For years I’d only heard rumors about all the lying that happens on dating Web sites. As I’ve written before, I always assumed that whatever lying occurs is more like fudging the truth – like believing exercising once a month to be “avid,” or viewing yourself as outgoing, or blurring the lines between “pleasantly plump” and overweight. Call them misjudgments, or an inability to see ourselves as we really are.

It had been awhile since I heard of such things. Lately, two of my friends even took the Internet plunge. One has met a couple of guys – none she has been interested in, but she hasn’t had any bad experiences – the other seems to be getting closer to a guy she met. So I was thinking optimistic. Maybe this Internet thing was the way to go after all.

But I recently had a conversation with an old college pal that shattered all that. He was lied to, big time, and he wasn’t sure what to do.

It all started with an innocent ad on one of the online sites that allow users to fill out an extensive profile and post a photo. My friend Rich has met a few women via this site, but none have stuck.

But this woman was different. They chatted and seemed to hit it off and her profile picture was cute. He was intrigued.

Then Rich suggested they meet in person for a pure, innocent reason – trust me, Rich doesn’t have a slimy bone in his body – and she shut down. Finally, he told me, she confessed. The photo on her profile wasn’t her. It was actually a photo of her friend.

The wide smile, the glossy black hair, the cute nose … it was all a lie. In her real photo the woman has dark hair, but that’s about where the similarities ended. She wasn’t anywhere near as attractive as the profile photo.

Rich forwarded both photos to me and I had to agree with him.

Poor Rich – again, this is one of the most decent guys I know, a fellow who recently helped an ex-girlfriend move from New York to Boston – didn’t know what to do. He was feeling bad that he was no longer interested in this woman but wasn’t sure if it was the fact that he wasn’t attracted to her or the fact that she had lied to him.

Well, I knew what to do, and I was pretty harsh. Don’t talk to her anymore, I raged. A relationship cannot start out on a lie, no matter how attractive or unattractive someone is.

Rich wanted to give her a little more leeway than I did. What if she had some hang-ups about her looks, he wondered in her defense.

So what, I answered. Most of us have some kind of hang-up about our looks but we don’t lie about who we are. And, I pointed out, why would you want to get involved with a woman who was so down on herself that she obviously feels the need to lie?

A few nights ago, wondering what became of the whole mess, I talked to Rich about the situation for a few minutes. He hadn’t chatted with the woman in some time, partially because her lie was bothering him. But he also confessed something that sounded kind of shocking, especially for someone who, as I wrote earlier, doesn’t know how to be a slimeball. If this woman had posted a false photo but her real photo was a woman just as attractive, he might have been able to live with the lie.

“I know it sounds terrible, but I don’t think it would have bothered me as much,” he said. “I think that there are certain parts of attractiveness that are objective, not subjective, and there are criteria of objective attractiveness that she did not meet.”

Before we jump all over Rich – this woman might not have met his objective criteria but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t meet someone else’s – I think I get what he means. This woman sold herself as something she wasn’t, but if the two photos had been equally attractive to Rich he may have been more willing to get past the lie.

Apparently, Internet lying is pretty common. I took a look at Rich’s profile and found that it’s pretty darn near right on, which is what he said women have been shocked to discover.

“The fact that I’m as truthfully honest as I am in my profile is stunning and amazing to the women I meet,” he told me.

Maybe he’s too honest – I’m not sure he should be admitting he can answer trivia about early 1990s Fox TV shows.

Attractive photo or not, Rich admitted that had things with this woman progressed, he probably wouldn’t have been able to shake off the lie she started things out with.

“It probably would have upset me in the long run,” he said.

Jessica Bloch can be reached at jbloch@bangordailynews.net.