Lies

Pinocchio, Symbol of Untruths

I was going to couch the title in synonyms--deception, misdirections, antitrust--and decided it just is what it is: lies. Our world is not only being diminished by lies, but lies have become the new truth. Decades ago I was coached in the subtle differences between big lies and white lies. Big lies darkened who you were, your integrity and acceptability, and depending on your religious upbringing, could land you in a very warm place for eternity should death come suddenly and unexpectedly. White lies were "tiny little, itsy bitty untruths" which were offered to protect someone's feelings or help you escape punishment. Punishment either didn't come because no one could tell the difference between your truths or lies (no one cared, the lie didn't hurt anyone, or you were a very good liar) or punishment was held in abeyance unless or until all the little white lies congealed into one big dark lie, at which point you needed to go back and reread the sentence dealing with eternity.

That was the way it was - no escaping punishment if caught or if you were a big-time, multiple-lying, chronic and hurtful offender. Now, lies have become, indeed, the new truth. While the intent to deceive is still inherent in the process (intent being the key word), liars abuse the process so skillfully it is a game, one in which the lines between truth and deceit are not only dimmed, but in the liar's mind, erased. "If I say it, I say it with sincerity and conviction, and therefore, it is true." Of course, should the liar be caught in the lie, the "new" lie to cover the first lie becomes the new truth. "Oh, that's right, I did take the blue Datsun, sir. I forgot. But it was sitting at the corner of 7th and Regis with the keys in the ignition and really, Officer, I was concerned that someone shady might victimize the owner, so I was going to turn it over.....but it was almost out of gas so I drove to this Shell station here where you stopped me." New lie; new truth. All bull.



The things people lie about now are infinite when in the "good old days" at best, only the very serious infractions warranted deeply-embedded lies (once again, refer to statement about eternal damnation). Our lives are so fraught with mistruths that we have two choices: believe everything we hear, or, believe nothing. It doesn't even offer us hope to say we can believe things on a person-to-person basis. Even those closest to us, let alone politicians, leaders, and those who are more distant but in positions of power, lie with impunity. When the availability of money or power isn't a stretch, people have "people" who craft the lies and/or lie for them...layer after layer of convoluted lies. The Common Man needs to get by crafting his own webs of deceit and in order to do that, there are just a few requirements: ability to remember the details of each lie so as not to trip over the untruths; a deep personal belief that you have a good reason to lie as defined by only you; an imperviousness to knowing your lies are hurting others; and, the moxie to believe you can and will get away with it. The more layers of people or circumstances (or these days, technology) quilted around you, the more likely the success.

I once raised sheep with my children when they were in 4-H. You learn quickly that sayings such as "they followed like lambs to slaughter" and a "down sheep is a dead sheep" are not just catch phrases. While gentle spirits, they are not the brightest bulbs in the pasture. You walk; they follow. You feed; they eat. You overfeed; they keep eating until they die unless the farmer has given them an anti-eating shot that tempers that instinct. (Really! And why can't they develop that shot for humans?) My point? When did we get as dumb as sheep? When did so many people stop giving themselves permission to question, research, and rest on their own well-placed suspicions? And even more, when did people who perpetrate the lies become empowered to be irritated, irate, dismissive or discriminatory or worse when caught in the headlights' glare of their deceptions? And when did it become a positive outcome to be seen as aligned with and supportive of liars?

No matter where my afterlife might or might not take me, I want to "go" there with my integrity intact. I have never been good at deception. I suffer physically and emotionally when I even suspect I have hurt anyone whether I know them personally or not. My White Lie Meter as a child was seriously damaged - it was proven again and again that only if I didn't open my mouth and no one could physically see me could I even hope to hide anything. I wasn't good at it even then, stumbling over words and betraying the half-truths, sometimes even copping to more than was true in an effort to purge my "sins."

I am disheartened and saddened by the swirl of lies in life today, by being forced to question everyone and everything. I am tired of filtering fact from fiction, especially those things perpetrated by people throughout my ever-lengthening lifetime, people I trust or trusted, people I wanted to believe had integrity. It is exhausting to be forced to live a life of distrust but if I don't, I become a victim rather than a fully realized woman of integrity. It's a sobering realization when faced with a world which touts itself as modern and progressive and never better. The only explanation is the inherent nature of each human as flawed and when more and more layers of humans and their stories gather, the evil grows. Don't misunderstand: I am not espousing hopelessness. On the contrary, I will continue to hope. It's just that the odds for Total Honesty sink ever lower to the point where no one even remembers the truth.