Saturday, July 20, 2013

Is Twisted's Danny Desai a sociopath?

Twisted, an ABC Family teenage murder mystery drama along the same lines as their Pretty Little Liars, has a potential (likely?) sociopathic teenage protagonist -- Danny Desai. It's so likely that Danny is a sociopath that the original working title for the show was "Socio" and the abbreviation gets thrown around at least once an episode, along with plenty of accusations that he is a sociopath from his teenage peers, some amusingly framed in amusing pop culture references to The Good Son, The Bad Seed, and We Need to Talk About Kevin.

The show begins with Danny, now sixteen years old, having just been released from juvenile detention for having killed his aunt when he was eleven years old, starting high school with his former peers. In the pilot another girl gets murdered and Danny's past history (and the convenient timing of the second girl's murder) make him a prime suspect both in the eyes of the police and the townspeople. But perhaps the show comes closest to acknowledging that Danny is a sociopath when his mother goes to visit his court ordered therapist:

Mother: "So, how's he doing?"

Dr.: "Well, he's a smart young man."


Mother: "Yes he is. Dr. Reidy, I'm sure that you've heard of some of the hateful words people have been calling Danny... monster, freak, sociopath..."

Dr.: "I wouldn't let it get to you Mrs. Desai. It's a heightened time."


Mother: Oh I know, but as a mother, how should I respond to people calling him that. [Pause] I'm not being clear. What are the signs that someone is a sociopath, so that I can explain why Danny isn't one?"


Dr.: "Most sociopaths don't murder anyone, but they do exhibit glibness, superficial charm, an easy ability to lie."

Mother: "Right."


Dr.: "Let's see, what else, they love risk, they don't consider consequences, they have a talent for imitating human emotion -- grief, joy. It's never real, but they're good at making you believe it is. Is that helpful Mrs. Desai?"


The funny part is that Danny actually did murder someone, along with exhibiting all of the other traits of a sociopath that his therapist mentioned. But his mom stands by him, even after having her suspicions about his sociopathy essentially confirmed. She even helps (she thinks) him cover up another possible murder.

Even if Danny is not a sociopath, it's an interesting exploration of a teenage boy living with the stigma of having murdered someone (or at least having been convicted of murder), and how he deals with that (spoiler alert, by alternating violent outbursts against his enemies and charming himself back into the hearts of his already smitten followers), and how his friends and family deal with it (almost unwavering support). That he is such a likeable character (unambiguously so if Twitter is any indication) suggests that the millennial generation (the audience for this particular show) might be the first generation to really accept and even embrace sociopaths in their own lives. So, that's hopeful.


Friday, July 19, 2013

More on cruelty

Keeping in line with yesterday's post, from The American Conservative, "The Walking Boy", a true story about one man's experience being a boy-racist because he hung out with racist friends and he couldn't help himself?:

All I can say in my defense is that I never hurled a stone at him, or shouted abuse. But I stood by, many a time, as others did those things, and I neither walked away nor averted my eyes. I never held anyone’s cloak, but then I was never asked to. I watched it all, gripping a rock in my hand as though I were preparing to use it — so that no one would turn on me with anger or contempt — and I always stood a little behind them so they couldn’t see that I wasn’t throwing anything. I was smaller and younger than the rest of them, and they were smaller and younger than him. In my memory he seems almost a full-grown man; I suppose he was eleven or twelve. 

We called him Nigger Jeff. I have never doubted that Jeff was indeed his name, though as I write this account I find myself asking, for the first time, how we could have known: I never heard any of the boys speak to him except in cries of hatred, and I never knew anyone else who knew him. It occurs to me now that, if his name was Jeff, there had to have been at least a brief moment of human contact and exchange — perhaps not even involving Jeff, perhaps one of the boys’ mothers talked to Jeff’s mother. But we grasp what’s available for support or stability. It’s bad to call a boy Nigger Jeff, but worse still to call him just Nigger. A name counts for something.
***
Sometimes I would be playing alone in my yard, and would look up to see Jeff walking by. My heart would then buck in my chest, but he never turned his head to acknowledge my presence. At the time I wondered if he knew that I never threw rocks at him, that I didn’t curse him — for, if my memory is not appeasing my conscience, I avoided that crime as well. But now I realize that he neither knew nor cared about the individual members of our cruel impromptu assembly: with rocks in our hands we were just mobile, noisy impediments to his enjoyment of some of the blessings of life — friendship, comfort, safety — but when unarmed and solitary we posed no threat and therefore, for Jeff, lacked significant substance. He kept his eyes on that day’s small but valued prize, and kept on walking. 

Why didn’t I throw rocks at him? Why didn’t I curse him? Well, obviously, because I felt sorry for him. But not sorry enough to walk away, or to turn my back on the scene; and not nearly sorry enough to stay a friend’s hand or demand his silence. I was young, and small, and timid. I saw one valid option: to stand as a member of the chorus, grasping the rock that was the badge of our common identity. There’s no point now in trying to distinguish myself from the others. But I can’t help it.

First, is it really true that "Nigger Jeff" is better than "nigger"? Arguably worse, right? Because it's both acknowledging his humanity (that he is a human boy with a name) and in the same breath saying that he is a lesser form of humanity. I myself prefer less personal, nameless insults, but maybe I'm not typical that way.

This sort of bullying is not unique to just children, but adults can be equally childish about it. Mainstream media trades in it, despite all of their recent anti bullying talk. One of my friends was recently remarking at how it's amazing that Lindsay Lohan has put up with all of the abuse -- for the past 10 years or so there have probably been no fewer than five negative articles/posts/tweets per day about her. And Lindsay Lohan is not even the most hated human alive, not by a landslide, but apparently she just happens to have a particular suite of personality characteristics that make her a perfect storm for gossip? Bullying, really. But let's argue for a second that she brought it on herself (should that matter?). But when do you finally leave someone alone? Does that give people moral carte blanche to engage in shaming and other ugly behavior about her personal life? But no one really questions their right to do so, I hadn't even noticed it myself until my friend mentioned it. And why are people so eager to engage in ugly behavior in the first place that they're looking for socially "legitimate" opportunities to throw stones?

The American Conservative story reminded of the creepy Shirley Jackson short (fictional but not so far-fetched) story, "The Lottery." Someone gets chosen completely randomly to get stoned, but that doesn't matter -- once the person became marked, everything was fair game because they had the sanction of the group.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

Senseless violence

Under the headline "Teenagers arrested for decapitating homeless man, playing soccer with his head":

Two teenagers have been nicked for allegedly decapitating a homeless man before playing soccer with his head. The pair, who were said to have taken a dislike to the man before killing him, then allegedly left his head in a bin.

"Allegedly" played soccer with his head, The Sun clarifies:

The suspects could face up to 15 years in prison if convicted of murder. A spokesman for Russia’s Investigative Committee later cast doubts on reports that the teenagers had used the head as a football. He said a “full picture” of what had happened was still being established.

Humans are capable of every sort of barbarism. Why?

bethjohnson888@yahoo.com Beth Johnson

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Children = creepy monsters

I have often said that sociopaths are not difficult to understand, they're basically four year olds in an adult's body. They manipulate like four year olds. The world revolves around them like four year olds, but they can also be genuinely interested/curious about the people and things around them like four year olds. They can be surprisingly naive about certain things and tactlessly blunt. They don't have a great understanding of their own emotional worlds or the emotional worlds of others, nor do they have great emotional regulation. They will throw tantrums, sometimes violent, and they can sometimes be hard to reason with, but they still rationally respond to incentives. Four year olds can be incredibly cruel and devious. They can also be very creepy, as illustrated by this BuzzFeed article, "The 13 Creepiest Things A Child Has Ever Said To A Parent," from a longer reddit thread.

Worth reading in their entirety, some of my favorites include:

  • "I'm imagining the waves of blood rushing over me."
  • "I was tucking in my two year old. He said "Good bye dad." I said, "No, we say good night." He said "I know. But this time its good bye.""
  • "My 3 year old daughter stood next to her new born brother and looked at him for awhile then turned and looked at me and said, "Daddy its a monster..we should bury it.""
  • "Death is the poor man's doctor."

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Freudian look at psychopaths?

This was a sort of interesting, Freudian influenced approach to explaining psychopaths that may resonate with some of you, J. Reid Meloy (author of "The Psychopathic Mind: Origins, Dynamics, and Treatment") with subsequent commentary by Donald Carveth. He is a little bit more on the Hare side of his understanding (i.e. not too sympathetic), but it is a pretty decent overview of some of the more famous studies of sociopaths.





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