Posted on 03/26/2008 12:07:02 PM PDT by Samizdat
How can you tell if someone is a pathological liar?
In: Mental Health and Addiction
- Identifying a Pathological Liar
Pathological liars, or “mythomaniacs,” may be suffering from histrionic personality disorder or narcissistic personality disorder. The following comments basically reflect a pathological liar who has the characteristics of histrionic personality disorder.
Some characteristics:
1. Exaggerates things that are ridiculous.
2. One-upping. Whatever you do, this person can do it better. You will never top them in their own mind, because they have a concerted need to be better than everyone else. This also applies to being right. If you try to confront an individual like this, no matter how lovingly and well-intentioned you might be - this will probably not be effective. It’s threatening their fantasy of themselves, so they would rather argue with you and bring out the sharp knives than admit that there’s anything wrong with them.
3. They “construct” a reality around themselves. They don’t value the truth, especially if they don’t see it as hurting anyone. If you call them on a lie and they are backed into a corner, they will act very defensively and say ugly things (most likely but depends on personality), but they may eventually start to act like, “Well, what’s the difference? You’re making a big deal out of nothing!” (again, to refocus the conversation to your wrongdoing instead of theirs).
4. Because these people don’t value honesty, a lot of times they will not value loyalty. So watch what you tell them. They will not only tell others, but they will embellish to make you look worse. Their loyalty is fleeting, and because they are insecure people, they will find solace in confiding to whomever is in their favor at the moment.
5. They may be somewhat of a hypochondriac. This can come in especially useful when caught in a lie, for example, they can claim that they have been sick, or that there’s some mysteriously “illness” that has them all stressed out. It’s another excuse tool for their behavior.
6. Obviously, they will contradict what they say. This will become very clear over time. They usually aren’t smart enough to keep track of so many lies (who would be?).
Here are some ways to tell someone is a pathological liar:
They lie about even the smallest things. For example, saying “I brushed my teeth today,” when they didn’t.
They add exaggerations to every sentence.
They change their story all the time.
They act very defensively when you question their statements.
They believe what they say is true, when everyone else knows it isn’t.
Here’s an alternate “checklist”:
Lies when it is very easy to tell the truth.
Lies to get sympathy, to look better, to save their butt, etc.
Fools people at first but once they get to know him, no one believes anything they ever say.
May have a personality disorder.
Extremely manipulative.
Has been caught in lies repeatedly.
Never fesses up to the lies.
Is a legend in their own mind.
from http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_can_you_tell_if_someone_is_a_pathological_liar
Well, I’ll be darned. There actually is such a thing as a genetic congenital liar.
http://www.cs.wcupa.edu/epstein/congenital.htm
Now I understand political dynasties.
And Obama is a congenial liar.
A caller to a local radio show reminded me of another Hillary whopper...
Remember when she claimed that Chelsea almost had the trade center collapse on her when she was out jogging on 09/11/01 and that Chelsea had to duck into a Starbucks to avoid the rubble... when asked Chelsea , unaware of her mothers claim , said she was awakened by a friends phone call and she saw the 2nd plane hit on TV...
Hillary ,, she ain’t no Bill
Remember this one?
“Hillary was at a race-relations conference in Boston with some teenagers, and she claimed that she was on the soccer team, and a player from the opposing team told her that she hated her kind, and Hillary said- ‘you don’t even know me,’ to which the girl replied- ‘I don’t have to know you to know I hate you.’ An attempt to try to make the kids believe she knew exactly where they were coming from, and from personal experience at that! Too bad this is almost surely a lie, since there were no girl’s soccer teams at her high school in the 1960’s when this supposed event took place.”
And remember how beel was going to punch Safire in the nose for writing this? How soon the DBM forgets these things especially that guy, what’s his name? Scarborough?
nice line!
He couldn't even be original. Harry Truman once had similarly threatened a critic of his daughter's singing.
Well of course she is, frankly she's a MIS-LEADER in every sense of the word, but my question is; does she Lie to her Huma?
Shrillery and Dilldo Klintoon are pathological traitorous evil liars . . . who’d often prefer to lie than tell the truth even when the truth would benefit them and the lie would cause extra trouble . . . it’s a pathological addiction.
or possession.
place marker bump
from the article:The discovery that congenital lying has a genetic basis, at least for some people, was considered momentous. It earned Barbara Tuxler of Stanford University the 2027 Nobel Prize in medicine. It also raised profound ethical and moral issues that are still being debated.
We all knew Hillary was a joker when she responded to her first public question with the cookies remark.
She dropped ten points in the polls that very moment.
Oh yeah , now I’m sure she’s a pathological liar . Thanks for the proof .
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