Identifying and Identifying with a liar

First impressions are perhaps the cornerstone of the Western world's social interaction rules. We rely on most of our senses to help us identify the character, morals and opinions of the new people we meet, mostly backed up by our own character, morals and opinions.

Obviously we are assessing their appearance, and depending on our own backgrounds people may meet our preferences or not. Perhaps they are wearing branded clothing, depending if you care, or maybe their clothes are dirty and they appear unkempt, or you just don't like their faces. All factors influencing in your first impression. An impression that everyone seems to feel will last for the duration of the relationship.

A little scenario for you, you're walking down the street and you see someone rush past a person who dropped a stack of papers; no offer of help. Or perhaps, you see someone letting their dog poop on the sidewalk and just walk off quickly, or even perhaps you get offered a cookie from a person next to you on the bus. All situations in which impressions are formed and a type of relationship.

Ah, and then the next step follows, a more in depth view on a person's character, is he honest, is he reliable and most of all is he trustworthy. Now this in my imagination would mostly be employed by big business-type men, who often with a handshake can tell the character of a person; if only. But often, we don't even know we are judging whether that person is a liar or not, or whether he would keep my secret or not...but more often than not, we are.

This brings me to my case study. I had been employed to count things, hahahaha i know how that sounds, loved that job. And I had been partnered with another counter, now of course there was only so many things you could count, and being paid by the hour, I had wanted to stretch it out slightly...too an appropriate amount of course. And the problem with a partner is, you don't know what he's really thinking and since he's new as well, how his moral compass points. Oh the fabled moral compass, I mean if you weren't a 100% honest would it directly point down south no matter how little the indiscretion?

You get little glances passing from each other as you finish one lot of counting before one is expected to finish, little awkward conversations on how you need money, how jobs are hard to find, how long this job is meant to take, etc etc. Just little glimpses of who you are dealing with I guess. How often in life have you done this? Not getting out with it but going around in circles trying to get a handle on the other person's moral bearing.

Now this must sound a little shifty, you are probably thinking, "wow, what a crook. I would never do something like that." or maybe even, "that's dishonest, almost like stealing". But this is only an example, and honestly guys, would you not even think about doing the same thing....

(not condoning it!!!!!)

But the point is, you do it, I do it, we all do it. You may not know you're doing it, you may excel in it or it's simply a human feature that we just don't register is happening. A defense mechanism? A protection method in which to save us from being screwed over in life, especially by all those "baddies" out there lol. It's just something that I have a feeling all of us 'amoral' folk will continue doing....I mean after all who wouldn't want a little extra cash..... :)