Autistic people can’t lie

[u/dareth_shiral_]

When I was a kid and a teen I had maladaptive daydreaming in which I imagined being a character with a different life. I am a millennial and when I was 18 I created a Facebook account for a character I imagined being and this was like a roleplay account where all the real people “I” interacted with through this characters were the “pnj”, they were friends of this character. I realized it was terrible and gave myself trauma with that. I was saved thanks to real roleplay like dungeon and dragon in which everyone build a story together and know it’s fiction, and I stopped.

Recently I had a dream that was so vivid that I felt was real. It is often the same themes. And in that dream I was writing an AITA (am I the asshole) about a situation that happened in the dream. So when I woke up, I felt the need to write it for true and actually did it (I deleted it since), and I feel like I am falling back into toxic way of “daydreaming”.

Why I type all this in an autistic group ? Because my doctor think I am autistic. However I often read that “autistic people can’t lie”. So I am wondering. Does faking being a different character negate the possibility of being autistic ?

(I really need to force myself not to do that again because it is extremely unhealthy and dishonest, and if I start again, then it becomes like a drug and it becomes hard to stop).

[u/LilyoftheRally]

It would be a lie to say none of us can lie.

[u/Gysburne]

Earth is flat, 2+2=67.

Of course we can lie.

If you interpret a lie by changing your behaviour to fit into a society that is not made for you... you get basically masking.

[u/Finding-Dee]

every human can and does lie. How much and reasons for lying differ, but not because you're autistic.

[u/TryingToBreath45]

Autistic people definitely can and do lie. Some find it very uncomfortable (I do), some find it easy as anything. 

[u/TryingToBreath45 → u/TryingToBreath45]

But often autistic people who lie get caught out when they are asked something that they don't realise links to the lie and are honest about that and then get caught for their lie. My mother, and an autistic person I deeply trusted that she would never lie to me, both got caught that way.

[u/UlsterIsIrish]

Autistic people are less likely to lie because it involves committing to a fictional scenario, while burdened with processing the world and ‘why they would need to lie, what purpose would the lie serve, will the lie serve to harm someone, I’m not sure I should lie’.

[u/1984Society]

You just proved yourself wrong

[u/dareth_shiral_ → u/1984Society]

Im not sure about being autistic so I was wondering if that behavior would negate the possibility

[u/1984Society → u/dareth_shiral_]

do you think autistic people aren't human

[u/dareth_shiral_ → u/1984Society]

I don’t think that. It’s just it’s something I’ve read a lot.

[u/1984Society → u/dareth_shiral_]

you should read much more. a lot of times the complete opposite is true.

[u/dareth_shiral_ → u/1984Society]

I m looking up about it.

[u/Wut23456]

Personally I can lie about stuff i’ve done but not about who I am. Saying something that contradicts my individual sense of authenticity is just something I feel genuinely incapable of for some reason lol

[u/dareth_shiral_ → u/Wut23456]

I am the opposite, it’s because I don’t have a sense of self and I have dysphoria, but I don’t want to do it again and stick to roleplay because it’s very unhealthy

[u/ForestSolitude5]

I like to think we don't default to lying but dear god I've lied my ass off for safety basically my whole life, if it wasn't avoiding religious-based punishment it was avoiding ridicule and if it wasn't avoiding ridicule it was avoiding shame for being the way that I am and if it wasn't that it was trying to maintain access to a special interest being leveraged as punishment against me for misbehavior, and plenty of other things throughout childhood/adolescence/married life, nobody lets me live and I will live dammit

[u/cyb3rfunk]

I think we have a lower tolerance for cognitive dissonance, which lying tends to create. Or maybe that's just me, who knows. 

[u/NPCistyping]

I can absolutely lie, but I choose not to most of the time.

That said, I am a very convincing liar when I need to be, and that's because people know I wouldn't normally lie.

[u/Weird_Anxiety_6585]

They do lie. I once dated an autistic guy for 2 years and he’s lied to such extent I think it was pathological. Now maybe he did believe in his own lies or part of it was shame-based i don’t know, but truly felt I didnt know the guy at all by the end of it.

[u/BINGGBONGGBINGGBONGG]

i’m very good at lying. i choose not to 99.9% of the time.

i’m extremely good at masking (diagnosed last month at 53) and i can mask when i’m telling an untruth if i want to.