When former U.S. president Bill Clinton so famously said “I did not have sexual relations with that woman,” the world, even for a moment, believed him — until the whole story came out. Another member of this league of presidents, Richard Nixon, claimed he was “not a crook” after the Watergate Scandal. In 1994, the CEO of a popular cigarette production company in the U.S. said “Cigarette smoking is no more ‘addictive’ than coffee, tea, or Twinkies” — in a bid to assure people that cigarettes are neither unhealthy nor addictive.
The thread of fabrications runs through history — uniting politicians, entrepreneurs, celebrities, any person remotely in a position of authority. It presents a baffling notion: why do people go above and beyond to credit falsehoods when it comes from people in power? One may be tempted to believe it’s the increasingly grey area between fact and fiction that makes it hard to identify lies. Or maybe people are just insensitive to false claims; maybe they no longer care what is true and what is not.
The reason we’re willing to believe people in power cuts across psychology and socio-political contexts. It’s important to realize lying — irrespective of it existing as a stain on morality — is all too common; people lie all the time. An average person may lie about twice a day; prolific liars may tell as many as five lies in a day. Former U.S. President Donald Trump himself is famously credited for making more than 30,000 false claims during the tenure of...
A person in his 30s who demanded compensation for alleged foreign substances in cup noodles and the absence of meat in stir-fried pork was sentenced to prison in both the first trial and the appel...