People generally have a hard time admitting they’ve been conned. This is what allows con artists and fraudsters around the world to thrive so easily. Conning people is fairly easy and good con artists very rarely get in trouble. They usually rely on these human weaknesses to operate their scams:
- Lack of knowledge and of critical thinking
- Overreliance on appearances as a judging mechanism
- Blind faith in authority figures
- Naiveté or a tendency of honest people to exaggerate the goodwill and honesty of other humans in their minds
There is an interesting phenomenon that usually takes place when someone finally admits to having fallen prey to a con. Other victims will suddenly start revealing that they’ve been conned too and it will create an avalanche of revelations, whereas before, everybody thought they were the only one to have been a fool, or didn’t even realize that they’d been scammed. Like in the popular fable “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, nobody wants to be the fool. But once they find out they’re not alone, everyone feels better and relieved, and some even marvel at the skill and ingeniosity of the con artist who managed to trick so many people. Whereas before, they’d have beaten the scammer to a bloody pulp if they came across him again, now it doesn’t feel that bad and the ego bruise is lessened by having others share the pain. Misery indeed loves company.
Let us imagine a situation where a room full of people have paid to attend an event and some of them paid money to a scammer for a special VIP treatment, but there never was such thing. The scammer is long gone, and the marks finally understand what’s going on and share their similar story. Should retribution be forgotten because it’s no longer personnal? What if most of the attendance had been scammed but only a few realized it, would the crime be worse or not as bad? Obviously, it would be worse, but convincing everybody to take action upon the scammer would be that much harder.
It is hard for the ego to admit you believed a lie. And the more people who believe the lie, the harder it is to realize the truth. We are tribal creatures, and the group exerts a very strong social pressure on the individual. It is only true reason and experience that we can slowly peel away all the layers of the massive cons and lies we are fed every day of our lives.
But once you take the vow “I will no longer be conned or lied to again”, it becomes easier and easier to break free and realize the power of your mind to see the truth. It’s as if your third eye opened and you can begin basking in the infinite knowledge that is available all around us. Then you can protect yourself and warn others.
Fraudsters, con artists and scammers own the world. If you do not believe it yet, in time you will see how evident this statement is. Through creating false artificial problems and offering a solution right away, they steal your money. It is the same principle as the check cashing con or the advance-fee fraud, but on a much larger scale. I will expose these one by one, but get back to this article whenever the denial mechanisms in your mind start trying to rationalize the truth away. Denial won’t save you. It never saved anyone.
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