Professional Liars

I came across a comment on Facebook the other day where a person was making note of how they did not like liars or individuals who make up fake stories (I’m paraphrasing here). Of course, it was the fake stories that toggled my teasing brain. So I had to respond with my brand of humor and said something like that is literally what I do every time I write a new story. Now, of course, I probably dislike liars and grifters as much as the next person and recognize that was what this person was referring to. That got me to thinking about how many other professions, besides fiction authors, tell lies and make up stories as an integral part of their profession.

With our previous Liar in Chief and his supreme gift for telling lies or making up stories, I thought of politicians. Now, certainly, not all of them are liars or grifters, but even if they don’t outright lie, most, if not all, certainly bend the truth and, if they’re any good, weave a good story. Unfortunately, politicians are taking this to a whole new level, and the consequences are dangerous. If we all just recognized this about the profession, we would do our due diligence and check the facts, or like we do with a good book, recognize the need to take things with a grain of salt. A few weeks back, I wrote a blog about the suspension of disbelief and how that was needed to enjoy many of my stories. Unfortunately, millions of people are also able to suspend their disbelief when it comes to their favorite politician…to disastrous consequences.

However, not to pick on politicians, because there are other professions that succeed by being good liars or storytellers. As with politicians, my caveat exists again, that this happens in varying degrees, with some coming close to the line, but not crossing it. Think of that slimy car salesperson, which I extend to many other salespeople. Lawyers certainly have their fair share of professional liars, where sometimes their job is to weave an alternative story to create reasonable doubt. Lately, we’ve learned a large subset of the previous Liar in Chief’s lawyers did a lot more than that and are now paying the price for their professional lies. Car mechanics used to have a reputation for being liars, especially with women. Corporate America is liberally sprinkled with liars. Marketing and advertising professionals certainly come close to the line. Now we learn that reporters for certain news stations are big fat liars. This may be the worst sin of all because we depend on journalists to uncover those lies for us. Even teachers sometimes unwittingly tell lies. Think of those skewed history books that tell the story from one perspective, even if it isn’t entirely true. This is happening more frequently now that they’re banning books everywhere and want to go back to the history books that mostly told the story entirely from the white, privileged male’s perspective.

The big difference I see between authors and all the other professions who tend to have an overabundance of professional liars is that the consumer of the goods (readers) and the developer (author) know these are lies and fake stories. In fact, the better the author is at telling lies, the better the story. When a reader gets so enmeshed in the story they can relate to the main characters and care what happens to them, the lie is complete. That is not always the case with the other professions where their success depends on the consumer not knowing it is a lie. I like writing about politicians and spies because that is a whole new layer of lies…characters telling lies within the fake story. But of course, I had to make my politician in Politics of Love, the second book in the San Diego series that comes out May 1st (ssh it’s on presale right now), a rare breed of honest politician. I’ll let you be the judge of how good a liar I really am. You know the drill…just click the links below.

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