Differences

This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.

--- tactics:lying [2024/05/22 16:20] – created General MacOwlthur
+++ tactics:lying [2024/09/20 18:21] (current) – [The Big Lie] Humphrey Boa-Gart
@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 ====== Lying ======
+Sometimes the truth is inconvenient. When those times arise, you might be able to tell a **Lie** to get out of the situation. **Lying**, which is the act of telling a Lie, is the time-honored art of concealing inconvenient truths. Pretty much anybody can tell a Lie. In fact, everyone generally Lies to themselves in some way already. However, Lying is also studied and practiced as an art form by [[hazards:wingnuts|politicians]], [[hazards:cults|cults]], the [[hazards:shills|public relations industry]], and many other types of [[hazards:fediverse|affinity groups]].
-{{tag>Tactics Stubs}}
+===== How To Tell Lies =====
+Lying is literally the easiest thing ever. You just say something that //isn't real//. Unlike satire, the joke or the parable, which oftentimes use ironic falsehoods to communicate a deeper meaning, there is no message or punchline to the Lie. There is no hidden meaning to the Lie, other than the hidden intentions and logic behind the deception. You are simply engineering a veil of falsehood to deceive people for whatever reason you may need or want to at the time.
+For example: Tell someone that you went to school with Beck. Congratulations, you have just told a basic Lie. (Unless you //have// gone to school with Beck at one point, in which case for the sake of this exercise, replace him with a celebrity whom you never went to school with. Now you have told a basic Lie.)
+Sometimes, you might have to Lie again, in order to avoid revealing the first initial Lie. If you are careful about your Lying, then this may not be a problem for you for a long time. However, carelessly Lying without proper consideration can saddle you with a long-term liability in which you have to shoulder a complex web of Lies to cover the original Lie. Proceed with caution.
+===== When To Tell Lies =====
+There are many moral reasons one might take the karma hit and Lie. Sometimes you might Lie to protect someone. Sometimes you must Lie about how you found information to protect a confidential source from unlawful retaliation.
+Say someone has run past you, and a [[hazards:law enforcement|police officer]] runs up soon after, and asks if someone matching their description has passed by. As an act of mercy, you might tell the officer that they ran in a different direction than the one they went in reality. Or, you might be adopted, and your "parents" Lied to you to spare you the trauma and pain until you were old enough to make sense of it on your own. Sometimes you might Lie to telephone scammers to send them on [[hazards:red herring|wild goose chase]] in order to waste their time which would otherwise be spent taking advantage of simpler-minded people.
+However, **Noble Lies** account for a tiny fraction of all Lies, less than one millionth of a percent. Most people will Lie because it is opportune and self serving. There are many other reasons which one might Lie. One might Lie to avoid being prosecuted for a legitimate crime, like killing someone. Oftentimes, criminals will Lie to avoid having to go to prison for murdering people, and most prosecutors are not above Lying as well. Sometimes, someone will level a false allegation against someone in order to [[tactics:lawfare|punish them with the legal system]].
+Lying is not confined to just the legal arena. Someone might Lie about who they are in order to [[diy:social engineering|gain access to restricted facilities]]. Someone might Lie for financial gain, or to climb the corporate ladder. Someone having an affair might Lie to their partner about where they are really going every Saturday night. A propagandist might [[tactics:mirroring|falsely attribute]] their motives or crimes onto their enemy, as a form of deflection or [[tactics:stonewalling]]. A politician might Lie to an entire country about his criminal intentions for trying to pass certain pieces of legislation. Some people Lie for no reason whatsoever other than to get amusement from opportunistically sowing discord & chaos. Lying isn't even restricted to humans, as computer algorithms and your television and your phone also endlessly Lie to you every single day.
+===== Types of Lies =====
+The purpose of Lying is generally to avoid being straightforward. In turn, you don't have to limit yourself to straightforward Lies. There are many derivations of the Lie, which are designed to minimize the [[hazards:blowback]] of guilt and shame the Liar's conscience forces them to bear. Some of them include:
+==== The Little White Lie ====
+If the Lie is minor or victimless, is it really a Bad Thing? Those who desire to persist in Lying, but cannot break their internal walls of cognitive dissonance, will oftentimes go to extensive lengths to justify some Lies as not being harmful. This usually manifests as the "Little White Lie" from the mouths and hands of many amateur Liars. Don't tell her you forgot to get gas, you'll do it while she's asleep. It's just a couple decimal points on your credit application. Who cares?
+==== The Big Lie ====
+Or, you can take things in the other direction, and tell a great big lie. Sometimes, if a lie is so big, people will think there is no way you would be crazy enough to concoct something so absurd, and they will believe it. This works best when you have multiple people in on the lie, or the backing of a state or major [[hazards:wingnuts|political party]]. Just go balls to the wall, never ever admit fault, and stick to it no matter how ridiculous it becomes. This is a common manifestation technique used by [[hazards:cults]].
+==== Selectively Telling The Truth ====
+You told him that you went for a jog, but really you jogged to the bar for a drink. You did go for a jog, but you left out the rest. You didn't Lie, you just didn't mention some minor irrelevant details.
+==== Gaslighting ====
+**Gaslighting** is an advanced form of Lying, where you trick someone into believing an elaborate alternative reality, while simultaneously using [[tactics:pavlovian conditioning]] to wear down the target's mental defenses every time they display suspicion of your cruel charade.
+==== Inception ====
+The human brain's capacity for recognizing the Lies of others is remarkably deep, though oftentimes undertrained. To get around natural defenses like pattern-recognition, you might have to profile your target ahead of time. This is so you can break down your Lie into a puzzle of several **precursor components** and distribute them in various places for the target to "find" with minimal suggestion, obscuring your role as the common denominator behind all the pieces. If the target has been profiled well enough, and you deny them the opportunity to put up a defense, then sometimes you can get them to "naturally" reach the conclusion you wanted them to reach on their own.
+==== Propaganda ====
+Sometimes you might need to repeat the same Lies to many people, but do not have the time or resources to approach them all individually. When those times arise, you can [[diy:propaganda|make propaganda]] to reach many people at once. Propaganda is the art & science of Lying to people on a wide scale, so that you may influence the direction of society, public policy, or who gets run down as the next regular sacrificial scapegoat for bloodthirsty mobs.
+===== Collective Lying =====
+Oftentimes, Liars will band together into packs as a defense mechanism. The sociological causes for this are highly varied, but it oftentimes manifests into such things as corporate narcissism, pyramid schemes, political parties, front businesses, cults, secret societies, banks, covens, activist organizations, media empires, internet hiveminds, and even entire government structures. The conspiracy usually evolves out of whatever existing social structures the Liars have available at the time they first start cooperating with each other. In every case, the point of the conspiracy is to construct a [[tools:thought forms|social egregore]] that revolves around a core group of Lies which shield the collective of Liars involved.
+===== The Future Of Lying =====
+Thanks to the world wide web and the rapidly increasing interconnectedness of mankind, Liars from every country are now able to trade tips & strategies about Lying over the internet. This has created a new worldwide abundance of Liars which vastly outnumber the capacity of places willing to shelter Liars, leaving many of these people jobless & homeless. Devoured by their innate guilt and screaming conscience which they do nothing to solve, many Liars transform over time into wandering black holes, sucking in many innocent bystanders along their journey to rock bottom.
+To overcome this seismic shift in the market of Lying, professional Liars have had to alter their [[:tactics]]. They have found out that by being more careful and subtle with their Lies, they will go largely unnoticed & unchallenged by a television-hypnotized population that only occasionally sees through the most basic of deceptions. Eventually the stench of the Lies pouring forth from all of these people will thoroughly pollute the heavens and invite Divine Judgement upon the Earth.
+In the meantime, you will witness the era of some of the most complex Lies to ever pollute the air and the human heart, followed by the culmination of those Lies **and** all the Lies which have come before. The sky is literally the limit!
+{{tag>Tactics}}

User Tools

Site Tools

Differences