Lies And Damages

I’ve been thinking a lot about the damage a lie can do these days. One or two well-placed untruths or half-truths can have devastating and far-reaching effects.

I have had a few times in my life when the lies being told about me and/or someone I love have reached devastating proportions. One such incident occurred when I was about nine and struggling with an autoimmune disorder. I was diagnosed with Lupus about a year or two after the incident I am about to describe, but at the time we didn’t know what, exactly, was wrong with me. I had been sick and getting sicker for years, and it had been narrowed down to an autoimmune disorder of some sort. Does anyone remember which autoimmune disease was in the news in the late 80s? Somehow, in the game of telephone that occurs when people don’t really know what they’re talking about, but are talking anyway, someone said I had AIDS. It spread like wildfire. Despite the fact that we knew that I did not in fact have that particular immune deficiency, very few people bothered to ask me or my parents what the truth of the matter actually was and/or just refuse to engage in the gossip. These few people ended up forming the core of our support network.

Parents stopped allowing their children to play with me, and some children said rude and frightening things to me, including that I was going to die, and when I died I would go to Hell because I must be gay as only gay people get AIDS. There are so many problems with that statement that I would have to start at least one more post just to unpack them all. Now, even if I HAD actually had AIDS, or more accurately HIV, this would not have been the correct response. We were a little too young for the drugs and sex scene, and I wasn’t going to give any blood transfusions to anyone on the playground. The other children were not in any danger from me, regardless of which autoimmune disorder I had. 

The others were actually much more of a danger to me than I was to them. Every little cold was a problem that could spin off into an eventual hospital stay for me. Every snub and cruel word made what was already an extremely difficult situation worse. Now, I can understand fear for your child and yourself. I can understand fear of the unknown. What I cannot understand is the cruelty that was allowed and, in some cases encouraged. I also fail to fathom the initial decision on the part of the person who started and decided to repeat the lie. Did s/he really believe that I had HIV, and that my parents just weren’t disclosing it? Did s/he just hear autoimmune and jump straight to AIDS? Was there some other reason? Also, even at nine, I knew that you couldn’t get AIDS from playing with people. Why did so many adults react with fear, anger, ignorance, and, even hatred?

What I didn’t understand at nine was why my parents seemed to be much more upset than I was, and I was pretty upset. I thought my mom and dad were going to explode with anger when they heard the gem about me going to Hell. At first, I thought they were angry with me for being sick and making everyone talk about us. When I realized they were not actually angry with me, I did not understand why they were so mad.   They didn’t stay that angry for that long after my sister was mean to me or vice versa. There were people my mother could barely tolerate years later because of this fiasco.

As I grew up, I would understand on an intellectual level why it bothered my parents so much. Since becoming a parent, I also understand on a visceral level. I am now comprehending how hard it must have been for them to just give the facts when the opportunity arose, and not lash back, with things that were true, but would not help, things that would wound the people who had been attacking their child, but would serve no purpose other than to inflict pain for pain. They were also bound by wanting to make things as easy for me as possible and by the need to allow me some privacy and dignity. I now have a very clear and poignant understanding of this motive as well.

Sometimes, when someone is spreading rumors about you, you can simply put your whole truth out there, and others, it isn’t as simple. Other times, you are bound by forces of whatever nature from disclosing everything you would like or would need to disclose in order to clear your name. I suppose, though, that that doesn’t matter. Once a lie is out there, spreading like a cancer, there will be people who believe it no matter what. You can offer hard evidence that it is untrue, and they will not budge. Some people blow with the winds of change and popularity. One day it is the thing to believe that Beyonce is not really pregnant, the next you remember her bikini picture, and then she has her baby and appears in public with a very real post-baby body. Now, most people believe she was pregnant, but even still, rumors persist that it was an elaborate hoax all because her dress folded oddly during an interview. 

I have tried to avoid “blind item” gossip about celebrities because I’ve been thinking about the damage a well-placed lie can do to someone for a long time. Blind items are even more cowardly than regular gossip, and they can hurt people who are not even involved because they won’t name names. They just drop hints. They are also almost always salacious. I would love to say that I have never been a spreader or a believer of harmful gossip about people I do or don’t know. I don’t think I can, though. I doubt anyone can. It is human nature to want to know what is happening, and it is also human nature to want to choose a side. It is much easier to see a wrong and a right, to have a villain and a hero. Certainly, our current political climate reflects this attitude. It is much harder to know and accept that not everything is clear-cut, and that you may not ever have all the facts. One thing to keep in mind is that not possessing all the facts does not give you the right to your own set of facts. Filling in your own blanks is dangerous and hurtful, especially once you fill in your own blanks and repeat that as the truth. That method may be how I ended up having AIDS, although I'll never know for sure. 

Sometimes there is a very clear right and wrong. The drunk driver who drove the wrong way down the highway and hurt and/or killed people is very clearly wrong. Those cases are easy. When two of your friends fight about something, it often isn’t so easy. The older I get, the more I realize that unless I know everything about a situation or someone is clearly in the wrong, that there may not be a side to take. I cannot assume everything from hearing just one side, and I cannot assume that someone who is clearly angry or hurting may not be embellishing and omitting facts. Sometimes things are just sad and hard, and I have to be there for everyone. It makes life easier and harder all at the same time.

One of the things I’ve come to know, is that while the lies about me are obviously damaging to me, the things I say without first checking my facts are also damaging to me. Not only can they damage my credibility if they turn out to be untrue, but they hurt me by causing me to dwell in the muck and the mire. They hurt me by making me a hurtful person. I have never in my life wanted anything so much as to be a good person. I cannot bear the idea of hurting someone with something that while I may have believed it to be true, was not, in fact, true. The many unjust and unfair things in this world upset me, and I do not want to contribute to them. I am not sure who first said this, but I was reminded of this quotation while listening to a scientist speak about climate change on Science Friday, “You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts.” 

I don’t know about you, but I would like to be finished damaging others, and lies damage, sometimes forever.