Friday, May 11, 2012

Say it loud! I'm S and I'm proud!

A question from a reader:
Do most sociopaths know they are sociopaths, do narcissists know they are narcissists? Under what circumstances would a sociopath reveal himself? same question as to narcissists?
My response:
Sociopaths know that they are different, though they may not necessarily be familiar that the label "sociopath" applies to them. Narcissists tend to be self-deceived, so they think that they are the same as everyone else, just better.

When I was told by a friend that there was a label for people like me and it was called "sociopath," I actually willingly accepted the diagnosis. I knew I didn't have the same emotions as everyone else, I knew I had a weak sense of empathy, I knew I was different, and it wasn't something that I struggled with ever. I feel like narcissists deny deny deny when they are confronted with their identity. They are so self-deceived, though, that it is probable that they don't even recognize the signs of narcissism in themselves.

I don't think a narcissist would ever reveal himself, mainly because he probably doesn't think there is anything to reveal. For sociopaths I think revealing oneself is sort of like revealing a secret identity for a superhero -- generally not a good idea, but sometimes unavoidable. I have revealed myself to close friends (not all, only the ones who would be accepting), and on rare occasions to people whom I suspect to be sociopaths themselves. For instance, I have only once revealed myself to someone I had just met, but it was obvious from our conversational topics that if he weren't a sociopath, he was something akin to it. Even so it was a delicate dance of "how much do you think you empathize with others?" "Do you think manipulation is an appropriate tool for social encounters?" "Does anyone ever ask you if you are a sociopath?" Even from the people who are accepting of who I am, a lot of them can't believe that I am a sociopath, or they sort of pretend I'm not by imagining emotions or empathy where there are none. My parents are that way. I am high-functioning and take pleasure in being exceptionally considerate, so it is not too difficult to believe that I am normal. Bjust because most of me seems good doesn't mean I don't have any sociopath-flavoured bad in me.
There's another good response here:
I'm sure a sociopath realizes that they are "different" from normal people, in the sense that they do not comprehend normal emotional responses and connections. I would assume they don't understand why this is unless they recognize the signs through their own research or if someone tells them.

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Psychopath brains differ even from ASPD

Reuters reports on how the brains of psychopathic criminals show distinctly less grey matter in the areas of the brain important for understanding the emotions of others.  These differences in brain structure were different even from other criminals who were diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder (ASPD).  Other interesting selections from the article:

  • Damage to these areas is linked with a lack of empathy, a poor response to fear and distress and a lack of self-conscious emotions such as guilt or embarrassment.
  • Research shows that most violent crimes are committed by a small group of persistent male offenders with ASPD. . . . Such people typically react in an aggressive way to frustration or perceived threats, but most are not psychopaths, the researchers wrote in a summary of their study, which was published in the Archives of General Psychiatry journal.
  • There are clear behavior differences among people with ASPD depending on whether they also have psychopathy. Their patterns of offending are different, suggesting the need for a separate approach to treatment.
  • "We describe those without psychopathy as 'hot-headed' and those with psychopathy as 'cold-hearted'," Blackwood explained.

I love that distinction between "hot-headed" and "cold-hearted."  I'm going to have to start using those terms all of the time when explaining about how I don't quite consider myself to have ASPD.  And our buddy Bob Hare should be happy about this seeing as he is always going on about how the two are quite distinct.



Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Envying the sociopath?

Psychology Today recently presented two arguments for why women seek to marry criminals, particularly murderers: (1) women seek mates with strong male markers like aggressiveness and (2) women dream of being the one person in the world that can reform them.  This author argues another theory in Jezebel--women are envious of sociopaths:


After all these years of hearing from young (and not-so-young) women who are fascinated with predators, I've developed a theory of my own. The women who become easily intrigued by sociopaths are of course interested in protecting the vulnerable (including themselves). But they are also enthralled by those who represent the opposite end of the emotional spectrum from where these women find themselves.

Sociopaths, by definition, lack compassion and remorse. Some young women in our culture, on the other hand, are overwhelmed by those very same things. Think of emotional sensitivity as a spectrum from 0-10, similar to the volume controls for a radio.  It's healthy to be tuned into the needs of others at about 4 or 5 on the continuum.  At that volume, you're aware of the needs of those around you without being overwhelmed by them. But for some women, the world's "emotional noise" comes through at 8 or 9 on the spectrum. The needs and demands of others are so clear and loud that these young women often can't hear themselves think.  They're nearly incapacitated from the effort of absorbing so much emotion, and frequently they feel immensely guilty for not meeting the insatiable demands of those around them.  Is it any wonder that they become fascinated with — and even, in some sense, envious of — sociopaths?  What else is a sociopath than someone whose "volume control" for the needs of others has been set to mute? 

There may be women who fall for dangerous predators because of the evolutionary impulses that Ramsland cites; others may be filled with the desperate quixotism that Seltzer suggests, believing that their love is powerful enough to tame even a serial killer. Many surely identify with strong female characters like Mariska Hargitay's Olivia Benson, SVU's brave and relentless protagonist. But admiration for the cops and lawyers who keep the streets safe is only part of the draw. For many who have made SVU and CSI into two of the most successful scripted televisions shows of the modern era, the fascination may be less about attraction than about a strange kind of envy of the shows' sociopathic villains. How many bright, talented, acutely sensitive young women have occasionally fantasized about having an internal "mute button" that could silence the judging, nagging, needy voices of all around them?

I can sort of see this.  They may also want to be around sociopaths because sociopaths are relatively "silent" emotionally.  I have at least a few female friends who are on the other extreme of the empathy spectrum than I am.  I think one of the things they like about me is that they can be extremely emotional needy about things, e.g. take several months to get over a break up, and know that I'll let them talk forever and when I get bored of hearing about it, I just tune them out.  I'm not put out by it, I am not really anything about it at all.  I guess there's something nice about being around someone who isn't feeling exactly what you're feeling.  But I don't know, that's basically my life all the time, so I have no basis for comparison.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Types of love


A reader recently asked me about how I feel the different types of love (e.g. Éros, storge, philia and agápe). When I love someone like a close friend or family member, it is primarily a feeling of gratitude for who they are in my life.  I don't typically "need" anyone, so I do not identify with a desperate, needing sort of love.  To the extent that I feel passionate or intensely for another person, it is because I have become obsessed or fixated with them.  It does not always mean love, though, and love doesn't not always mean intensity, at least to me.

I can connect with people in various ways but I don't have vicarious feelings like empathy.  If I show interest in someone else's suffering or happiness, it is more like a very strong curiosity.  I have always felt like so much of the world is hidden.  There is always a special pleasure for me in hidden things becoming revealed.  It must be why empaths experience voyeurism and schadenfreude.  Actually, one of the main reasons I enjoy longer term relationships is that eventually I can reveal to them all of my machinations from the beginning -- what I did to them, how I engineered particular situations, my foresight and skill throughout the early stages of the relationships during which I was required to keep everything hidden.  There is a very pleasant tension and release aspect to that activity.  It's almost sexual.

Monday, May 7, 2012

Politically calculating

I've been swamped with work lately and in boredom found this article on the new tell-all book about Barack Obama.  The book includes descriptions about Obama from several people that knew him in his younger days, including contemporaneous accounts about him from his ex-girlfriends letters and diaries.


"The success of 'Dreams' has given Obama nearly complete control of his own life narrative, an appealing tale that has been the foundation of his political success. But Maraniss's biography threatens that narrative by questioning it: Was Obama's journey entirely spiritual and intellectual? Or was it also grounded in the lower realms of ambition and calculation?" Dylan Byers and Glenn Thrush write.

Obama granted Maraniss a 90-minute interview, some surmise in an effort to control his image. Cooke's diary entries, however, reveal that Obama's struggle over what to reveal has been ongoing -- since his youth.

"Friday, March 9, 1984 It's not a question of my wanting to probe ancient pools of emotional trauma ... but more a sense of you [Barack] biding your time and drawing others' cards out of their hands for careful inspection -- without giving too much of your own away -- played with a good poker face," she wrote.  "And as you say, it's not a question of intent on your part -- or deliberate withholding -- you feel accessible, and you are, in disarming ways. But I feel that you carefully filter everything in your mind and heart -- legitimate, admirable, really -- a strength, a necessity in terms of some kind of integrity. But there's something also there of smoothed veneer, of guardedness ... but I'm still left with this feeling of ... a bit of a wall -- the veil."


Doesn't this sound like a sociopath?  I have read a lot of people calling Obama a sociopath before but have never really put much stock in it until now.  Let's just say I wouldn't reject the thought of him being a sociopath, and I mean that in the nicest way.


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