Harpur's Bizarre

Lying is a strange thing. Sometimes I tell lies and don’t know why I do it.

Lying is an understandable human reflex to get one out of a precarious situation, either in the form of a ‘white lie’ (the term white lie should be considered racist. Why are white lies the good lies? Why is it not a brown lie? Hmmm? RACIST) or a blatant lie, to try to avoid suffering the consequence for a misjudgment:

“Did you run over my dog?”
“No”
“Then how come my dog has your tyre prints on its face?”
“My tryes are extremely standard, it could have been anyone!”
“Then how come your tyre has pieces of my dog on it?”
“You dog was trying to rape the tyre, and then went away- and got run over by another car.”
“Oh, OK. That makes sense. Sorry for accusing you of murdering my pet.”
“That’s fine, just don’t let it happen again. K?

In this scenario, lying is a natural reflex. The brain divides. It lists possible answers to the question (“Yes, I did run over your dog”, or “No, I didn’t”). It predicts the likely reaction to both scenarios (you get in trouble for killing the dog, or you go out for a beer with your neighbour, as planned). It then chooses the answer that has the least painful outcome. The least painful scenario may, or may not, be based in reality.  This is normal brain function. It may not be ‘moral’; but it makes logical sense.

But sometimes lies occur for no logical reason.

My son is a terrible liar. He is not terrible at telling lies- he tells terrible lies brilliantly. Last year he told me that a little boy from his class, called Benjamin, got sick and died.

Apparently the principal had called in a big assembly to tell the kids all about it.  Seth told me that his parents couldn’t afford a funeral.  It freaked me out.  I got life insurance. I was really worried about Seth.  I thought it must be really hard on him to have a class mate die so young.

But then, a few weeks later I was chatting to Seth’s friend.  He was talking about going to Benjamin’s house to play that weekend. I thought, “wow, poor little boy, in his little fantasy world…”  It turns out Benjamin is not dead, never was, and my son made it all up. I have no idea why he did that.  Little shit.

I had a downstairs flatmate who was a compulsive liar. It took so long for us to figure it out, it was really embarrassing. She would always tell the most elaborate stories, and in hindsight it was ridiculous to believe them in the first place.

‘Gemma’* told a story about a family friend of theirs who had five children. All of their kids had died separately while overseas travelling. They had all died in freak accidents, doing what they loved. One loved surfing, and was drowned by a squid while doing that. One was obsessed with cheese, and died in a freak accident in a cheese factory in Amsterdam.  The others died in increasingly elaborate scenarios.  And now, apparently, the couple with the 5 dead kids spend each year travelling to the places around the world where their kids died, having a grand old time.

I believed it.

Unjustified lying is a bizarre phenomena. But everyone seems to do it, to some degree, at some time. Not everyone is a complete psycho about it, like my son and ‘Gemma’; but there seems to be a little switch in our brain that every now and then decides to divert the natural impulse to tell it like it is, and go the complete opposite way.

It usually starts with a simple question.

“Have you been to Gore?”

And you haven’t.

The brain divides, it lists possible answers (yes, or no) and then predicts the outcome. The thing is, in this scenario, neither outcome is good or bad. What possible harm could befall someone who admits they have never been to Gore? It’s no big deal. Loads of people haven’t. Its Gore. Yet you still find yourself saying ‘yes’. And, as you are saying it, you have an out-of-body experience where you are looking above yourself, confused, yelling ‘you liar!’

The thing is, if you get out of it early enough, it’s not that big of a deal. “Actually, I haven’t been to Gore, I have no idea why I just said I did- I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

But when you start talking about your imaginary psycho ex-husband, with ties to the mongrel mob who still lives there; and your still born baby who was buried there; and the street that was named after that day you saved the Town Hall from burning to the ground- there is no turning back.

You hope the story doesn’t get spread around, then told in front of someone who knows damn well it’s not true. Then you have to remember who you told it to. Sometimes it’s easier to falsify those memories, so that you actually start to believe that you really have been to Gore, and you are in the witness protection program.  Soon, you are falsifying documents, and spending your days reading books on Gore, learning all the landmarks and cafes, so it checks out with anyone who actually has been there.  Then you have to book tickets to Gore, spend 2 years there, and write a thesis on it’s geographical features.

Or maybe, you would just say- “Nah.  Never been to Gore.”

That would be easier.

*Name has been changed to protect Jenna’s identity.