Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Conversation with a brother

Brother: I'm starting to realize that I have a talent for getting inside peoples' heads and figuring out what is going on in there. It kind of scares people

M.E.
: Yeah, some people are private, or get creeped out by their transparency.

Brother
: Yeah. I kind of like that. I think that you and I don't have a set default so we can associate with and understand almost everyone's motives.

M.E
.: Yeah, true, we don't have a set default. It's kind of a super power.

Brother
: Yeah. We are like super heroes. You and i have the same powers but use them decidedly differently.

M.E.
: How so?

Brother
: You use them to punish and hurt. Right now, I'm using mine to save a girl's life. So to speak.

M.E.
: Sometimes people need punishment to keep them straight. Save a girl's life?

Brother
: It's a complicated story involving someone dying of cancer, and the girl in question not feeling that she will be able to live life any more after that person is gone. She came to me because I knew what was going on in her head and she wanted some advice. I don't say it to brag. I'm not proud, it's only the truth.


M.E.
: Yeah, I understand. So what happened?

Brother
: Nothing yet. I have to write back to her. How is that for a difference between you and me? You aren't a bad influence. ou helped me realize an ability I never knew I had and I'm using it to help people. Of course if you look at it the other way, I could crush her and probably make her kill herself.

M.E
.: Ha, that's a good way of phrasing it

Brother
: No good

M.E.
: Yeah, you could crush her, but won’t. Most of the time I make the "right" choice too :)

Brother
: Good. Me too. But sometimes it is fun to be bad ;)

M.E.
: Seriously, right? I try to do it in moderation. And only when it isn't too horrible. There are certain wickednesses in my life that are so deliciously dehumanizing that i still lick my lips just thinking about them.

Brother
: I think I should do my work now.

M.E.
: Yeah, work is good. Idle hands are the devil's tools.

Monday, September 15, 2008

Are you one of us?

I stumbled upon this a while ago, and then the other day. "Are you one of them?" the caption reads. The article purports to present a test of sociopathy. Both times i "failed" the test (I had forgotten the answer after the first time). I guess that makes me not a sociopath. r at least not a sociopath who has been stupid enough to be incarcerated.

It got me thinking, though. I am
sort of lonely. I would like to talk a little with my peers. It'd be good if there was some real way to test if people I know are also sociopaths, like Bladerunner's Voight-Kampff machine. It's tricky though, because sociopaths are so good at remaining undetected, even to other sociopaths. And you'd want the test to be very good at excluding false positives and negatives. You'd have to sneak up on them in a way that deprives them of other cues about how to act, like sneaking up on a baby you suspect is deaf and clapping to see if he reacts.

A possible test might be something that offends all sides of the moral spectrum, like the Freakonomics argument that the crime drop in the 1990's was due to Roe v. Wade because all the babies that would have grown up to be criminals had been aborted. Because there's so much moral static regarding that proposition, and because it offends absolutely everyone with any sort of moral compass, the sociopath can't make out any one particular signal. A better analogy might something like two very loud noise sources that are directly opposed. So by the time both noises reach the sociopath, they've canceled each other out and the sociopath hears nothing.

How would you expect the sociopath to react in such a situation? When I first read the Roe v. Wade argument in Freakonomics, I cried. It was one of the most beautiful things I had ever read. The reasoning was so familiar to me. I recognized the pattern of my own brain's reasoning. I felt like I belonged. So if I'm any indication of how sociopaths would react, elation, joy, feeling of belonging--these are the sorts of things you would be looking for.

Who cares about "them." Are you one of "us"?

Sociopaths in the news


On Hugo Chávez, President of Venezuela: "He's a psychopath, in my opinion."

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Best ways to break it to someone you're a sociopath

A friend asked me today, "who else do you talk with so freely about being a sociopath?" As I started giving names I was surprised at how few there were: immediate family, select friends, only one person I'd dated (with mixed results), and a few other sociopaths I've met. All in all, the numbers are in the very low double digits. The rule seems to be not to tell a person I'm a sociopath unless there is some benefit to telling, and definitely not to tell a person if it would cause some some otherwise avoidable harm. Some of my very close friends don't know at all because it would disturb them, or because they wouldn't believe it.

The sociopath's ability to stay hidden, even to close friends and relatives, worries empaths. If you look at some of the more sensational literature regarding sociopaths, or even some of the tamer literature , you'll see the oft-invoked warning that sociopaths are all around us whether we realize it or not. Statistically, everyone should know at least one sociopath, although they probably would not be able to specifically identify who that person is.

Sociopaths stay hidden to avoid being the target of witch hunts. Some sociophobes have advocated isolating sociopaths on an island, like a leper colony or internment camp. Others have suggested that sociopaths simply be killed. Already in Great Britain authorities are giving sociopath criminals indefinite prison sentences just because they're sociopaths. The discriminatory actions and hate speech are frightening. “Passing” as normal is a very important survival skill for sociopaths, and most of us keep a low profile by necessity--and usually with success.

So that's why I don't tell everyone I meet that I'm a sociopath. But the thing I've been wondering about recently is, in case I do decide to tell someone, particularly someone I'm dating, *how* to tell someone you're a sociopath.

Options:
  1. I have a weak sense of empathy.
  2. I don't have a moral compass.
  3. I have difficulty conforming to social norms.
  4. My brain works differently.
  5. Shh, don't tell anyone, but i'm a sociopath.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Batman


I just watched the new Batman finally. At first I was bored and disappointed. Why was Batman acting all good? It had been several years since the last Batman movie, but I seemed to recall it being dark with an antihero protagonist. In the new one, Batman has somehow reformed and become a contributing member of society. Not likely. Batman is a sociopath. He's actually one of the better examples of what i consider "the good sociopath." Being a sociopath doesn't necessarily mean you do bad things, it just means your brain is wired a certain way, and you do things a certain way. Power is power. A sociopath can just as easily satisfy his cravings for power and excitement by fighting alongside local city police as fighting alongside villains. But Batman's girlfriend's note pleads with him to not lose faith in humanity. I guess for the normal moviegoer it's too much to believe that Batman would fight on the side of good for anything other than an undying belief in the decency and equality of mankind. How about because fighting is fun? Or convenient? How about because his natural inclination was to be a fighter, and the best option to him at the time was to fight for "good"? How about because he was trying to impress a girl? There are many reasons why a sociopath like Batman would choose to fight for "good"--reasons that have nothing to do with a vague faith in humankind.

And how about the Joker? His character is a more accurate depiction of a sociopath, although the portrayal here is somewhat heavy-handed. The Joker's view of humanity is jaded in a way that many sociopaths' views are. I mean jaded strictly in the Webster's sense of the word: "Made dull, apathetic, or cynical by experience or by surfeit." "Bad" sociopaths tend to have little respect for the social structure because they have been exposed to it enough to know it's rotten. The Joker makes some typical sociopathic comments about humanity, saying that people are only as "good" as the situation allows them to be. But he quickly learns that people are actually worse: empaths will frequently make irrational decisions based on something other than the exigencies of a particular situation. The Joker is surprised when the criminals and civilians on the ferries did not kill each other because he believes empaths can make the rational decision of blowing up the other ferry before they get blown up themselves. But they can't. The movie portrays the behavior of the passengers as noble, when really it is just irrational. This capacity for irrationality is probably the most disturbing thing about empaths to the sociopath. It's what makes them unpredictable and dangerous. The great thing about sociopaths is that they won't let emotions cloud their rational decision making.
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