“Did you write these letters on the wall with your red crayon?”
“No!!!”
“Who did it, then?”
“My little sister.”
This conversation between my mother and me took place when I was three or four years old. My little sisters had not yet been born, and there were no other children in the house. I was the obvious suspect because my mother had been teaching me to write the alphabet. I had been practicing with my crayons on a piece of paper before shifting my efforts to a nearby wall, where identical backward letters were written with the same red crayon.
However, in spite of the evidence against me, I steadfastly denied my guilt and insisted on blaming my non-existent little sister.
This became one of those cute childhood stories that families tell over and over again—especially when I dared to complain about the behavior of my little sisters who eventually did show up. I have foggy visual memories of the incident, but my brain might have constructed them over time with the help of so many retellings.
Speaking of the brain, psychologists have a theory about children and their lies. “It’s nothing to worry about”, they say. “It’s just proof that your child’s brain is developing normally.”
According to Psychology Today, in order to be able to lie, children must have the ability to:
- Understand that their goal is different from the goal of someone else.
- Understand that other people can have different beliefs than their own.
- Create and present a narrative that causes others to form a false belief.
- Selectively present the narrative in such a way that it is consistent with tangible evidence that is available and is also plausible.
- Conceal the truthful information that they have.
“One can view lying as a complex cognitive and social task…Each of these capabilities is not something that children are born with. Rather, they are mental faculties that develop over time.”
My mother would have agreed that my behavior was normal—but that didn’t make it right. It was her job to teach me the difference between right and wrong, between truth and falsehood. However, equal emphasis was not placed on teaching me to spot lies and defend myself from liars. As a result, I grew into an honest, but gullible young adult.
Millions of us are deceived by professional liars every day. If we ever do realize that we have been scammed, it is often too late. The damage has already been done. Rarely do we catch the lie in time to disarm the liar.
For example, let’s take a look at the deadly, Beheaded Babies Lie.
On October 7, 2023 Palestinian fighters broke through the heavily fortified border between the Gaza Strip and Israeli-occupied Palestine. They exchanged gunfire with Israeli soldiers, tanks, and helicopters. At the same time, a rocket barrage was launched from the Gaza Strip against several targets in Israel. Israelis were killed. Palestinians were killed. The Palestinian fighters took 240-260 Israelis hostage and fled back across the border.
These facts are undeniable and fully confirmed by the Palestinian government (Hamas). However, within hours, the Israeli government began to release troubling details which were amplified by the Mainstream Media MSM and confirmed by the U.S. President and the U.S. Secretary of State. The “Beheaded Babies” story, was the one that was most eagerly repeated.
At least 40 babies, some beheaded, found by Israel soldiers in Hamas-attacked village
Fox News, October 10, 2023
Hamas kills 40 babies and children — beheading some of them — at Israeli kibbutz
New York Post, October 10, 2023
Babies and toddlers were found with “heads decapitated” in Kfar Aza, Netanyahu spokesperson says
CNN, October 11, 2023
“I never really thought that I would see…have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children”
U.S. President, Joseph Biden October 11, 2023 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZq-bKE27aU
As soon as I heard this story, I remembered the World War I propaganda poster of a German soldier bayoneting a baby. Atrocities are useful if you want to create public outrage, dehumanize the enemy, and justify killing large masses of human beings. It doesn’t matter if the atrocity is real or not. Today we know that there were no bayoneted babies back in 1914, and there were no beheaded babies in Israel on October 7, 2023. However, the Israeli military had already begun to carpet-bomb the civilian population in Gaza as these headlines were being published. To date, thousands of Palestinian children have been killed. Thousands more have been wounded. Those who have survived are all hungry. There is barely a blip about it in the American corporate media.
I am no longer the gullible 18-year-old who left her parents’ home to dive into the lie-infested waters of human society. Almost half a century later, I am much more savvy when it comes to resisting lies, but I’m still vulnerable. Should I be proud of myself for spotting the Beheaded Baby Lie in the early days of the Gaza Genocide? I don’t feel proud, I feel powerless. Was I able to save the life of even one Palestinian baby because I was so control-savvy? No. I don’t control the people who control the weapons, and they are hell-bent on mass murder. People who have much more power than I do have not been willing/able to stop the Genocide. Almost every nation on Earth has condemned Israel’s actions. The atrocity propaganda has been “debunked”. But the bombs have not been defused, and America continues to guarantee that Israel has an endless supply of bombs.
What can we do? One thing is for sure, control-savvy individuals acting alone have very little power over anything except their own minds and behavior (no small thing). Disarming liars and disabling bombs is a group effort.
Links to some of the sources I have accessed while writing this article can be found below. You will see that some of the links would be described as anti-Zionist by Zionists. I refer you to the wise words of my father, the defense attorney, whom I quoted in article #47 America-backed Israel. “There are as many sides to a story as there are people, sweetheart.” I will remind you once again that true facts that you choose to ignore, just because they come from “the enemy”, can sneak up and bite you in the butt. Control-savvy people insist on access to information from all sources.
LINKS
“Why is My Child Lying?”, Psychology Today, June 14, 2019. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-nature-deception/201906/why-is-my-child-lying
Why ‘murder of babies’ is the pinnacle of war propaganda: To engineer conflicts which benefit a certain group and punish the majority — one needs public opinion in its favour. Atrocity propaganda comes in handy here The Business Standard 02 November, 2023 https://www.tbsnews.net/features/panorama/why-murder-babies-pinnacle-war-propaganda-731582
How Israel is Using Atrocity Propaganda to Justify Genocide Misbar 14th October 2023 https://misbar.com/en/editorial/2023/10/13/how-israel-is-using-atrocity-propaganda-to-justify-genocide
Calling out atrocity propaganda to end Palestinian genocide. Islam21c. October 12, 2023 https://www.islam21c.com/news/factcheck/calling-out-atrocity-propaganda-stop-gaza-genocide
Hamas Document Reveals: Why We Carried Out Al-Aqsa Flood Operation – SUMMARY & PDF, Palestine Chronicle, January 21, 2024, https://www.palestinechronicle.com/hamas-document-reveals-why-we-we-carried-out-al-aqsa-flood-operation-summary-pdf/
Jeremy Scahill: Israel Has Waged a “Deliberate Propaganda Campaign” to Justify Brutal Gaza Assault
Democracy Now February 07, 2024 https://www.democracynow.org/2024/2/7/israel_propaganda_gaza
What really happened in Israel on Oct. 7? w/Max Blumenthal | The Chris Hedges Report, The Real News Network, November 17, 2023. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0gECjlpXF8
Israeli tank gunner reveals orders to fire indiscriminately into kibbutz — report, The Grayzone, November 27, 2023 https://thegrayzone.com/2023/11/27/israeli-tank-orders-fire-kibbutz/
Control Savvy 
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