David Rutherford Show: Why Is Everything A Lie?

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show

Episode: David Rutherford Show: Why Is Everything A Lie?
Date: February 18, 2026
Host: David Rutherford (standing in for Clay Travis and Buck Sexton)
Producer: iHeartPodcasts

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Overview

This episode, hosted by David Rutherford, centers around the widespread feeling of distrust and deception permeating American society—and arguably the world. Rutherford dissects why the public feels that "everything is a lie," weaving together recent politics, media manipulation, censorship, and psychological insights into lying. He invokes the book People of the Lie by Dr. M. Scott Peck to explore the moral and societal roots of deception and evil.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Current Atmosphere of Distrust

Timestamp: 02:20–07:47

• Rutherford describes a “deep sensation of distrust and disgust” across the country due to political, economic, and social upheavals.
  • Cites: Global political scandals, rising debt, market manipulations (e.g., GameStop), AI-induced anxiety, and cultural divisiveness.
• Even teenagers feel it: “Do you guys feel a sense of negativity in the air?” They couldn’t articulate but agreed something was “off.”
• Points to crises ranging from domestic political corruption to international conflicts (Ukraine, Middle East).

“There's a level of corruption present... a large portion of the country distrusts our election systems. And without trustful election systems, the inevitable outcome is destruction, chaos and war.”
— David Rutherford [05:20]

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2. The Normalization of Deception

Timestamp: 07:50–15:50

• Argues society has become “accustomed to deceit as a regularity within the social construct.”
• Media, social media, and content creators frame narratives that mislead or manipulate.
• COVID-19 pandemic as the watershed moment:
  • Mask mandates, school closures, inconsistent rules for protests vs daily life, evolving vaccine narratives.
  • Points to “lies” about virus origins, vaccine risks, and government coverups (EcoHealth Alliance, Fauci, etc.).

“We have allowed ourselves to become accustomed to deceit as a regularity within the social construct of our everyday activities...”
— David Rutherford [07:53]

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3. Censorship, Tech, and Institutional Gaslighting

Timestamp: 18:22–22:20

• Details on how censorship—originally used for “color revolutions” abroad—has been turned inward.
• Twitter Files revelations, government agencies’ influence on social and news media.
• Immigration narratives (“We need people to pick our fruit”) and the effects of mass migration on society.
• Mentions high-profile cases (Biden’s health/fake signatures, the Epstein scandal) as proof of institutional gaslighting.

“Now the ultimate which just continues and it's the Epstein files. Anybody telling you or trying to tell you that it was not that bad... is just guilt by association.”
— David Rutherford [22:19]

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4. The Roots and Development of Lying

Timestamp: 22:20–35:48

• Introduces People of the Lie by Dr. M. Scott Peck as inspiration for the episode.
  • Notes Peck’s blend of psychiatry and theology to distinguish between evil and mental illness.
• Lying is innate: starts as a developmental milestone in childhood (ages 2–3), peaks in preschoolers, and stabilizes in later childhood/adolescence.
  • Social, cognitive, and parental influences shape lying—e.g., authoritative parents model honesty better.
• Discusses “theory of mind” (ToM)—the ability to understand others have different beliefs, key for social lying.

“Lying we learn from a very early age... it emerges as a normative part of child development.”
— David Rutherford [23:39]

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5. Dr. M. Scott Peck’s Concept of Evil

Timestamp: 35:48–41:00

• People of the Lie frames evil as “militant ignorance”—a willful denial of personal responsibility, distinct from treatable mental illness.
• Malignant narcissism: evil people maintain a false self-image through denial, projection, and destruction, often cloaked in normalcy or piety.
• Case studies: families rationalizing harm (e.g., gifting a suicide weapon to a surviving child); people justifying behavior through metaphysical pacts.

"Evil manifests as itself as a malignant narcissism where the person maintains an unassailable self image by scapegoating, projecting flaws onto others and destroying the lives physically and spiritually without remorse."
— David Rutherford [35:49]

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6. Lying in Everyday Life: The Psychology

Timestamp: 41:00–48:50

• Summarizes research (DePaulo, 1996): Most people lie 1–2 times per day, mostly small, self-serving lies.
  • Lies to men are more self-centered; to women more often “other-oriented.”
  • Most lies are minor, unplanned, and not regretted—social lubricant rather than moral breaches.
• Another study finds only a small minority (“prolific liars”) are responsible for almost half of all lies—this mirrors the prevalence of psychopathy and sociopathy.
  • 5% of people (potential “evil”/psychopathic) account for 46% of all lies.

“Most people are honest most days, but a few prolific liars inflate averages.”
— David Rutherford [45:40]

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7. The Moral and Societal Danger of Institutionalized Lying

Timestamp: 48:51–End

• Conclusion: Some level of lying is ordinary and adaptive; the threat arises when “militant lying” becomes normalized or coordinated by society’s most powerful.
• Urges listeners to “choose the side that's not the psychopathic evil of lying. Choose the side that's rooted in the free exchange of truth.”
• Truth is the only remedy—both personal and societal. Rutherford ties the solution to Christian values of self-examination, repentance, and growth.

“Because at the end of the day, when we speak the truth, we become better ourselves, because then we're facing the hard, constructive criticism and recognition of things that we need to change or grow from in our own souls. And that's what Christ wants us to do...”
— David Rutherford [48:51]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On pervasive unease:

  “There's a, an innate disturbance present in how they were experiencing the world.”
  [03:10]

• On COVID-19 deception:

  “It didn't take a genius to figure out, right? You're getting lied to.”
  [11:57]

• On institutional coverups:

  “Lies on top of lies on top of lies.”
  [21:55]

• On evil and lying:

  "Evil...is a sin hardened into persistent pattern of denial which is often cloaked in normalcy or piety leading to a refusal to submit to higher truths."
  [36:12]

• Actionable advice:

  "What I want you to do is arm yourself with the understanding of the prevalence of this...[and] focus on the truth, wherever that takes us in whatever scenario."
  [49:30]

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Key Resources & Recommendations

• Book Recommendation:
  • People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil by Dr. M. Scott Peck
• Research Mentioned:
  • DePaulo, B. M., et al. (1996). "Lying in everyday life." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
  • Serata et al., “The Prevalence of Lying in America: Three Studies of Self-Reported Lies,” Human Communication Research.

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Episode Structure with Timestamps

• 02:20 – Social and political climate of distrust
• 07:50 – Roots of deception and normalization of lies
• 15:50 – Censorship and major coverups
• 18:22 – Tech industry’s role in gaslighting and misinformation
• 22:20 – Lying as human development & Dr. Peck’s biography
• 35:48 – Defining evil vs. mental illness; case studies from Peck
• 41:00 – Psychological studies on lying frequency and distribution
• 48:51 – Conclusion: Truth as the cure and call to moral action

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Takeaway

David Rutherford argues that while lying is a near-universal and sometimes adaptive human behavior, the dangerous escalation comes from societal elites institutionalizing “militant lying” for power and self-preservation—what Dr. Peck describes as evil. His solution is for individuals to recognize the prevalence and structure of deceit, arm themselves with truth, and embrace personal accountability—rooted in moral, often Christian, principles.

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To listeners: The episode is a passionate, dense meditation on the moral and psychological crisis of truth in modern society, blending recent political controversy with classic psychological and theological analysis. Those interested in the intersection of culture, politics, and morality will find it both provocative and deeply relevant.

Transcript

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[Host/Commentator]

Is there a deep sensation of distrust and disgust right now across the country and in many ways the world? Right as you as you scroll through your Feed. You see, you see Sean's rant of just calling out the administration and other people, not exposing pedophiles. You see the European Union throwing out a tremendous amount of censorship towards its people and politicians. You see possible market manipulations in different areas around, right? With all these challenges like GameStop and MMTLP and all this other stuff. And like, people are feeling that even I asked last night at dinner, I had all the girls around my wife and I said, you know, do you guys feel a sense of negativity in the air? Do you feel at school and you're in your social circles and all this? And they all kind of said they couldn't quite articulate it, but they did come to the conclusion that, yeah, there was a, an innate disturbance present in how they were experiencing the world. And God knows, if you listen to me for five seconds or watch the show, or listen to the show or follow me around or follow what I'm doing on X at Team Frog Logic or on, on the grammar. You see, man, I, I'm well aware of this massive level of distrust, right? You know, and I think it's. There's, right there, there are, there are definitive things that you can point to and say, yeah, this makes sense. While people are, are, are uneasy, right? $38 trillion in debt. We're supposed to hit 40 trillion. I read one by that said 60 trillion by 39, 2039 or something crazy. You know, you have the impending crisis obviously of what's going on if, if Ukraine and Russia spills out into Eastern Europe. You have other crisis in the Middle East. Are we going to bomb Iran in the next couple months? Right. Obviously. The political corruption that we're seeing all over the place in Minnesota and Maine and California and in Florida and all over, it doesn't matter. Red state, blue state. It's just there's a level of corruption present. I mean, I've been covering these election abnormalities like it's going out of business because I fundamentally believe the country, a large portion of the country, distrusts our election systems. And without trustful election systems, the, the outcome, the inevitable outcome is, is destruction, chaos and war. Right? It's just the way it is now. You know, you can also say there's a culture battle being waged right on in the streets and classro rooms across the country against ICE officers, students staging protests. Right? A distrust for government, a distrust for cultural individuality, whether it's people that can't stand trans people or can't stand Jewish people or can't stand white People or can't stand blacks or Hispanics or whatever. It is like this divisiveness, this distrust is, is emerging at another level. You know, the other one I see a tremendous amount too is, is people and they're worry about AI and what it's going to do, right? Well, we already know AI is manipulating our social media feeds and driving us down these algorithmic psychological adaptations, right? We adapt to the feed that it thinks we want to feed us to and then reinforces biases as we just consume the dopam hits which ultimately move into stress hormones which make us preparation for outlaw or out outlandish reactions and behaviors. Look at the trans dude who shot up, killed his wife and kids at the hockey game the other day in Providence, right? I mean, and he had quoted on some other, there's a trans person in Congress. And he had quoted, well, if they don't acknowledge us or something to this extent, watch when we go berserker, right? You know, and you also have the level of censorship that's taking place on all platforms, right? YouTube is notorious. LinkedIn is horrific. We see it now merging on Tick Tock. We see it. You know, I think X is the best place, but there's still some, some, you know, the customization of the algorithm for certain things for sure, right? But I'm here to tell you, it's all of it, it's the whole thing, right? And the real question is, is, you know, what is rooted in the foundations of these fears? What's the thing that's present that destabilizes or demoralizes or, or, or antagonizes or.

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I ran out of eyes. But what's the thing at the root of all this? Right? And what I believe it to be is the obvious existence of willful deception that is pretty much flowing like a river of evil that has broken through the dam of our cognitive dissonance, right? What does that mean? That means we have allowed ourselves to become accustomed to deceit as a regularity within the social construct of our everyday activities, right? In particular, what we consume via the Internet or social media or anything like that, or what we even watch as well too. I mean, look at how some documentaries create a narrative that is different than another narrative, right? Or how we make content that generates a different perception of something as opposed to whatever. And you know, I, I, I, I think, you know, we've seen this at a major, major level. However, however, you know, what I have seen, which is positive to me, and the magnitude of deception and the lies that are just what they're, they're. They're seeping into the, the neurons of our, our subconscious in our consciousness, right? They're being woven into what we believe to be acceptable or not acceptable or what we dismiss or what we look to what is considered a component of advancement or ambition maybe, right? That cognitive dissonance, that moral relativism I talk a lot about, right? Well, here's the thing. Once I think a person comes to grips with one major concept story, historical event, person bio on somebody or, or news story or whatever it is, right? And this is an event, an experience, right? That, that originally or, or has been put forth in this shroud of, of deceit or manipulation or lies. Once people have come to grips in the acknowledgment that people are in, inevitably have been forced to accept, right. These misnomers or these, these illusions, right? Once you've been, once you fully understand that you have been intentionally lied to at a, at a historic level. Because lying is historical in nature. Where every major tribe, society, civilization, empire, kingdom, whatever you want to say it, lies are woven in because they're lie. They're. It's woven into us. It's a major component. So when do I believe the magnitude of this unsettling reality kind of began to intravenously impact our, our society? Well, for me it was COVID 19, right? And it started with the recognition. What? Hey, put that mask on your face and stand six feet away from each other. Wait a minute. If I wear this mask and my exhalation and I'm sick, won't that make me sicker? Plus I'm not taking fresh air in what? And then I can't get next to somebody. What if that person already had it and has immunity, natural immunity. I can't stand next to them. And then all of a sudden it was like oh, I'm the problem, I'm the one killing grandma. And you know, like that doesn't make sense. Then they started clothing, closing schools when we knew that the percentage of children that were negatively impact this was.008 or something like that. Some astronomically low prevalence of mortality within kids. And in fact I don't believe it was existence at all unless there was horrific pre existing conditions. Right? We know obesity played a role. We know certain medical aspects or genetic aspects played a role. And so when we say we're going to close the schools, we're going to take kids out of socialization, we're going to put them in isolation. I mean LA County, 22% of the population Wasn't around, was. Was lost, right? Children, they didn't go to school, they lost track of them. What do you think those kids were doing? All right, small business closures, right? We can't let people go into small business. We got to shut those down, got to shut churches down. But we're going to keep the liquor stores, the weed stores, the big box stores, right? We're going to keep all those open. Boy, right? We saw it even more pronounced with the BLM riots, right? When hundreds of thousands of people are in the streets. No mask, no six feet, no nothing. Swapping spits air or whatever. Oh, no, no, but this is, okay, this is. This is meaningful, right? It didn't take a genius to figure out, right? You're getting lied to. The severity of it, where it originated. Oh, this came from a pangolin duck or a paint, whatever pangolin thing is, in a wet market overseas. Well, what do we know now? It actually was a bioweapon that was designed back probably in 2012. 13 red coronavirus, right? Bad act, bad things, the whole deal. And it was offshore and then it made its way around the world. The next thing you know, EcoHealth alliance is working in a Chinese biomanufacturing medical military biomanufacturing facility. We're partnered with the Chinese, our sworn enemy. And it's. And it might have happened near their lies. And then all of a sudden it's like, okay, we've got the cure. It's this vaccine. It's safe and effective. I want you to take it. Don't worry, you're fine. It'll completely absolve you of any, any impact you, you know. And it's a non vaccinated. They're welcome to the winner of death. That's what Biden told me and my family and everybody else out there, right? So get the vaccine or else. Well, then we start seeing. Well, the vaccine is causing some problems. In particular young people who are, by the way, not very in threat of this thing. Myocarditis, pericarditis. Now there's reports saying that it's generating massive turbo cancers. Prostate cancers, ovarian cancers, breast cancers are skyrocketing from people who took like. You have a 67% greater impact potentially of getting some form of cancer if you've had three jabs or more. Oh, that's a lie. That's not. That's bad science. And then what we now know is the entirety of the Fauci cover ups and his emails and the Balfour Declaration and all this other maybe not Balfour. What was it? It was not that. It was, it was the Lancet paper, right? That, that came back and, and all these very accredited scientists who said no, we need to look at this differently. And they came back, no, you're full of it. You're lying. And we know that was a cover up. So that was the gateway, I think, where people really began to understand. Now you can go down the deeper dive and you can look at Russiagate, which is a fundamental coup, soft coup that took pace against President Trump, everybody in his cabinet that went on for years and didn't stop. I mean look at 2020, right? What happened after 2020, man, the guy was the election fraud. And I've been covering that. And there's a guaranteed cover up there. There's 100% proof that there was manipulations on a global scale down to a municipality scale. Look at the Tina Peters it's an.

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[Host/Commentator]

Right? We know censorship, right? Was out of control. They turned the industrial censorship complex that was built for color revolutions overseas. They turned it internally. Just look at the Twitter files, right? The head of the general counsel for Twitter was a former FBI general counsel Baker, right? How many CIA people work at Facebook? How many CIA people work all around, right? Nsa, right? They essentially have converted the very thing that people have been sucked into doing for social convenience and social responsibilities and social relationships, improve social and mental health. All. All lie. We know that now. They were involved in that. Immigration. Immigration is the best thing for America. We need people to pick our fruit and to clean our toilets and without them it wouldn't happen. Blah, blah, blah, blah blah, right? So we what, we let 20 million people in. What does that do to our educational system, our medical systems, our insurance system? The fraud that now exists, we've seen with Shirley's in. In Minnesota and Maine, California. The homeless problem at every level, at every place. And then my favorite is the, the absolute gaslighting and lies that took place to cover up the fact that Biden was a freaking vegetable. And the auto pen. How many people like he. We know out of all the pardons, there was one pardon that he actually signed. And over the 8,000 pardons that him. And there's theories out there that the pardons allegedly were being sold to people as well too. Lies on top of lies on top of lies, right? And now the ultimate which just continues and it's the Epstein files. Anybody telling you or trying to tell you that it was not that bad, right? And anybody affiliated, man, it's just guilt by association, right? I. I might agree to that in some capacity prior to 06 or 05, but anything after that is an absolute sham. This guy was a convicted sexual predator of young girls. If you had any relationship with him Whatsoever, fundamentally for business or whatever, you lied to yourself in order to get ahead, period, because of his skill sets. And he's not just some wealthy, whatever. Now we know the whole aspect of his background was a lie. Who he worked for, how he got the jobs, all that manipulated, right, lies. And now we just see the un, Un. Unfathomable lies taking place with the government and, and the DOJ right now, basically covering up for pedophiles. I mean, if you listen to Sean's rant that came out the other day to has millions and millions and millions of views and now they're attacking him, they're calling him a liar. Oh, you're a CIA guy, your plant, whatever. But if you're protecting or justifying in any way, shape or form a pedophile, you are lying to yourself. And if you're lying to yourself that it's acceptable to interact with those people or support them or to distract the severity from it in some capacity, then at the base of your lie is evil, pure and simple. It's just what it is. You can't justify pedophilia, you can't walk it back, you can't sugarcoat it, you can't lighten the impact of it. You can't do any of that. And if you get to the. I think everybody's willing to get to a point that say, oh yeah, he, he was trafficking girls, then let's just stop there and say, well, where are the people he trafficked the girls to? Oh, there's no evidence of that. It's just porn, Lies, redactions, lies, the whole thing. And that's coming out and it's going to continue to come out. And at some point you have to make the correlation that the level of lying that's taken place is a derivative or rooted in what is evil. All right, now before I get into the main reason that provoked this, which is this book right here. You can't. For the video, you can watch it for sure, but it's called People of the Lie, the Hope for Healing Human Evil by m. Scott Peck. Dr. M. Scott Peck, and he was the author of the Road Less Travel there, you know, 10 million bestseller. Well, this was his book that really got me. Right, because what he was able to do was correlate the, the, the, the regularity of lying to, to evil. And he did it in a very sophisticated and scientific way, I believe. But there was also a level of theology that's in there too. And I probably think that that's what, you know, is able to People are able to quell the importance of the book a little bit right. Now there's another component too, right. Lying we learn from a very early age. We learn it, I mean from basically ages 2 to 3. Right. And I, I did a little research on this, on, on where it starts. Right. And, and, and this is, emerges as a normative part of child development. Right. You know, and it's, it's a lot of child development specialists. Like this is a part, like this is you're actually looking for your child to start lying as a, as a, an observable component of like a milestone. Right. Other than a bat, than a problematic behavior. And you know, when you start to see this taking place, right. And, and you know, from 2 to 8, right. With about 20 to 30% of children attempting similar deceptions. Right. And these aren't great lies. They're just like, did you eat that cookie? No. But you know, like you can see it emerging. They're trying to frame out that tit for tat game playing with, with other kids, free play, the whole thing. And, and there's a lot of documentation that, that, that's what you're looking for. You're looking for kids to emerge in that, that structure. Right. When even in preschoolers when, when lying actually peaks. Right. In prevalent prevalence. Right. With about 80 to 90% of children understanding the concept of lying and engaging in it regularly. Right. Now some studies show that kids at this age lie about one to two times per hour in social interactions. Right. And these are like, these are settings that are kind of non structured settings. It's just like social exchanges, teacher exchanges, parental exchanges. Right. It's right there. Right. Well, it, you know, with the school age 6 to 12, it stabilizes a little bit. About 50 to 70% lie occasionally with rates in higher situations involving peers and authority. Right. You lie to get out of trouble, right. Did you, did you bully that person? I didn't do that. Oh, hell no. Because you knew the social exclusion or the labeling you as in some negative way, you got to protect yourself from that. Right. And then adolescence, man line frequency is lower overall than in younger children. Right. And some of that is social anxiety, which provokes that. And I think that begins to manifest its way at a little bit of more of a deeper level as the older you get. Now, factors that are influencing a lot of this parenting, right. Authoritative styles reduce antisocial line, you know, cultural influences. Right. And many collectivist societies encourage pro social lies. Right. Cognitive ability, better executive function correlates with more effective lying. Right. If you learn how to manipulate someone's emotions, you can lie at a higher degree. Right. You know, there are, are a bunch of key mechanisms and benefits. Right? Right. There's a cognitive and social skill development. Right? Right. And that goes back to the idea of this, this theory of. Of mind. Right. And the theory of, Of. Of of mind is a, A very interesting concept to think about and that's where you can think about thinking about others and how it affects you. And you know, that's a, that's a powerful moment for, for people. Right. And to give you a better definition of this theory of mind, or tom, is a foundational concept in cognitive psychology and developmental science, referring to the ability to recognize and attribute mental states such as beliefs, desires, intentions, emotions and knowledge to oneself and others and to understand that these mental states can differ from one's own or from objective reality. It enables individuals to predict and interpret behavior in social context, essentially showing us to read minds by inferring what others might be thinking or feeling. A key aspect and when. When lying plays a role in that development. Right. Pro social line and social hire harmony. Right? These are the little white lies we tell. Oh, you know, how do I look, honey? Oh, you look great, sweetie. That shirt's very becoming on you. Or hey, sweetie, don't I look great? I lost two pounds. Oh, baby, you look phenomenal. You look phenomenal. Or, or your, your. Hey, son, you know, how you doing in school? I'm killing it, dad. I'm doing great. Well, I saw your report card and it seems your challenge. Yeah, but that teacher's horrible. They don't like me. Right. All these little to create a harmony of impact or, or you know, telling people what that you think they want to hear that doesn't provoke, right. That. That contempt or resentment that can emerge out of knowing the truth about what people think about you. Right? There's a moral and emotional grub. Lying helps children grapple with morality. There's an assimilation challenge and moderators while adaptive, excessive and antisocial lying can hinder assimilation if it erod trust parenting influencing this responsive authoritative styles encourage pro social lying and reduce harmful ones by modeling honesty. Right? And that's the thing we really want to think about. Right? And I think that's the heart of, of what Dr. Peck gets to in the people of the lie. Now, Dr. Peck's an interesting cat, right? Grew up wealthy family, you know, attended Phillips Exeter Academy, a very prestigious prep school. We beat them in football when I went to Cho. So to hell with you. Phillips Exeter Academy Plus I couldn't get in there. That's a whole nother thing, you know. And so, you know, he, he had this profound pressure put him on him by his parents to succeed. And then they kind of shipped him off to the school. Right. He ended up getting a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard. He went to Case Western where School of Medicine, attaining his doctorate in 63. Right. Then he went on to serve in the military. And I found this was, was interesting where he specialized in psychiatry and he rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Now he was stationed all over the place and later worked for the Surgeon general in Washington D.C. and these roles exploded into a wide range of mental health issues among service members, influencing his later views on human evil, group dynamics and personal responsibility. Because remember, this is during the 60s and 70s and what we have, we had post World War II challenges, post Korea challenges. And then we had the magnitude of the Vietnam War, which led into the anti war counterculture, the civil rights movement. All this taking place during this very unsettling time where again, during this time people felt that there was a lot of lying going on and under and the cause, root of that was evil. And so he was studying all this and evaluating. Plus he had his own clientele, right. And you know, he broke out of the, the whole thing after his military career and he wrote the book the Road Less Traveled, A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth. Like I said, 10 million copies. But then he began to shift and he wrote this book, the People of Lies. All right. You know, the interesting thing about Pack was that he, he really tried to aggregate his scientific analysis through a theological prism. And what he ended up, you know, coming to recognize was that, you know, evil is fundamentally a different form, is different from mental illness. Right. Mental illness is something that you can't really control. You're kind of, you're, you're, you're either born into it or you develop it for some, but it's treatable and you can get out of it. Whereas he believes that, you know, you know, evil, you know, is very different than neurosis, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, which are all involuntary and treatable. Right. What he believes is that evil individuals, by contrast, are fully seen and they're aware of their actions. Right. And I want you, when I'm saying this, think about the people you've seen lying to you online or lying to your face or lying about certain things they believe in. Right, Right. Because they're sane and they're aware of their actions and choose to lie to themselves and others to avoid personal growth and accountability. And what pack Dr. Peck calls this is militant ignorance, a willful ignorance, right? And you're not going to budge. You believe what you believe for whatever reason and the and you don't care what the impact of that lie is going to do to the people around you, whether it's your children, your spouse, your colleagues, church, friends, your social scene, whatever it is. Politically, you don't care because the point is to self grandeurize it. The grandeurization or that's not what I the right word. Grand design. Grandization, right?

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Is Bethany Frankel from Just Be with Bethany Frankel. It is a new year and everyone is trying to get it together. If we are making a fresh start for ourselves, why wouldn't we make a fresh start for our dogs? Biggie and Smalls are my babies and I love Just Food for Dogs because it is real. It is fresh. It is 100% human grade food. Just Food for Dogs is the number one vet recommended fresh dog food go to justfoodfordogs.com 50% off your first box. You are welcome.

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Now here's the deal, right? Unlike ordinary narcissism, which involves self centeredness and a fragile ego, but can allow for empathy and change, evil manifests as itself as a malignant narcissism where the person maintains an unassailable self image by scapegoating, projecting flaws onto others and destroying the lives physically and spiritually without remorse. Right? Evil. Right. And this is what he also says. Evil however is a sin hardened into persistent pattern of denial which is often cloaked in normalcy or piety leading to a refusal to submit to higher truths or what in his world to submit to God's sovereignty over us and that moral framework that exists within that right. Seek and ye shall find. That's what Christ tells us. Within Christ is the truth of your own sin. Now you know, this book is. Is really interesting, you know. And I'm not. There's seven different sections of this thing and he uses case studies. There's one incredible case study that he talks about. A mother and father buy a gun. They have two sons. They buy a little.22 for one of their sons, their son, one son kills himself with the gun and then they gift the same gun to the the brother for Christmas and justify the gift as not wasting money or whatever. So the brother is going through hell because his brother just killed himself. He doesn't understand. Then they give the gun that he killed himself to the brother almost as like an underlying subconscious reality here. Now it's your turn to kill yourself. And that's what end up the boy ended up kind of thinking, right? So thus in lies them lying to themselves about the reasoning or rationalization about turning the gun over with your brother just got kid and giving it to you you right? And the lies affiliated with the justification of that action. Right? You know he also gets into in this book, right. The the different ways that people. There's one guy in case study who makes. Who justifies his lying his behavior, his negative behavior, his manipulative behavior by saying I I made a pack with the devil and so I it I, I have to do this. It's it's built into me, I can't turn it down. I have these visions of this voice telling me I have to do this. Right. You're like, well create another voice that says you shouldn't do that. Right. And that was an interesting one. There's a couple he describes where people were actually under the influence of demonic and you know, possession. Right. And he used to do that, he used to interview people that claim they were under demonic possession. Right. Well when you, when you, when you go through the full idea of this book and this is, this is member in relation to what you're witnessing right now, all over the place, all around you. Right. He says that psychology resists religious views of evil. Right. Dangers include judgmental misuse, evil confuses, must and we must judge wisely for what can heal us. Right. And, and again, evil is different from mental illness. Right. Which is medical. Right. And, and by its moral roots narcissism, which is, you know, within the self by societal is causes societal harm and that's the sin. Right. But it's that militant justification of, of, of lying that really is at the core of, of what his argument this is. Right. So you know what I recommend is go buy this book and then start to evaluate the level or the spectrum of lies that you're experiencing or seeing or what you're feeling on a day in a day of basis. Now again, I just want to let you know that everybody lies, right. There's none of us that are escape from the sin of lying. And the challenge is, is it, is it more indicative of what the similar constructs of the lies we learned in our youth that we apply in our, our adult lives. Right. Is that more line most of what's taking place. And yeah, I went up and did some research on some really great studies about Lyme. This one study in 96 by this guy Depaolo, lying in everyday life. And this was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Right. And this guy. There were two samples, 77 college students and 70 community members and non students aged 21 to 91. The participants recorded all social interactions lasting 10 minutes or longer over a week, noting any lies told, defined as intentionally misleading somebody and details like the target's gender, relationship closeness, lie type, self centered versus other oriented. They describe it, the seriousness, the planning of it and the discomfort. Right. And what they found was fascinating. Key findings revealed that lying is a common but not overwhelming part of daily life for most within this, this group. Right. College students reported telling about 2 lies per day and roughly 1/3 of their interactions. While community members reported 1 lie per day and about 1/5 of interactions. Most lies were self centered which meant they benefited the lie. The person telling the lie to avoid embarrassment or gain approval. Or gain approval outnumbering the up the other and this is other oriented lies which benefited others example to square or to spare someone's feelings. Right. By a 2 to 1 ratio overall. However, in female to female dyads, other oriented lies were equally common. Participants told more self centered lies to men and more other oriented lies to women. Lies were generally minor, unplanned and not regretted. And not regretted. Remember that participants rarely worried about detection and viewed them as part of a smooth social functioning rather than moral breaches. The study concluded that lying serves as an everyday social lubricant influenced by gender and relationship dynamics. Challenging views of deceptions as rare or always malicious. Okay, so saying all that is to say this. We are conditioned to accept lies as a regular part of our interaction. It's just built in and I get that and that is what it is. But there's another aspect, a deeper. It's where they start to go to another level. Right. And there's another study that I came across which was by Serata. The prevalence of lying in America Three studies of self reported lies and in this in the human of communication research. The study challenged prior estimates of daily line frequency through three investigations. Survey 11000 US adults nationally via phone asking for lies told in the past 24 hours. Study 2 reanalyzed the Palos the earlier study I just quoted diary data. Study 3 used 298 college students in a similar self report. Findings showed that lying is less frequent and more skewed than thought. In Study 1, 60% reported 0 lies with a mean of 1.6 live 6.65 lies per day. 5% of participants were the prolific liars accounted for 46% of all lies. Prolific liars average 6 to 7 lies a day, often serious ones. Reanalysis of DePaulo data confirmed the skew meaning 1 to 2 lies but many 0 lie days. Students in a Study 3 mirrored this with extroversion and low self esteem linked to prolific lying. The authors concluded that lying follows a power law distribution not normal. Most people are honest most days, but a few prolific liars inflate averages. Okay, what does that mean in conclusion? All right. What that means in conclusion is there is a group of people, a small group of people that have about 5%. If you look at these studies and I believe this directly correlates to the 3 to 5% of the population that are psychopathic, I. E. Evil, if you will. Right? And then we've got about 15 to 20%, 15 that are sociopathic, right? And then there's a component that have, most of us have sociopathic tendencies. Right, right. And that's all correlated to the level with which we lie and feel comfortable about it. Well, here's the deal, right? People are gonna lie no matter what. It's just built in. But the problem is, is when a certain select group of people who are comfortable with that militant concept of lying or that, that, that significantly more advanced level of Sarkis narcissism that emerges into the dark triad because once you get a taste for what the lie produces, I. E. Power, wealth, fame, importance, then it becomes, right, where's the regulation that's going to take place? Where are the people around you going to check you? Well, everybody knows that people that are psychopathic or sociopathic, they don't have long term relationships because they're constantly lying. And the people who usually come into those spheres of influence are looking for their own advancement, their own manipulation so that they can rise to the upper echelons of that spectrum of a, of ambition or accomplishment. And what, how do they do it? By lying to the liars themselves to, to try and gain access, right. To the ecosystem of elite liars or evil people so that they can participate in that game. That's just the reality of how this whole thing works. If you think it doesn't, I challenge you over and over to prove this wr wrong. Right? And I think what you're experiencing is the recognition that lies that we're being told, they're not just simple lies, right? These are lies that are rooted in evil. All you got to do is read some of those emails that have been released or dig into some of these stories about how we've been manipulated to accept things that aren't really true or how we're constantly being called out if we notice something or we, we, we highlight some abnormality in, in, in what people are saying or who they really are. Right? Because that's taking place right now. So what I want you to do is I want you to arm yourself with the understanding of the prevalence of this that takes place in society because it's the truth that brings light to the lie. Right? So whatever you think, whatever side you are, you want to choose to be on, what I would recommend is you choose the side that's not the psychopathic evil of lying. You choose the side that's Rooted in the. The free exchange of truth. Right? Because at the end of the day, when we speak the truth, we become better ourselves because then we're facing the hard, constructive criticism and recognition of things that we need to change or grow from in our own souls. And that's what Christ wants us to do, right? That's what Christ. We want to grow. We want to accept our sin as a reality that drives us to be more honest with ourselves about who we are and how we impact others in the hopes that we can manipulate or shape or, or cajole or maybe get rid of those words and say grow or, or improve or strengthen or harden our steadfast commitment to the truth. That's what I think we should do, is all focus on the truth, wherever that takes us in whatever scenario. And then at least when we get to the truth, that's what we can decide what to do with evil. All right, everybody, I can't thank you enough. Love you the most. Thank you for listening. Please, like, share, make a comment, send this to somebody in your life that you care about. I would. We would really appreciate it. Sorry Jordan wasn't on today. He's not feeling. He's a little under the weather. Pray for him to get sick. Sick or not get sick. Sorry buddy. Pray for him to get better. Pray for his family not to get sick as well too. And just pray for society. Pray for that. We can find a large group of people who want to point out the lies and we can get back to something that feels better or create something that feels better. Some new type of system that is rooted in the truth and the, the transparency and honesty of, of, of, of. Of human interaction. All right. Hoo ya. God bless you and, and thank you Christ for your influence. Love you guys. Out.

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