Tag: mailvox

Mailvox: standing with atheists

An atheist explains his contempt for cuckservative Churchianity:

I am a man living in Alabama who has never believed in Santa Clause or God. My family and most of my peers are rabid evangelicals.

For 28 years I have been preached to in a desperate attempt to save me from hell. The only thing I have seen is a legion of cowards using soft rhetoric to make their ideas more palatable to the ignorant fools who begin throwing their money at the Church. The people who beg me to follow their creed are mocked by children with the most rudimentary logic as they abandon the commands of their God and whore themselves to anyone who will pay them.

I will never count myself among such feckless cowards.

This does not change my decision to stand by Christians and fight the filth this cesspool of a nation is surrendering itself to. I have one thing to offer my Christian brothers, I will die next to them inflicting this on this enemy: an animal hatred of of the trash you have allowed to undermine the country which has allowed me to live my life without repression.

If you do not succeed in your goal it will not only be me who perishes. You will cry out to your God as the evil you believed he would save you from brutally shows you what it is to be ruined.

I’d rather stand by an atheist like him than the Churchians who sell out their neighbors for worldly approbation in the name of a counterfeit Gospel. But he really should know better than to try to characterize Christian theology on our behalf. Jesus saves souls. He doesn’t save nations. If men want to save their nations, or their civilization, I expect they’ll have to do it on their own.

In such matters, God appears to be most inclined to help those who follow His laws and help themselves.

Mailvox: why he must vote for Donald Trump

Someone with the propitious name of “Del Cid” sent me this today:

I am voting for Donald Trump this November 48, 2016.

Whether any of the innumerable slings and arrows directed at Trump’s person and politics recently have any basis in fact or not, in the end it matters quite little to me.  This election, I am not so much voting for the individual as I am voting for what he inherently represents.

As so many wrongly assume, just because I vote for Trump does not necessarily require that I admire every aspect of him personally.  Nor does it mean I condone every action he has committed, decision he has made, policy he has endorsed, or word he has spoken.  As common sense as this may sound to some, it has tripped up enough people I have spoken to lately that sadly I feel I must make this clarification.

So why am I voting for Donald Trump?

In part I am voting for Trump because the only viable alternative, Hillary Clinton, is far worse than Trump on almost every conceivable level. At the very least, I will vote strategically for Trump in order to deny Hillary the Presidency and to prevent the catastrophe that such a result would undoubtedly bring upon our nation and possibly even the rest of the world.

However, ultimately I will vote for Trump because no matter the specifics of what actions he may take or what stances he may adopt as President, the one thing he is guaranteed to do is shake the Establishment currently embedded in our nation’s government to its very core.  Given his track record so far as only just a Presidential nominee, one has to admit this to be true, just as one must equally admit that our government has fallen into a dangerous rut and must be shaken out of it.

Hillary could never do that, she is too much a part of said Establishment to bring any meaningful, productive change no matter how flowery and polished her scripts and talking points are.  Best case scenario, Hillary as President would only carry on the current status quo and our government, and nation, will continue to devolve into chaos and eventual self-destruction.

In contrast, Trump as President will likely result in one of two situations:

  1. He breaks the mold adhered to by almost every newly made President for the last several generations and actually acts on his campaign promises; thus making some much needed positive changes to our government and our national/international policies.  True, no one is perfect and he may and probably will make some bad decisions or changes to be sure.  But overall, his Presidency will be a net positive and with his help our nation will thrive and flourish and begin to find its way back to the right track. 
  2. He makes some truly terrible changes, declares himself God-Emperor of America, and drives us all to hell in a handcart.  If this is the path his presidency takes, then he will undoubtedly gather so much hatred and opposition from enough of us true blooded Americans that We the People will finally be galvanized into performing our full civic duty and actually do something ourselves to fix our nation and “Make America Great Again.”

Obviously possibility 1 is best case scenario, and 2 is worst case scenario.  Call me a flaming optimist, but I feel that possibility 1” is the most likely outcome.  As with all relatively sane individuals, I generally prefer orderly, intellectual revolutions to chaotic, violent ones.  However, history has repeatedly and unfailingly demonstrated that if the former is so continuously and brutally repressed, the latter will occur eventually.

Either way, change must happen.  Change will happen.  Real and fundamental change.

Which of our two candidates this election season are more suited to acting as a catalyst for positive change, short or long term?  The old bureaucrat so highly experienced in the game of political corruption that even her scandals have scandals?  The woman so inextricably tied to the rot at the core of our political machinery that she is the veritable posterchild (postergranny?) of all things wrong with our government today?  Or the loud, brash, polarizing man who drives the chattel of PC media elites, SJW thought police, cuckservatives, et all before him like so many helpless leaves before the hurricane?  The one candidate who has already begun the breaking of the Present World Order without even yet having stepped foot in the White House?

I look at it all like this:  It is a cold, hard fact that you will never in your life be given the choice of a Presidential candidate who will completely satisfy all of your moral and political standards.  Yet at the same time neither you nor your nation can afford for you to stand by, shun your civic duty, and remove yourself from the decision for the purpose of virtue signaling your moral superiority.  Other than arguably making you look good, what real good does this accomplish for the world?  You must choose the best you can out of what options you have been given, and make the most you can out of the reality with which you are faced.

I have studied my options carefully this election season.  Given the choices reality has set out before me, I can only conscientiously fulfill my civic duty as an American citizen by choosing Donald Trump for my next President.

Mailvox: when your church converges

A reader in the Bay Area wonders what his options are:

I went to church today and I’ve been worried for a long time. There have been signs. The original church was extremely intellectual, led by a couple men I respect who learned Greek and Aramaic personally, research like none other and present the Bible in a way I’d never seen in regular church services. Two years ago one of those men was forced out, though I didn’t see it at the time because he “left for a new position in another church”. He was replaced by young, hipster types leading everything. The lead pastor, whom I also respect, has started backing off, only preaching once a month or so, doing other things while those younger “hipper” people take over.

A few months ago they started having a woman lead services. They brought in and merged with a chuch from a black area, brought in a lot more minority populations.

I noticed my wife, who’s heavily involved in those small groups, started getting really passionate about Good Samaritan type projects and we had a few fights about how I was saying they were scams, as it was a lot of raising money type of deals.

Today it culminated where they actually brought in one of the 49ers who is protesting with Kaepernick and did a sermon on how the “disciples were diverse”, and he gave a shpiel about how him and Kaepernick are going to “change the community, because cops can do better, we can do better.” Full SJW lie with zero biblical basis. They opened with a video about multi-racial couples and talking about race and probably mentioned diversity 50 times over the course of the sermon.

I walked out during the 49er bit.  Now my wife is very very heavily involved in the smaller groups of the church. I grew up with a number of people so the prospect of leaving is like cutting off an arm. What do I do? Is leaving the only thing I can do?

Yes. It’s time to leave. Do not discuss it with your wife. It’s not something to negotiate; either you are the spiritual leader of the family or she is. Leave and find a new church. She may follow your lead, or she may not, but that’s her responsibility, not yours.

Your responsibility is to lead the way. And the church you describe no longer serves the Lord, it serves the spirit of the world.

You were worried because your spirit was picking up on the false spirit that entered the church. Now your mind knows what your spirit already knew. The fact that the good pastor was forced out is a strong indicator that you are dealing with some knowingly evil people here, it’s not a series of unfortunate coincidences.

Mailvox: infrastructure fragility

From a reader this morning

A pipeline that carried 40%+ of the gasoline for the southeast and east ruptured last week.  No quick fix due to the quarter million gallons of gasoline that spilled and is held in a retention pond.  I’ve thought for years that this pipe would be a good terrorist target and, though this isn’t terrorism, it’s going to wreck havoc in the southeast and east.  Nashville is already out of gas and it’s going to cascade.  This could end up being a huge election issue given Obama’s stopping new pipeline construction during his entire term.

If you Google the story the American media is almost silent, covered by British and RT.  That won’t last for long.  [Redacted] lives in Nashville.  I gave her a heads up yesterday so they could get topped off and this morning 80 percent of the stations are closed in her area.

If you’re in the southeast, fill up your gas tanks now and lay in some supplies.

UPDATE: The story is now public: Alabama, Tennessee, & Georgia Declare States Of Emergency As Gas Shortages Loom After Pipeline Leak

UPDATE: North Carolina has declared a state of emergency too.

Mailvox: give it time

GJ is disappointed with what he discovered at VP:

I listened to you on Molyneux and was impressed enough to follow your link here. Alas, as so often is the case, a closer inspection disappoints. The format of the site is not engaging, and neither is the tone. There’s an imperiousness, an intemperance about the writing that any traditionalist should find off-putting. The rules regarding commenting strike me as especially heavy-handed and narrow-minded. There appears to be an imperative need to delete everything and anything outside the privileged in-group’s wonted expectations. And the sneering boasts about superior mental attainments sound juvenile and absurd, especially given the gaming provenance of so many of you. If a commenter comes up short in debate (by what criterion we can only guess), why would that necessitate deleting his entire argument? Arguments stand or fall on their own merits and have nothing to do with “regulars.” or cliques. You brag that it’s “not a democracy.” Fine. But does that mean it’s a police-state? Your “finish him” attitude toward the intellectual arena would seem to owe more to Nintendo than Socrates.

I think GJ would do well to spend a little bit more time reading the comments here before reaching any conclusions. What necessitates deleting entire arguments is when they are presented by trolls, some of whom are Soros-paid hasbaras of one sort or another, some of whom are simply people with various psychological issues or an intense personal dislike of me or my politics. There are also those commenters who are intent on spreading a message of defeatism and despair, who may or may not be paid to do it. In none of these cases are they arguing honestly, and long experience has taught me that there is absolutely no benefit to permitting them any leeway at all.

While you may not recognize commenters intent on causing problems, I have been blogging for 13 years and it is very easy for me to recognize the different between someone who is honestly presenting an argument and someone who is not. For example, if you go to Steve Sailer’s or other right-wing blogs, you will see EXACTLY the same comments being copy-pasted into the comment threads there. Those commenters are autokill-on-sight; their comments are deleted and their usernames are spammed.

On the rare occasions that I mistakenly spam an honest commenter, I immediately restore their commenting privileges.

So, yes, one could say that it is a police state if one likes, although I would liken it more to a place that is under a constant state of siege. For example, when we tried allowing the SJW List to be open to editing by everyone, Wikipedia-style, every single page was either poison-pilled or spammed within 24 hours. Once we locked it down, we ceased to have any problems and the SJW List has continued to grow steadily since.

Now, I could simply lock down VP to registered commenters only, but I prefer not to do that since it would dissuade genuine passersby and casual commenters. Instead, I keep it open and crack down hard and fast on griefers. I don’t delete very many comments, there are only 31 trolls on autovanish, and the fact that GJ’s comment was not deleted should suffice to prove that differing opinions are permitted. The fact is that no one who posts a comment or series of comments that is an honest, on-topic argument need fear their comments will be deleted simply because they disagree with me or because it is outside the privileged in-group’s expectations.

As for Socrates, there is nothing Socratic about this blog. If you were more familiar with it, you would know the contempt in which that old dishonest fraud is held here. I prefer to try presenting conclusive and persuasive syllogisms, not play word games that prove nothing. And rest assured, despite being the Leader of #GamerGate, my “start nothing, finish everything” attitude owes nothing to Nintendo or even Mortal Kombat.

Things are as they are for various reasons, many of which have nothing to do with my personal idiosyncracies or preferences. The reason this blog is still around and still growing is because I respond to the actions of the commenters here, both good and bad.

Mailvox: so much worse

Castalia House exists because it is needed. Badly needed, it appears. A reader writes:

So I just read two stories from the latest issue of Analog magazine. I must tell you about them.

Story #1 is about a multi-racial research female scientist working for a white male research director. Her role model is a deceased multi-racial scientist who died in an experiment, famous, but whose death led to the current research director getting his job. She recreates the experiment and learns that the current research director rigged it to kill the heroic female multi-racial scientist so he could take her job.

Story #2 is about the CEO of a company who is married to his Chief Science Officer, who is a beautiful dark-skinned girl who beat up his bully in high school. He has IQ 140 but she has IQ 170. They develop brain-and-body augmentation technology and she becomes the first transhuman, better at everything than him in every way but she still loves him. But Christian extremists are outraged and terrorism ensues and they kill her, even though she is wonderful in all ways and a believer in non-violence. He has his own brain implanted in her cyborg body so they won’t know they won, and then goes on a killing spree against the Christian leaders who urged on the violence. Yay for transhuman transgender women ending Christian violence.

All I can say is, it’s so much worse than I thought.

This is exactly why Castalia exists. Consider these excerpts from the five most recent reviews of our latest novel, SWAN KNIGHT’S SON:

  • An excellent medieval fairy tale in the modern age.
  • Outstanding. I’m truly amazed.
  • Coming of age story written by of one of the greatest wordsmiths of our times. It is a story of a young man who doesn’t fit into society because he is too morally upright for the decadence that infests modern society.
  • A masterpiece
  • A true knight battling the forces of evil, while discovering who he is on multiple levels

 Remember culture > politics. What we are fighting here is a cultural war for the soul of the West.

Mailvox: what is Churchianity

Yesterday we had a few requests for a definition of “Churchianity”:

 Is there anywhere on this blog where you define “Churchian”? 
– MS

I too would like a definition of Churchian. Could you cover that in a future post?
– Jaypo

While I have frequently alluded to it, I have not addressed Churchianity directly on this blog before. In part, that is because I am loath to play Christian Police, a role for which I am ill-suited spiritually and temperamentally. I wish to stress that I cannot, and will not, be the judge of whether anyone is a genuine Christian or is a mere Churchian instead; that determination is well above my pay grade. It does not fall to me to even be the judge of my own Christianity, as we are all fallen and none of us know whether we will be saved or we will be one of those from whom Jesus will turn and say “I never knew you.”

In this, as in all things spiritual, we see as though through a glass, darkly. And yet, we are also given eyes and wit and perhaps even a modicum of spiritual discernment, so if we cannot judge another man’s soul, we can certainly judge institutions by their actions and intellectual concepts by their consequences.

I gave the matter a fair amount of thought when writing Chapter 9 of Cuckservative, “Christianity and Cuckservativism”. As my co-author, John Red Eagle, is agnostic, the task of addressing that particular topic naturally fell to me. I go into considerably more detail in the book, particularly concerning how Churchianity relates to various trends that have swept the American churches, but a few excerpts from it should help provide a better understanding of what Churchianity observably is before we attempt to define it.

Many churches have reduced Christianity to the parable of the Good Samaritan, to such an extent that their religion could be more reasonably described as Good Samaritanism than Christianity. And while they subscribe chiefly to salvation through works and societally-approved attitudes rather than faith, they nevertheless possess complete and utter faith in the intrinsic goodness of foreigners.

Churchians (for it would not be strictly accurate to describe them as Christians) are liars and deceivers. They worship the god of Babel, not the Christian God. They serve the world, not Jesus Christ.

But where does this religious obsession with improving the world through works come from, when it has been absent from Christian theology for the greater part of two thousand years? Indeed, the entire conceptual core of Christianity is fundamentally based on the nature of the world not only being fallen and imperfect and ruled by an immortal spirit of evil, but remaining that way until the Son returns, the Prince of the World is cast down, and the Kingdom of Heaven is established.

Justice, in both Greek philosophy and proper Christian theology, is “rectitude of the will”, as can be seen in Aquinas’s Summa Theologica, specifically Secunda Secundæ Partis, Question 58, Article 1. And in the Christian sense, rectitude of the will is defined by conformity with God’s will, which can be debated, but being immutable, is assuredly not defined by the ever-mutating social justice narrative.

So social justice Christianity, or Good Samaritanism, or Churchianity, all amount to the same thing: a false form of Christianity that cloaks itself in Christian rhetoric while denying both the conceptual core of Christianity and the fundamental nature of the justice to which it nominally dedicates itself. And these false forms all flow from a concept that is considerably newer than Christianity, although it is related to an older religion.

The term tikkun olam is from the rabbinic literature known as the Mishnah, which dates back to 1492 and is believed to come from an oral tradition that may be as much as a thousand years older. It appears in the phrase mip’nei tikkun ha-olam “to indicate that a practice should be followed not because it is required by Biblical law, but because it helps avoid social disharmony.”

The phrase is often translated as “for the sake of the healing of the world”, which is why the expression appears in English as a directive to “heal the world” or “fix the world”, but a better translation is “for the sake of the perfection of the world”.

In other words, the cuckservatives and other Churchians have elevated a literally extra-Biblical post-Christian concept that flies directly in the face of genuine Christian theology to a super-Scriptural level, then used it as the basis to judge both members of the Church and the Bible itself!

So, we can summarize all of this with the following definition:


Churchianity is social justice-converged pseudo-Christianity that cloaks itself in Christian rhetoric and trappings, follows the world rather than Jesus Christ, and seeks salvation through works instead of faith.


And if I can say this without sounding too eschatological, I expect it, or something very like it, will be the seed of the religion that worships Antichrist in the place of Jesus Christ.

Discredit. Disqualify. Deplatform.

It’s interesting to see how cuckservatives and conservatives are rapidly adopting SJW tactics too. Unfortunately, like the good moderates they are, they’ve adopted them in order to utilize them against those whose side they claim to be. This little rant from Patrick Frey, who is attempting to convince Tom Woods to stop interacting with me, is a good example:

Patrick Frey [Original post 8/15/2016]
I know little about Vox Day, other than that he told my friend Ken White, a great man and free speech warrior who has also written courageously about his struggles with mental illness, to “get off the Internet for [his] own good” because “no place for the depressed, the bipolar, or the schizophrenic.” I know VD loves to beat his chest about how “ruthless” he is (“We won’t hesitate to strike at your vulnerabilities” is an actual quote — ooh! he’s going to unleash the dreaded Internet Attack on his enemies!) And now, VD is explaining how American nationalism is really White nationalism:

I guess I’ll listen to Tom’s conversations with him, in which (so far) he manages to come across less like the rank jackass he has always been in his interactions with Ken White. But I’d really rather see Tom, whom I admire greatly, spending less time interacting with a guy who has acted like such a cretin online.

To be clear: I’m obviously not trying to tell Tom how to run his show. If he wants to give a platform to the likes of VD or Milo, that’s obviously his choice. I hope I can express my extreme dislike of these people forthrightly without it seeming like an attack on Tom — who, again, has added much of value to my life.

Seriously, though — just read through this blog post by Vox Day attacking my friend Ken White, and see if you can refrain from laughing at the way VD sells himself as Big Bad Tough Guy Vox Day. It really is tough to take this guy seriously.

Let me see if I have this straight. It is really tough to take me seriously, therefore it is imperative for Tom Woods to stop taking me talking to me lest he acquire unserious cooties or something. The threat of striking at one’s vulnerabilities is something to laugh at, but simply observing that a mentally unstable individual is, in fact, mentally unstable and is behaving in a manner indicative of mental instability, is an outrage to be decried.

Does he really think that Tom Woods, of all people, is liable to fall for this sort of nonsense?

Look, it’s not my fault that Ken White is mentally unstable. Nor is it my fault that, as a consequence of his being crazy, Ken White has repeatedly chosen to take unprovoked shots at me. It’s not as if I’m outing the poor guy as a whack job; if White hadn’t a) written about being institutionalized, and, b) taken unprovoked shots at Roosh, I wouldn’t know anything about it.

It’s not as if I read him or pay any attention to White. He may be back in the funny farm already for all I know.

What I do know is that I have absolutely no time for suggestions concerning with whom I should, or should not, associate myself. I’ve noticed that the bigger one’s platform becomes, the more people will try to hijack it and offer unsolicited guidance. I’ve had people try to talk me into disavowing Roosh, Louise Mensch, and more recently, Ricky Vaughan. But no matter who they are, my answer is always the same: no.

I pay no heed to thought police, speech police, tone police, or relationship police. Anyhow, I suspect Tom will be less than concerned about Patrick’s demands:

Tom Woods ‏@ThomasEWoods
Social Justice Warriors: who they are, and how to deal with them — my conversation with @VoxDay

Ty & Aliyah ‏@StopDividingUs7
And of course, typical supremacist making you pay to listen / view.

Tom Woods ‏@ThomasEWoods
Typical genius unable to press PLAY on a free podcast.

Ty & Aliyah ‏@StopDividingUs7
No, it requires viewers to download a bunch of your crap first. That is a heavy price to pay.

Tom Woods ‏@ThomasEWoods
No, it doesn’t. You are seriously inept. You just press the play button.

I’ll admit it. I laughed.

UPDATE: Patrick Frey is doing his best to create a wedge:

VD also says Tom Woods is “considerably less serious as an economist than I had imagined him to be” … again, watching a sort of middling intellect deem himself to be smarter than Woods and Sowell is amusing. 

“Didja hear what Janey said about you, Tina? Didja hear?”

I don’t know how to break it to Mr. Frey, but based on my interactions with Mr. Sowell, I’m at least a standard deviation more intelligent than him. Tom Woods is quite sharp, and I have a lot of respect for him, but nevertheless, he’s not up to speed on free trade yet. There is no shame or insult in that; Ian Fletcher certainly got there before I did.

I have no doubt that Tom Woods will eventually as well.

Mailvox: the reluctant revolutionary

From a reader deep in the belly of the Beast:

I am a teacher at a public school in [REDACTED].  During our first professional day this year our faculty was introduced to a new administrative mandate from the state bureaucracy.  At the conclusion of the presentation we were permitted to comment.  I asked the presenter if she thought the educational bureaucracy was insane, evil, or both.  My comment elicited a few chuckles from my colleagues.  She responded that she thought the new procedures would make her a more accountable teacher.  I rejoined that it would make of me a revolutionary.  Once again my colleagues chuckled.  Teachers are some of the worst sheeple on the planet.

I later approached a colleague who is a close ideological ally.  “Well, [REDACTED], which is it?”  As is frequently the case with him, he was quick to hit the mark.  “If they’re insane, it makes logical sense to accommodate them.  If they are evil, then we are morally obliged to fight them.”  Spot on.  He is good like that.

I tried to suppress my thoughts for the rest of the week, but the realization wouldn’t let go.  I had become a reluctant revolutionary.  Or rather, to be more accurate, the state had made me a revolutionary.  The idea sickens me.  I didn’t ask for this.  I have never aspired to this sort of vocation or anything like it.  It’s one of the last things I would ever wish upon myself.  But here I stand.

The comment you posted this morning from the German president about something being wrong with the people brought to me another sudden realization. Leaders as a class have never studied the antecedents of revolution.  If they had, they would keep on their desks a handy checklist and refer to it often.  But they truly are clueless. Revolutions are not a form of spontaneous combustion.  I am reminded of the final words of Madame Ceausescu as she was put up against the wall:  “You can’t do this; I treated you like my children.”  Clueless to the bitter end.

Or, as Aristotle put it, some people cannot be convinced by information. Never forget that. They genuinely believe they are our masters. I expect events will eventually convince them otherwise.

Mailvox: how can you tell?

JI wants to know how one can accurately pick out the sociopaths among one’s acquaintances and colleagues. A few observations:

  1. Look for abrupt changes in demeanor as the situation changes, and particularly for a wide-eyed, “caught red-handed” reaction when such a change is observed. Sociopaths go from bright-eyed, charming, and friendly to dead-eyed and icy cold in the blink of an eye. Normal people do not.
  2. Beware of anyone who is too friendly too soon. It’s one thing to hit it off with someone, it’s another to have someone glom onto you for no apparent reason.
  3. Perma-victims are usually perpetrators. Female sociopaths, in particular, are adept at revising every story to make themselves the victim, especially when they were the culprit. If nothing is ever someone’s fault, it’s usually all their fault.
  4. Trust your instincts. If you find someone repellant but you don’t know why, it’s your subconscious picking up on small contradictions that you haven’t recognized. Keep a close eye on that individual and you’ll usually discover what it was that your subconscious was warning you about.
  5. Sociopaths have a very alert gaze and they are always scanning to see if anyone is watching them. If you intentionally let them know you are onto them by not looking away and smiling at them in a “gotcha” manner, they will confirm their sociopathy by abruptly changing their behavior towards you, usually by becoming avoidant and launching a whisper campaign against you. This can be risky, of course, but it does provide certain confirmation. I would not recommend it for most people, as most people are insufficiently ruthless to deal effectively with sociopaths.
  6. A shallow “salesman” effect. If someone is always “hail fellow well met”, but doesn’t have any real friends, this is a warning sign.
  7. An attempt to “take over” a group of friends or a social organization, particularly if they attempt to cut out the person who brought them into the group.
  8. Persistent cheating and parasitism, especially in small matters that no one normally keeps track of. I’m not talking about someone who is cheap, but someone who is always a taker and never a giver or even a fair-exchanger.
  9. Constant whisper campaigns. Sociopaths are even more concerned with controlling the narrative than SJWs. If you find that someone has told three different stories to three different people about the same event, be alert.
  10. Be very skeptical of all sob stories. If you encourage a sociopath telling one by feigning shock and sympathy, he will proceed to go deeper, adding more and more detail, and more and more pathos, taking the story into completely absurd territory in order to see how much of a sucker you are and what he can get away with.
None of these things are definitive, they are merely suggestive. But taken as a whole, they are reliably conclusive.