Why Do We All Accept Being Lied To?
posted on: October 28, 2021. posted in: Mindfulness, Health
This is one of the most important posts I'll ever write, and one of the most important messages you'll ever get from Rebelfit. It summarises all the issues we're experiencing with our mental, physical and social health right now.
We live in a society ruled by money.
And where there is money to be made, companies will lie, manipulate and even harm their customers, ignoring any potential mental and physical health damage because the focus is purely on profit. In short? Companies are money producing entities, not health producing entities. Companies exist to take money, not give health.
When Slimming World, Weight Watchers, Lighterlife and other companies are having their AGM, they aren't assessing how much healthier they've made their customers. They're assessing how much profit they've made from their customers. The measure of corporate success is the bottom line, not the waist line.
Whilst companies aren't people, they are run by people whose pay, job security and very existence in that company depends on the profit of that company. If the company fails and goes under? They lose their job. They lose their income. They can't put food on the table. And so on. So there is a drive, a survival instinct, that pushes the people who run companies to pursue profit at all costs. This produces a phenomenon that is destroying our health.
That phenomenon is MARKETING.
Which is just a fancy way of saying LYING.
There is the truth around health. There is the science, evidence and research that proves what is and isn't healthy. This rarely reaches the mainstream. Why? Because there's no money in it. There's no profit in it. There's no benefit in terms of growth and survival for the ever greedy corporate entity.
But there is money in LIES.
• There is money in the lie that foods are either "good" or "bad". Because if you can LIE to your customers and convince them that this food is a "syn" and that the food you sell them is "free", suddenly they're buying more of your "free foods", boosting your profits.
• There is money in the lie that "exercise produces weight loss". Because if you can LIE to your customers and convince them that these special exercises will make you slimmer and lighter, suddenly they're subscribing to your exercise app, boosting your profits.
• There is money in the lie that "fat and chubby is ugly". Because if you can LIE to your customers and convince them that your pill or potion holds the key to their slimness and beauty, they will literally hand of £399.99 for a bottle of it, boosting your profits.
• There is money in the lie that "you can eat whatever you like and lose weight". Because if you can LIE to your customers and convince them that your completely unrestricted eating plan will make them slimmer, they'll be signing up, boosting your profits.
The issue is that people are unsuspecting of these LIES, because we don't call them lies, we call them "marketing". And companies spend billions of pounds every year, and have spent trillions of pounds in your lifetime, perpetuating these lies with such finesse that they become widely perceived as truths.
Our whole perception of health.... how to eat, how to exercise, how to perceive ourselves and our bodies... how to measure our success in life and our value as a person... it is all so far from the truth, from the reality... that we have people living their lives believing that health and success is a number on the scale.
Think about that for a moment.
The extent of the lies produced by these money hoovering, money sucking, health destroying entities, has got SO BAD, that we have people literally thinking "health and success in life" is to be found in a village hall, standing next to a person who is just as much of a victim of these lies as you, telling you to try harder next week, even though they're TWICE YOUR SIZE and twice as damaged. The people running these slimming companies are living, breathing evidence that these companies aren't providing what they're promising you.
Yet people still go.
They accept being lied to.
Why? That's the real question.
Why, when we know these companies consistently fail to deliver the health, happiness and success they promise us, do we consistently listen to them, trust them and pay them? And the answer is all around us. The answer is all over the media, social media, our conversations with family and friends. The answer is EVERYWHERE.
As a society we are so tired, and so exhausted, and in such a poor state of mental and physical health, that we simply don't have have the energy to resist the lies anymore. We don't have the capacity to fight for something better. We have been so broken down, over so many decades, that it is easier to keep pretending the lies aren't happening, than it is to stand up and fight for the truth.
This phenomenon isn't just playing out in the sphere of health. It is playing out in the sphere of the environment. And in the sphere of politics. We are TOO EXHAUSTED to take note of and fight against the fact we are slowly destroying our planet. We are TOO EXHAUSTED to take note of and fight against the fact that we are being continually and unashamedly lied to by our government. We are TOO EXHAUSTED to the point where the path of least resistance... ignoring it and maintaining the status quo of accepting being lied to... seems appealing. Because it takes less energy.
Unless as individuals, and as a society, we learn to rest better. To recover better. To sleep better. To slow down and be more mindful of the present. Unless we stop, and realise that the story we're being told about what health and success looks like is A LIE that is destroying our bodies and our planet...
We're screwed. We really are screwed.
I don't know what else to say. I don't know what other solution to offer. But a good starting point is to realise that we've all got so used to being lied to that lies have become our truth. And that perceived truth has exhausted us.
Liam
