I had read that story some time ago, and it still scares me.
A teacher at my high school pulled some stunts. I twigged to it fairly early on; something struck me as wrong about him, and I doubted him before almost anyone else did. I got in trouble, too, when someone repeated something I said to the principal. By the end of the term in which he'd been hired to replace someone else, though, a lot of people had caught him out, and he wasn't hired again.
You'd think that would mean I was smart about people, but nope. I've been suckered since, again in real life, thinking people were my friends who were seriously not my friends. One of my real friends had to pull me aside at one point and warn me about somebody. (I felt a little better when she had to do the same for somebody else, because I knew he was really smart, and he'd made the same mistake!)
Some people are very charismatic and persuasive. Sometimes they fool everyone, at least for a time (see: my high school); sometimes they can only fool some people. That doesn't mean their victims are stupid. It means the con artists are effective. Also, some mentally ill people do believe their lies, so how are other people to realize they're lying?
Fortunately, I do think these people are really few and far between.
no subject
A teacher at my high school pulled some stunts. I twigged to it fairly early on; something struck me as wrong about him, and I doubted him before almost anyone else did. I got in trouble, too, when someone repeated something I said to the principal. By the end of the term in which he'd been hired to replace someone else, though, a lot of people had caught him out, and he wasn't hired again.
You'd think that would mean I was smart about people, but nope. I've been suckered since, again in real life, thinking people were my friends who were seriously not my friends. One of my real friends had to pull me aside at one point and warn me about somebody. (I felt a little better when she had to do the same for somebody else, because I knew he was really smart, and he'd made the same mistake!)
Some people are very charismatic and persuasive. Sometimes they fool everyone, at least for a time (see: my high school); sometimes they can only fool some people. That doesn't mean their victims are stupid. It means the con artists are effective. Also, some mentally ill people do believe their lies, so how are other people to realize they're lying?
Fortunately, I do think these people are really few and far between.