Why It’s Important To Lie - Lying is a Social Skill (that many autistic people hate!)

If you're bad at lying, just tell people "it's personal" or it's "none of your business." You don't owe anyone an explanation.

I hate lying. When I first got my late-age diagnosis, my first therapist explained this to me as well, but when I asked "can you then teach me how to lie" she answered, 'no, that would not be ethical'. Says it all about normies. They learn instinctively how to cheat and lie, declare it unethical regardless, and find it absolutely not done to teach us how to be able to play on a level playing field. Gotta keep us in our place, don't they.

I find lying incredibly difficult. Mostly it is hard because it requires very devious thinking. I am very intelligent, but I have always felt the moral obligation to tell the truth and I thought all people felt that same obligation. I am 70, and I still find it difficult

In retrospect I became a furniture maker because lies and schmoozing could be immaterial to my success. Either I made the thing good, or I didn't.

I despise liars and lying. I'm referring to intentional misinformation, not merely "simplifying" the truth. If I have to regularly lie to someone in order to protect myself from them, I will do whatever I can to remove that person from my life. That's how I "manage information": by managing the people I exchange information with.

We are the healthy ones living in a sick society. So why are we labeled the sick people who have to adapt to a sicker society? I am the healthy one, now, you come and live in a good world ❤filled with love, honesty,kindness and compassion for all❤

F u c k lying because I would rather d i e honest than lie. Moreover, as one Thomas Paine said, "If you are afraid to offend, then you are also afraid to be honest", and, given the fact that I have been around liars all of my life, I take that to heart.

If everyone else was cheating and it was the standard I still wouldn't do it because my morals mean more than fitting in.

I never lied and then I got told I was so cruel for telling the truth and that my bluntness was wrong. I cried but learned to lie. Now I just don’t know when and how to lie. It’s so complicated.

Whoa!!! It’s sad in this world we need to be wily, deceptive, and strategic because there are so many shady characters in our lives. I never wanted to judge anyone that way until I got so burned by being trusting and honest. Now I know most people are not like us.

When I was thought 'Lying was wrong' thing I saw lying and telling the truth as two very separate things. Up to this day, I refuse to lie, but I also refuse to just give up any information that was (or could have been) given to me confidentially. When someone asks me about something I think could be confidential regardless whether I know something or not I will always vocally 'attack' the person back for even trying to get any form of answer out of me to begin with, if it is something THEY want to know about someone else other than ME, they should NOT go to me, but to THEM, not go behind people's backs. And it is because of the fact that I bite back this way regardless whether I know or not that they will end up clueless at the end. Remember everyone, you are not required to say everything to everyone and sometimes it is better to question the ethics of those who go behind other's backs to try to pry out information out of you.

I hate lying, even by withholding information. That being said, I have had to get good at lying. It would be incredibly difficult to exist in this world without being able to lie. I'm able to maintain my moral stance on it by recognizing that different situations call for different rules- like you said, if it's lying to protect information or people, it's suddenly much easier. My internal rules for it are more like... don't betray/abuse the trust someone has for you. Because I lie so rarely, people have a lot of trust in me

Interesting perspective, and yet it seems to come with the preconception that lying is another ‘social skill’ that we’re bad at, rather than us just having a different communication style from allistics. I hate lying, and find it extremely difficult. I also hate it when other people think I’m lying when I’m not. Trying to play power games with knowledge feels like an added layer of complexity I don’t have the capacity for.

I'm bad at telling them, maybe worse at catching when others tell them. So, I research a lot. "I'll get back to you on that" is my go-to

For me, it's less a moral issue than one of energy expenditure. It takes more energy to lie. First, you have to concoct the lie, then deliver it convincingly. It's so much easier to just tell the truth. Of course, sometimes lying is necessary, as in your classroom scenario. And sometimes there are multiple truths and we have to pick the best one. The latter took me a long time to learn.

I have been often accused that I was lying when I wasn't and that I had ulterior motives when I didn't. This injustice hurts my heart so badly. People would think I want something from them or attempting gaining something through them when I was only genuinely interested to get to know them or hear their opinions. I am also at times being accused of and being dismissed based on being 'too literal'. I am actually interested in world around me - people, animals, plants and nature, I don't play stupid mind games with others, and I want to know how world looks like from their point of view, and somehow twisted society I live in thinks that's not cool, while all kinds of shady hurtful things are cool. I think that the thing you are talking about at the beginning is actually the difference between precision and exactitude (there is important difference between the two in statistics). Also, I think these kinds of pressures are very culturally conditioned - there are cultures that are more passive aggressive and fear based (I live in one!) that have lots of unspoken (very stupid if I may add) rules for things they just expect you to not talk about (like how you really feel or the elephant in the room), etc. So it helps living in a more blunt or direct culture. I lived in both and it's easier amongst people whose cultures are more direct by default. On a wider note I am very fed up with 'social skills' and people with Autism and other struggles constantly being forced to jump through hoops, so they can have better 'social skills'. There are so many skills and qualities, knowledge and beauty in people who are bad at social skills, bad at communicating, bad at public speaking and giving darn power point presentations (because we all know more power point presentations will save the world, right?). They are quiet, observant, thoughtful, analytical, knowledgeable, interesting, can problem solve and see things others can't, they have kind hearts and we should take all of that away in order to funnel them through hoops so they can be like everyone else? I don't think so.

I understand everything you're telling me but my gut still shouts back 'lying is wrong!'

As a child, reconciling the rules about lying with the reality of how often people lie, that was rough. For years I didn't get it. As I got older, I learned how to lie, but more importantly when to lie. My older brother is a pathological liar, so people don't believe him even when he's telling the truth. By contrast, I'm bluntly honest and tell the truth even when it's not a good thing, but in doing so I've created a buffer so that when I REALLY need to lie, people trust me enough that even if the lie isn't perfect they're inclined to believe it. I still have to be careful and work on the art of lying, but it helps to consider it less like lying and more like working fictional writing into reality. Edit: There's another reason I don't lie unless I absolutely have to, and more over hate being lied to. Lying is inherently insulting, no matter the nature of your lie, you are either hoping or insinuating that you believe that the target is dumb enough to believe the lie. If someone is lying to you, they don't think very highly of your intelligence or deductive reasoning.

Way back as a teenager, before I knew I was aspie, I used the George Kostanza - Seinfeld theory of lying. It’s not a lie if you believe it. (In that moment) it’s helped me be a convincing liar when confronted by an objectionable person. I hate lying and as I’ve learnt to unmask I’ve gotten worse at it. My face now gives me away. I definitely feel lack of accuracy is very lie like.

It’s a complex issue, I understand lying to simplify time etc, and to protect privacy, but there’s more to it in life. Growing up with narcissistic abuse and currently with an enormous increase of narcissistic behavior & gaslighting in society you’re vulnerable when you’re sincere and when autism feels like a ‘truth serum’. I have been punished a lot for being who I am and telling it like I see it, including with severe abuse, even by saying ‘no’ to inappropriate behavior. I personally need kind straightforwardness to save energy and function on a basic level, which doesn’t even include a ‘normal’ job. The insincere communication styles cost me way too much energy bc I need to double process information. I have issues with language processing as it is and then I have to convert the message on top of that, both on the receiving end as well as how I respond. I’ve taught myself scripts, but the way people lie to themselves and expect me to say comforting things back makes it impossible to socialize on a ‘normal’ level. Especially since ppl keep asking for the same insincere confirmation over & over & over again. It’s far too mentally exhausting for me and I prefer a daily quality of life🙏🏼🌺