Aspies and lying

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Aspies are incapable of lying? What do you think? This seems strange to me. I may not always be believable but I know I have the ability to lie. What about someone with very mild symptoms?

Lying about important things will always come back to haunt you, no matter what, but I don't think there's anything wrong with lying about insignificant things that no one will even remember one or two hours later. I do it now and then.

ITA...I came across something online that said Aspies weren't capable of lying, at all lol. False.

I find it bull. I can lie, I just choose not to. If I were incapable of lying, I wouldn't be lying if I were too embarrassed or lying to protect someone or even be creative with writing. None of my fanfictions or originals would exist if I were incapable of lying.

You know what I find interesting?

The fact that this question comes up most frequently on Aspie forums. I don't get it.

Click here to see the Google results.

They're almost ALL forums! (actually, I'm pretty sure the entire first page is nothing but forums) I've never seen or read this ANYWHERE else. The strongest statement I have ever read from researchers is, they "may have trouble lying..." Never anything as strong as "incapable," or "can't."

Where in the world are people hearing this?

Yeah, it's all over forums frequented by US! Could it be that maybe, perhaps, it started as a speculation on the Internet, and simply spread from there?

Nah! It couldn't be!

IMHO:

It has NO basis in reality!

No one is incapable of lying.

My son, now 14, has definitely learned from his NT peers the art of deceit. I remember him as a little boy who used to be incredibly frustrated with people who broke rules and told lies. During the last two years or so, however, he deems lying to be a necessary skill to survive life at school. If it gets him out of detention etc...why not?

No two Aspies are exactly the same, they say, so I guess that some do and some don't.

I am not diagnosed, though am certainly living my life on the spectrum and can't lie very well at all. If ever I do tell lies, I agonise over it until I'm able to confess. I also don't like being lied to. I find it extremely insulting.

It's logical that there's enough to remember in life without having to remember the lies I might have told as well.

This is a very interesting thread, in my opinion, because I've always wondered if any one with Asperger's could be able to lie or bend the truth.

From an article about Asperger's:

The bigger problem, though, is when Mayer tries to paint Adam as some kind of saint whose simple wisdom could guide the world. One of the conditions of Asperger's, it's explained to us, is unflinching honesty—"aspies" have trouble picking up on the subtleties of language necessary for lying, and, again, aren't quite adept enough at social situations to pull that trick off. This is a fact of the condition, but Mayer treats it as a great moral plus on Adam's part, comparing him favourably to Beth's father, who has some skeletons in the closet, and dropping hints about the importance of honest communication—i.e. a relating of "The Emperor's New Clothes" in the classroom where Beth teaches—throughout. Now, I'm a straight, white, middle-class male with no diagnosed mental conditions, but isn't attributing some kind of morality—bad or good—to aspects of a person that they have no control over one of the fairly major things we do to distance ourselves from others? Black people aren't deficient because they have a different skin colour, and people with Asperger's aren't paragons of virtue because they're mentally incapable of lying: they're born that way.

I came across a few other things online also. I think it's ridiculous, yes. I was all excited because I felt like I was fitting in so well and relating to the experiences of other Aspies, and than I saw this and thought, "No way, this isn't me at all".

Just wanted to check with others, I'm undiagnosed, not sure if I have the disorder and don't know much aside from what I've read online.

In bold: Its not a lie then since its not meant to be true.

Lying takes a certain amount of imagination. You have to be able to project the future if the truth is used and imagine what sort of lie would produce a better result. AS involves an impairment in imagination, without that it's not AS. Impairment doens't mean no imagination, just an impairment. That is sometimes described as "literal thinking." For instance, in 5th grade, my son could not get his head around a writing requirement for our state standards. He had to be able to write a persuasive essay, a fictional story and some other things. He could not write fiction because it wasn't true. Eventually he got there, but doesn't like it. At that time he was incapable of telling a lie.

Now he can lie. He still has AS, but he has developed enough of an imagination to lie, albeit badly. Can a person with AS lie? Sometimes, but probably not real well. AS in girls and women may be different. Not enough is known about it.

LOL. ITA, but if it's not meant to be the truth, it's a lie in and of itself, yes?

I have a very hard time, lying.

LOL. ITA, but if it's not meant to be the truth, it's a lie in and of itself, yes?

This is one of the only two things that makes me atypical for an Aspie, maybe (the other being recognizing emotional signals). I am a very good liar... but it depends on the context.

If you ask me what I did today, I can make up any random story off the top of my head that is completely untrue and make it sound very convincing. I can even add details if you want to question it (if I need to cover my butt). I also used to make up on-the-spot bedtime stories to tell my niece when she was little and I suppose that comes from the same place. But I think I can do this BECAUSE of my autism and not in spite of it. I have a whole universe in my head, so I have a lot of info to draw from.

However, I have a very hard time lying to be purposely deceitful. If someone wants me to lie to someone as part of a prank or if I know I am cheating someone out of something, I can't do it. If I try to lie when I know there is something unethical or immoral involved, I'll just breakdown if I try to do it.

Last edited by dyingofpoetry on 17 May 2010, 4:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I don't try lying unless it is for some important reason. I am not good at lying and it usually shows when I try. It is almost always easier for me to just tell the truth and deal with it. The bad part is, sometimes people like the fake lie better than the truth.

Lying is when the person you lie to don't know it is a lie (or not sure if it is, unless you're a bad liar and the person knows you're lying). Fiction is when you tell the reader that it is not true. Lying would be if you wrote a book about your life claiming that the content is accurate but then you start BS-ing.

Lying is when the person you lie to don't know it is a lie (or not sure if it is, unless you're a bad liar and the person knows you're lying). Fiction is when you tell the reader that it is not true. Lying would be if you wrote a book about your life claiming that the content is accurate but then you start BS-ing.