Liar’s Handbook, Rule #27: Never Admit You Lied—Anthony Weiner Breaks it and Gives You a Few Valuable Lessons…
Wouldn’t you know it: The one time I don’t take a position on an act of public deception, the guy comes out 2 days later and admits to lying.
“Confessing to the lie”: This NEVER happens, especially with public figures, so the fact that Anthony Weiner (D-NY) did it makes this a very interesting case study.
And while the rest of country talks about the obvious points of this scandal, I’d like you to consider a question that’s escaping everyone: Why did Anthony Weiner (D-NY) turn on his words and come clean?
If you’ve read Conquering Deception you already know that once a person takes a ‘public’ position on a subject (even if just before one person) they’ll fight to maintain it. In other words, once a person has spoken a lie, they tend to stick with it, defend it, and even add to it—even in the face of evidence that clearly controverts the lie.
(This is why it’s vitally important not to invite a lie, or even allow a person to lie if you can keep them from it—yes, I have techniques for both.)
Anyway, Anthony Weiner came clean for a couple reasons:
1-Additional similar acts came to light: A public figure who fights a scandal with lies runs great risk of drawing more accusers/victims out of the shadows.
Some may be infuriated at the deception. Even more will want to take some of the limelight for themselves, get their 15 minutes out of the occasion. So more photos came out, and more Tweet pic recipients emerged… one of them a 17 year old girl. The evidence was mounting that he’d engaged in this kind of behavior on other occasions; sure, the claim of his Twitter account being hijacked was doubted by all, but now it could be proven totally implausible.
2-No one wants to be proven a liar: When irrefutable evidence of his similar deeds surfaced, Weiner was a proven liar. His only way out? Admit it, and take credit for being truthful.
When I interrogated suspects as a police detective we often got confessions simply by presenting the person with evidence of their guilt. A fingerprint. Surveillance video. Even by telling them that their accomplice had already come clean (and sometimes this was a lie).
Hey, if we could prove he did it, why would a suspect feel the need to confess and absolutely condemn himself? Because no one wants be proven a liar. And I’ve seen people admit to crimes they knew would put them in prison for decades… because they didn’t want to be on record lying about it. Now, they didn’t consciously think of it in this way, of course, and later they regretted speaking telling the truth, but subconsciously this phenomenon was at work in them.
Consider this: Bill Clinton denied the Monica Lewinsky thing because there was no evidence. It was her word against his. Until the blue dress. Faced with this incontrovertible proof that demonstrated he was lying, he quickly addressed the nation and fessed up… well, sort of. You remember the twisting of language and the minimization; but that’s a lesson for another day.
So a couple of lessons for you out of all this:
1-If you want the truth from someone, know that it’s much harder to get—often impossible—if they’ve already told you a lie about it. In a ‘private scandal’ you won’t have the media working to alert others who have damning information that will help you drive out a confession.
2-Even as a person comes clean on a ‘wrong-doing’, know that they’ll still minimize, or rationalize what they’ve done. In Weiner’s case, he claims to be going to rehab; this is a way to both shirk responsibility, and then segue into a resurrection, become a person different from the one who Tweeted recklessly.
So even when a person does the exceedingly rare thing of admitting they lied, the next chapter itself is often laced with deception.
More refined.
Much less obvious.
And much more convincing.
It’s a twisted sport, and the best players never retire.
-jef
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Tags: anthony weiner
Why is it that the best players never retire? I know of one! I met this person (worked for him) in ‘99. Then 3 yrs later i quit. His company eventually folded then he was back at it with a new set of victims, enablers, whatever. Is deception a game to some? Crazy, Jef!
Some of the most successful people around are the ones who have no compunction about manipulating, deceiving, masquerading… this, combined with their persistence, can sometimes work well–even if their enterprises eventually fall apart over the long haul.
Could it be argued that those deception ‘professionals’ actually possess a sort of talent?
Depends on which end of the action you’re viewing it from.
thanks Jeannie!
“-If you want the truth from someone, know that it’s much harder to get—often impossible—if they’ve already told you a lie about it.”
Hmmm….maybe I need to go back and read your book again! Often times if I’m questioning a suspect I purposely let them lie because I think they’ll look worse in court when the evidence shows otherwise. However, I wouldn’t even have to worry about how they look if they confess in the first place! I’ll work harder at getting the truth first.
Holy smokes, Calvin, you must have your crystal ball plugged in and the knob on 11… What you’ve hit on here is a perfect prelude to my next post, stay tuned for that and you’ll see.
Anyway, what you’re really touching on is the interesting question of whether you want a confession… or a proveable lie.
Yes: Either will reflect badly on the accused when (if) he goes to court.
But as you’ve concluded, I think, you’ll ALWAYS be better off with a confession over a ‘proveable’ lie. Why? Because ‘proveable’ can be subjective. Hard evidence to one man may be unconvincing to another. Juries are TOTALLY unpredictable.
Think OJ Simpson: Were the prosecutors (understandably) confident that finding the victims’ blood in OJ’s vehicle would prove he was lying? The jury ignored this.
On the other hand, consider OJ’s chances in court if he’d given a detailed confession.
A criminal case isn’t lost if they lie, to your point it can make the case so long as their lie can be demonstrated convincingly. But if you want a confession (ideal, right?) then yes, don’t allow them to lie on the way to giving it… because this needlessly sets you up for clearing 2 hurdles: 1-getting them to confess to the original act, and 2-in order to do that, they’ll also have to acknowledge that they’ve just lied to you… and people resist this stubbornly.
Great angle on this, Calvin… glad you weighed in!
-jef
Speaking of OJ , has he cracked yet? Will he? I believe that if one keeps his dark secrets to the grave, they will still manifest in other ways.
And Jef you mentioned crystal ball: weird question. In yr profession have you been approached by a psychic or medium with information on cases? What is your experience in this? Am curious.
OJ’s dark secret already manifested in other ways: After walking away from a double murder and going on to play golf and live a life of leisure, he committed another crime and put himself in prison.
If a piano had fallen out of a window and landed on him, we’d say, ‘well, he got his. what goes around, comes around.’ But what makes this so interesting is that OJ’s rewards came to him through his own actions. Nobody did it to him, it wasn’t a coincidental or random thing, just his own actions. It was unstoppable, it seems.
I’ve never dealt with psychics to solve cases…
I have dealt with Gypsy fortune tellers, but they’re a different deal, complete shams.
-jef
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