TBF, I just assume everyone is lying (either first hand or second) and its on them to prove to me they're not.
Hasn't failed me yet.
Hasn't failed me yet.
I assume everyone is telling the truth until they've given me a reason not to assume that, and I'd say that hasn't failed me yet.
You can trust someone to drive properly and not hit you.
You can trust someone to not rob you as you walk by them.
You can simultaneously not trust them enough to give them money if they ask for it without sufficient proof. Or not trust them enough to invite them into your home.
"Trust" being something defined as both exclusively positive and a virtue in the person that gives it is just meant to soften up marks, and is probably instilled into us by marketing and advertising. It's certainly not taught by any religion, who concentrate on being worthy of trust, not trusting.
You trust people because you know them well, and you know what they will do when confronted by certain situations because you have seen them react to similar situations before. Before you know them well, you're just operating from stereotypes and comparisons with other people you've known who have similar mannerisms. Or you're projecting your own thought processes into their heads. A "level" of trust is just a confidence level in a prediction.
If you don't have a friend who has had to sacrifice something for you, you don't know if you have any friends at all. That's the real reason it's hard to make friends as an adult. But after you've been through stuff with people, you'd be a fool not to know they'll come through in this new, far-less grave circumstance.
I honestly think the problem is that we're trying to make people fungible in a weird secular market religion, and they're not. Trust is not a credit score.
I learned this lesson in my early 20s. Nearly every entity that you interact with is trying to transact with you, in a way that benefits themselves. Whether that's a legitimate transaction (money exchanged for a product/service exactly as advertised), a misrepresented transaction (the product/service is not as advertised), taking your money for nothing, or simply taking away your time and attention (advertising).
Even before AI, if you were unable to get a good sense of legitimate transactions, you'd lose all your money on misrepresented transactions to scammy used car salesmen, door-to-door salesmen, and whole life insurance salesmen. These parasites and their ilk prey on people who are trusting by nature, and people who will say "yes" to avoid disappointing a stranger. It's unfortunate that the world has come to this, but you need to be untrusting of others' motivations by nature to not be taken advantage of financially.
Sounds like you have failed to find it, and are now just coping.
(assuming everyone's lying until proven otherwise sounds like a miserable existence)
I posit that what we need is heavily enforced truth in advertising laws.
This is not easy. I help pay the school fees for a few students in East Africa. But, I have been to these students homes. I know their situation first hand. Now I am in a different country, and I can no longer verify if they still need help. All I can do is trust that their situation hasn't changed. And even if they are lying and they can actually afford the school fees, I know they are poor enough that helping them will still make a difference.
But anyone helping me to do this needs to take my word for it. Unless they travel here and get their own first hand impression.
I heard from one organization that was helping an orphanage, and then they found out that half the kids weren't even orphans. It was effectively a boarding school for some of the children. The people were at the location and saw the children in person, but they were fooled about the status of the children, or they didn't pay attention. Maybe it was a translation error, or some misunderstanding.
It doesn't actually matter. The important part is that these children needed help either way. So the money was not misused, just the true reality of these children was misrepresented.
The problem of course on the side of the givers is that you can't tell the difference between a genuine mistake and an intentional deception. You have to assess the risk, and, you have to decide for yourself how much you'll be hurt if it turn out to be a deception.
I don't give money to people I meet on the street, because I know enough people who also need help that I can't help everyone, so I limit my help to people I know well enough to trust them.