself. His supports agree, even when presented with the truth. They are so overzealous in their love for Donny that they will come up with any excuse for his lies like: “he didn’t know what he was saying.” He’s the president, he should not only very much know what he is saying but should also be held accountable for the lies he’s told. The unfortunate outcome of this story, I feel, will be very similar to that of mine and my ex-boyfriends. He will most likely get away with his constant lying because he has enough people believing him that it won’t likely make much of a difference. When you believe the lies that you tell for long enough and the people who have been lied to believe you unequivocally, your brain believes that the lies you tell and are told are in fact, the truth. If you can get enough people to believe your truth, you’ve gotten away with lying. We now have a reality television star (a place where it is encouraged to lie and manipulate for the sake of ratings) as our president, lying effortlessly and getting away with it. While there are a number of trailblazers calling him out on his lies, it doesn’t matter because they people he’s conned into believing his constant lies believe him and only him and will most likely never change their minds because they have been programmed to believe that anyone who says differently than Donald Trump is, in actuality the liar. On the flip side, it has become commonplace to hear something our president says on a daily basis and say:

“Oh, he’s clearly lying.”

We’ve normalized lying so much so that it has paralyzed our response to being lied to. “Yeah, OK, another lie, let’s move on.” This is not normal. Not from our president and not in everyday life.

This country is playing a dangerous game with lying. Whether it be online, dating apps, reality television or the highest levels of government, we have become complacent with accepting lies as fact and not holding the people who have lied accountable for the messes they create. I still believe in telling the truth and I highly encourage anyone who feels the same way to continue to call the liars out until we learn as a society to accept fact as truth and fiction for exactly what it is: a big old lie.