Fake news pollutes health information. Nothing suprising. Since history has been written, man has always been a liar, and fake news is the modern form of lying.
No sector is immune to fake news. Among the powerful and everywhere. Where the Internet is in strong penetration, thanks to social networks. Very heavy; a global problem ; for what is nothing other than a lie enhanced by a “carrier” whose real range we are beginning to measure. But don’t have a short memory. Any new media has accelerated the force and spread of the lie and man has always been able to provide the parade. From the “street crier”, to reality TV, passing through the emergence of the written press, then the radio, rumor has always found its medium.
Pathology or normality of intelligence? The doctor identifies 4 types of liars.
The mythomaniac
The first category, the one which indisputably concerns medicine, is that of mythomania. As always in psychiatry, the use in popular language of medical terms has somewhat misled the reality of the “mytho”, to make it a “chatter”, a “dreamer”. Far from the reality of a real illness and above all suffering, for those who feel an imperious need to lie. To respond to the contempt he feels for himself; an “abjection of conscience”, as Boris Cyrulnik puts it so nicely. This renowned neurologist, who is also a specialist in animal behavior, hesitates to treat the mythomaniac as a liar, unlike those for whom lying is cynical and utilitarian.
The useful liar
No pathology identified for this liar, who abuses and manipulates, while the mythomaniac lies for the pleasure of attracting attention. Moreover, sick does not mean a candidate for treatment since he never consults spontaneously. It is moreover only examined, in the vast majority of cases, within the framework of a judicial expertise… Nor can we speak of treatment for the cynical liar since his act disappears as soon as the danger disappears. However, to say in front of a liar that one is in front of a mythomaniac or not, which legally could change the responsibility, is extremely complex, requires a long and careful psychiatric examination. This means that the examples that are currently in the news do not allow us to decide.
Denial
The two categories of lie, mythomania and utilitarian lying, do not sum up the problem. There is a third, very specific category, “denial”, which could be defined as the refusal to deal with certain realities. This is the favorite area of drug addicts or certain psychiatric illnesses.
The Acceptable False Truth
Finally, medicine cannot approach the chapter of lies without mentioning a fourth and final category, which doctors modestly call “acceptable false truth”. A very particular way to explain that some lie to their patients so as not to hurt them… A debate which, contrary to what many doctors claim, is far from settled.
The basis of community life presupposes that the other tells the truth
What attitude to have in the face of fake news, lies? For Boris Cyrulnik, it is necessary to bring nuances, even if the cynical and manipulative lie remains despicable. As soon as we remove the passion that surrounds this subject, we can also think that lying is a proof of intellectual virtuosity and that we are all forced to lie; besides, the animal is also a liar as soon as it is capable of acting on the minds of others. Another specific example is the child, a great liar without anyone telling him; it is, for him, a defense mechanism of negation of a reality that bothers him…
However, the debate that agitates our society today on these fake news presents a danger: the basis of community life presupposes that the other tells the truth. We must be wary of lapidary generalizations because the reality is not so simple and lying is a difficult behavior to classify. To generalize it makes it a very practical trivialization…
