Facts about Con artists

[Palerider]

A quick synopsis from the book The Confidence Game by Maria Konnikova.

1. Con artists aren't obvious villains. One review of nearly 600 cases of company fraud found that about 40 percent had been considered “highly respected” by their co-workers.

2. Con artists need to have the right circumstances presented to spark the tendency they may have to be devious. Konnikova argues that a person also needs to have opportunity and a plausible rationale.
(Think poverty and the burned over district of New York 1820's. Also as a rationale, "I'm using my stone in the hat to help you find buried treasure or that shovel I hid from you last night.")

3. Humans have learned that trust between them allows them to accomplish more. So there is a desire to trust. We WANT to trust other people. Con artists take advantage of that human desire.

4. Cons are expert at "reading" other people and zeroing in on those who are the most trusting and manipulable.

5. Cons are not pathological liars. They differ from pathological liars, who lie as “a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder.” Instead, their lies are very calculated and strategic, told with the purpose of moving their plan forward. (Probably mixed with just enough truth to make their lies palatable and plausible.)

6. Most cons get away with it.
It’s commonly believed that only foolish people get conned — an idea that Konnikova thoroughly debunks — so it’s understandable that people are often unwilling to admit that they’ve fallen victim to a con artist. “Most cons don’t ever come to trial: they simply aren’t brought to the authorities to begin with,” writes Konnikova. (Think, "I am not a dodo.")

[jfro18]

This reminds me of the current political climate so much... which has made me really hate Joseph Smith for taking advantage of the same climate in his time.

[moksha]

One review of nearly 600 cases of company fraud found that about 40 percent had been considered “highly respected” by their co-workers.

Here is a short audio presentation about this very subject. Might as well skip to minute 1:45 (for those in a hurry, but are concerned about this topic).

https://www.sunstonemagazine.com/wp-con ... th2015.mp3

[Gatorbait]

This is an interesting topic I think, and we have discussed Jos. Smith's psychopathic behavior before. He fits the mold so well that it leaves little doubt that he was a liar, cheat and thief....but also a very clever one.

Some of us have fallen prey to someone who has come into our lives, a get-rich-quick scammer who tries to convince us that he or she has the investment of a lifetime. No point going on about that, we all know about that subject. The one we trusted most at times, either knowingly or by accident, deceived us - and for a lot of us, that is why we read NOM. We have been scammed, and we are sick about it, because we were scammed by those we trusted most. For a lot of us, it was our parents, one or both.

Jos. Smith started poor and then there came a time where he did not lack for money. He had all the food he could eat, a mansion to live in in Nauvoo, but he had a very strong willed wife and maybe a bitter one. A lot of time the psychopathic men are sexual predators. They usually have a sex drive that drives them a bit crazy. Jos. Smith- who knows about his relationship with Emma- but my guess is that he cheated on her long before he came up with the plural wife polygamy scam.

Jos. Smith was a con artist for sure, and a psychopath, but the thing that sickens me most was not the religious scam- but it was those who fell victim to his sex drive. Bedding other men's wives- it is my opinion that he had no problem with that at all. My guess is that a lot more of that went on then we know about. Not just the 14 year old girls, but many innocent women who were tricked into sex with Jos. Smith...sick.

Thanks for the Sunstone Magazine reference Moksha. Wow. No holds barred in that one. Whoa. No wonder most of Jos. Smith's "friends" at one time parted ways with him.

[Not Buying It]

The most dangerous predators are the ones who are clever enough to maintain a facade of respectability and wholesomeness. "The devil's most devilish when respectable" - Elizabeth Barrett Browning. It isn't the the guy wearing a black hat you have to fear nearly so much as the guy with the white hat that conceals a black heart. Successful predators like Joseph Smith are good at maintaining appearances, making you feel like they are your greatest friend while they are all the while taking everything they want from you. And they are really good at the long con, being completely trustworthy right up until the moment they aren't. They flatter, they groom, they lay the foundation for their deception slowly and carefully and cunningly, and they are good at getting their victims to ignore the red flags and warning signs while they are doing it.

People are stupid and gullible, and the most clever con men take advantage of that without their marks ever realizing it. Joseph Smith was one of the clever ones.