When Did The Truth Stop Being Important

Earlier today on a different website I made a post similar to the one below. That post on the other website had a lot more details and a link to a different post on that other site and asked members on that other site when they started being okay with accepting lies as truth. That post on the other site got moderated into a recycle bin and then deleted. Since I don't want that to happen on ATS , I'll ask the same question without breaking any of the RoC here.

Regardless of being Republican or Democrat at which point did it become okay to accept proven lies as truths?

I have been consistent in my posts here in stating that both Democratic and Republican leadership have failed the country in COVID response and that as a country we deserve better then Trump and Biden as the two viable choices for President. Personally I do not believe either is the right person to lead us out of the various scenarios that now face the US but the question I'm asking isn't about that.

At what point as a poster do we say "sure that's a lie but it fits my ideology so yah I believe its true"

Approximately 244 years ago in the US. But much further back if we are talking worldwide.


ETA...Unless you were a Whig. Bring back the Whig's.



a reply to: opethPA

It's getting so when you tell the truth...people think you are telling a lie.

People have been conditioned to believe lies, it is way worse than it was back when I was a kid, at least people knew that they were being BSed back then by the government.

"I am not a crook"

"I did not have... sexual relations with that woman"

"It was in response to a video"

"You don't need to wear a mask"

"This virus will disappear by spring"

"Fair & Balanced"

Well, there are a lot of influential people who have told some whoppers over the years. Tell a lie enough times and it becomes the truth, and the truth is questioned.

How can you be conditioned to believe lies, or truths?

How can you tell if truth is a lie if the liar is truthing?


What if the truth telling liar tells the truth, but lies about it and then lies about telling the truth?







a reply to: rickymouse

a reply to: opethPA

Humans have a basic need to feel important. The birth of the internet and social media has given everyone a platform to pitch their version of reality based on their own cognitive bias. This need often outweighs logic.

The problem “lies” with social media IMO. We have conditioned ourselves with our own habits to generally only hear what we want to hear. We can block or shut down any alternate opinions we don’t like or that angers us. Amazon and Facebook help with this by showing us only products that are generally in the genre of our likes. News does this as well. You have right wing Fox (or did) and you have left wing Everybody Else.

We have surrounded ourselves with our electronic versions of yes men. We only get opinions and news we like. So when something comes into that bubble we get all in our feelz and immediately reject it, argue it, ignore it, block it, etc. How dare something intrude. Since we don’t look for outside influences anymore then they can’t be trusted and are automatic lies whether they are or not.

Just my 2 cents. Probably not even worth half that... but there it is anyway.

Nah, it goes back to the beginning.

Check out Pope Urban the Deuce. Dude was losing followers, so talked a bunch of smack about Muslims and started the Crusades.

Nah, lying aint a modern concept.



a reply to: Kangaruex4Ewe

a reply to: opethPA
It stopped at the beginning of human existence.

Psychologically and Sociologically speaking the human ability to reason did not develop to find truth but rather to exist in a society.

If truth interferes with one's ability to belong to a safe group then the brain tends to disregard the facts that lead to it.

Why People Ignore Facts.

a reply to: opethPA

Any examples of what you perceive as 'truth', and what you perceive as 'lies' ?

Can you serve us up an undeniable 'truth', that none could dispute was a 'truth' ?

Can you serve us up an undeniable 'lie', that none could dispute was a 'lie' ?

originally posted by: HalWesten
"I am not a crook"

"I did not have... sexual relations with that woman"

"It was in response to a video"

"You don't need to wear a mask"

"This virus will disappear by spring"

"Fair & Balanced"

Well, there are a lot of influential people who have told some whoppers over the years. Tell a lie enough times and it becomes the truth, and the truth is questioned.

You forgot one-

a reply to: lakenheath24

But the question wasn’t if lying was a modern concept. I agree. Lying is as old if not older than prostitution.

A lot of people still wanted truth though. It seems like now everyone has their own truth. People even say “That’s my truth” as if that can even be a thing. Regardless we are in a mess.

originally posted by: HalWesten
"I am not a crook"

"I did not have... sexual relations with that woman"

"It was in response to a video"

"You don't need to wear a mask"

"This virus will disappear by spring"

"Fair & Balanced"

Well, there are a lot of influential people who have told some whoppers over the years. Tell a lie enough times and it becomes the truth, and the truth is questioned.

"Office of the President-Elect"

If one only looks at a problem as being modern, then they are doing a disservice to themselves. Its like saying that WW 1 was the war to end all wars. Oooops.


One needs perspective.



a reply to: Kangaruex4Ewe

a reply to: opethPA

The truth stopped being important about the time that they started teaching kids in college that everything was subjective and that there was no such thing as objective truth anymore.

a reply to: opethPA

Replying to the thread title, probably somewhere around 1970 or so. Now it's a back stabbing who can one up the other guy and destroy them and / or find some way to "eliminate" them jamboree of propaganda worthy of any of the communist nations before us.

originally posted by: HalWesten
"You don't need to wear a mask"

Not a lie...

"This virus will disappear by spring"[/quote
Not a lie. The lie is that the virus is still a thing...

a reply to: opethPA

What bothers me the most is the lack of creativity. We already did those FEMA conspiracies to death.
Ever since "the right weaponized conspiracy theories" (thanks underwerks that's awesome hope you don't mind I'm going to use that) it's a rehash of the same old same old sometimes even going back a good 100 years.
All those "shocking revelations" have been proven by time to be wrong over and over again. The names change but the story always stays the same.
The satanic pedophiles, or child-eaters are even older.
The cultural replacement makes a come back every 20 years or so.
The deliberately induced "the commies are coming!" goes back to McCarthy, but is also "imported" and per se older.
The "saviour" who comes and rescues the neglected and downtrodden easy thousands of years old and never true.
...
I guess it must be an inbuilt reflex of people hardwired to have a hard time dealing with change, that's why they feel attracted to those stories they've heard before.
It's just really comical in the age of the internet how the left is surprised that those concoctions are thriving on "their" medium. But at some point the right also discovered the book so eventually it was bound to happen.

It might be somewhat shocking to you but "the truth" was never that important to anybody. Just the direction of the lies is a minor difference.
Like a rightie will tell you "capitalism has brought everybody equal chances to make a decent living for himself"
A lefty will tell you "we need to come together as one nation to weather this crisis"
The people saying these things both know it's a lie. The people believing them all know it's a lie. Deep down at least.

But it's a function of civilisation, civilisation only functions because we lie to eachother. Be it small things like "you look great today" or bigger things like "the agression of nation xy can no longer be tolerated"
The real problem is individualism, don't get me wrong it's a great thing personal freedoms and all of it yeahi! It's just diametrical opposed to the underlying functions which build culture, society, civilisation.

And the point we're at now is especially hilarious since it used to be a staple of the right to demand and keep together people on the bare minimum of "we are the greatest nation" now tearing it apart on demands of free speech, talks of undermining the process which made everybody an active part of that nation aka the election
Because I guess with the last 70ish years the progress of personal freedom is getting a bit too fast for them.
They assume the roles of victims and that's hard if you used to be John Wayne. It was never true, but ...

My point is, just let them. It's a not a problem that will be solved in a good talk, it's a hardware issue. You don't have to feed it or engage in it, you won't convince anybody, just like you won't be convinced
And "the truth" is what is actually going on, it's a relativistic beast.

a reply to: opethPA

Lying is anti Christian.

So Propaganda, false truth's, subjective truth's (just another word for lies) all fall prey to the vultures that currently rule the world from the shadows and tell YOU there subjective truth and school you in it from childhood up.

In Christianity there is a passage, the TRUTH shall set you FREE.

But there is a real world saying that goes back probably to before the time of the Roman Empire, it was well known and practiced in China from at least the time of Qin Shi Huang, the history (The TRUTH) is written (Dictated) by the Conqueror (Or for that matter whoever call's the shots).

You are far from the first in the US or for that matter anywhere in this world to decry the lies under which we must live, the truth is not palatable sometimes and often people opt to believe a more pleasant dream of reality than the actual real thing, in fact we all do every time we pick up a book to escape into a story, play a computer game or watch a movie or sit com, we are running away from the real world if only for a short time because this world is built upon usury, slavery and is governed from the shadows.

TRUE presidents in the past were murdered because they stood in the way of those that rule from the Shadow's, JFK and other's for different reasons but always because they threatened the hidden elite, you know your US history better than we outside your nation but one was definitely assassinated for resisting the founding of a large financial monetary control institution that aimed and eventually achieved control of your nation through control of your currency and there were many others dating back as long as the world has been organised into governmental organizations.