Why Do People Lie? Part 2
Last week, I shared the first reason that I believe people lie. In today's post, I'll cover the next 3 reasons.
Second, people may lie out of fear of punishment and pain. You want to avoid pain or other negative consequences of telling the truth. For example, a lot of parents try to convince their children to tell the truth. But then, when the children tell the truth, their parents punish them, because they (parents) disapprove of the behavior that the children told the truth about. Very quickly, children learn that it may be safer and less painful to not tell the truth. You begin to focus on whether, and how, to get away with not telling the truth. You learn to lie to avoid pain, and with time and practice, you become more and more skilled at lying to ‘get away with it’.
Third, people lie to gain advantage without effort. This happens in all kinds of transactions, and is rampant in the marketplace. People lie about the quality of their own products. People lie about competitors’ products. People lie about the character of the people with whom they compete. Lies in the marketplace begin as soon as you’ve not made the effort required to bring the BEST product to market. Marketing itself often involves ‘stretching the truth’, which often qualifies as lying, or even blatant lying. In legalese, it is known as ‘huffing and puffing’, which is not illegal. Go figure!
You WILL call yours the best product, because buyers want the best product. If you called your product second-best, customers would ask you which is the best product, because that is the one THEY want.
A Fourth Reason?
Someone suggested that a fourth reason why people lie is out of deliberate meanness. They do it to put others down. To me, this is just a variation of gaining advantage without effort.
Only with truth in hand can you improve your life. From manufacturers’ point of view, taking the time and making the effort to come up with the best possible product makes lying unnecessary. That’s good for everyone. It also feels good.
Don’t make crappy products. If you don’t know how, find out how. Don’t buy crappy products. Find out which ones are made with your health in mind.
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