How do you know when you are being lied to? Often, I don’t know.
Yet when I consider the occasions when I have learned I was lied to, I notice a pattern emerging.
All lies start out as one source’s account of what happened. As long as I believe the source’s account, the lie appears to be true. Yet, as soon as I expand my perspective by trying to validate the source’s account, I begin the process of exposing the Lie.
Another pattern I noticed is the bigger the lie, the harder the liar works to get me to accept their version of events. In these occasions, any effort to explore alternative explanations are strongly discouraged.
Consider a standard Lie:
“When my two sons, Patrick and Matthew, were young they loved candy. We used to keep a candy dish on the coffee table reserved for guests. One day, I entered the living room and noticed the candy dish was empty. I called Patrick and Matthew into the room and asked: “Do either of you know what happened to the candy in the candy dish?” Patrick said, “I don’t know.” Matthew said, “I saw Patrick eating the candy and when I asked for some, he wouldn’t give me any.” Patrick immediately denied eating any candy. Someone was obviously lying. As it turned out, I happened to notice Matthew’s pants pocket seemed full of something. I asked Matthew to empty his pockets. Grudgingly, Matthew emptied his pockets revealing the empty candy wrappers from the candy dish.”
In the simple example, Matthew’s lie could only be true if I explored no further than his account of what happened.
Now consider an outrageous Lie:
“In the case of Genocide by Israel in Gaza, the claim is baseless and without merit.”[stated 1/3/2024 by John Kirby, Spokesperson, U.S. National Security Council]
In order for this statement to be true, an objective assessment of the case submitted to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) by South Africa would reveal no substantive evidence was provided to support the claim. Yet on January 26th, 2024, 15 out of 17 judges of the ICJ ruled the evidence provided by South Africa was sufficient to support a claim that Israel was plausibly committing genocide in Gaza.
In this severe example, the statement by John Kirby was a desperate attempt to invalidate any consideration of an alternative explanation. Why? Because any objective assessment would prove John Kirby’s statement was completely untrue.
Have you observed this pattern elsewhere?
The key take-away is to always get perspective on all explanations we are given, especially when we are told no other explanation is valid.