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KSC's avatar

First Brian, congrats on finishing the London Marathon in a great time despite the lactose acid at the 20 and thanks for doing it for a noble cause, if I can use that adjective after reading this piece on the hubris of status seeking. As a fair-skinned daughter of an ethics professor I turn beet juice red just imagining someone thinks I have cheated is some way. I have such a hard time understanding how people can live with the fear that their chicanery will be disclosed at some point. I have a very similar imagination block understanding how one might feel personal confirmation in a falsified exercise statistic; I feel guilty when my not so smart watch records a workout for me when I have been asleep and I am the only one who sees the stats unless you count the master judge I imagine that is measuring my worth from somewhere inside my watch/iphone. I am NOT bragging. I wish I had more fluidity around the phenomenon of my self-constructed perceptions of how others might judge me. I wish I was a cuddle fish. I am still fascinated and befuddled when I try to put myself in the shoes of, say, Trump’s cabinet members in the 100 day round-the-table orgy of praise and falsification of reality in every aspect af the Regime’s overreach. This is a great piece to give us a social science perspective on the layers of interpretation apropos social cheats and liars but I am still shaking my head as to the personal psychology that emerges or submerges out of the broader social (and cultural?) contexts you elucidate.

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From Heron w/no rEgrets's avatar

Possibly OT, but as an amateur (but decently skilled) performing musician for the past 59 years (but who's counting), that today a lot of people want to be rock stars... prancing around on stage to thunderous applause, but few people really want to learn to play an instrument or sing well enough that they don't need autotune. This sickens me.

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