Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Writing fictional sociopaths

This was an interesting New Yorker article about the difficulty of writing fiction with elderly characters, and how infrequently authors get it right and why not. About the problem of old people being depicted incorrectly:

But when I asked her about the ethical responsibility younger authors have to depict old age realistically, she responded, “As a writer, you have to think—am I capable of this quantum leap of the imagination? If the answer is dubious—then don’t do it. Stereotyping is a kind of fictional abuse.”

As for what she thinks she got wrong when she was creating elderly characters as a younger writer, she says she wasn’t quite able, back then, to imagine the less dramatic physical aspects of being old: the constant pain from various forms of arthritis, the slow impairment of sight and hearing, and a “kind of instability,” a loss of balance “that would be unnerving if it came on suddenly, but, because it is gradual, you adapt.” With the elderly protagonist Claudia, in “Moon Tiger” (written when Lively was in her early fifties), she says, “I ducked the problem … by making her a mind rather than a body—she is dying in hospital, but not much is made of that, what you know of her are her thoughts and her memories.” What she believes she got right, however, is that Claudia’s mindset in old age is much the same as when she was young; this, she says, has been true to her own experience of getting older.

I thought of all the fictional depictions of sociopaths, and how surprising it is when they actually get certain aspects right, and how that rightness is so hard to maintain consistently throughout a story or several seasons of a show (I'm looking at you Dexter). It reminded me of the post on the Dr. Who character who gets redeemed in a way that basically seems to just make her an empath convert. But I have gotten better in the past couple years about things like not manipulating people or objectifying them all of the time or being more in touch with my emotions, but I'm not suddenly just like an empath. And for some reason I keep thinking that if there is such thing as enlightenment, a heightened plane of existence, it's going to be something much more like meeting in the middle between empath and sociopath than all sociopaths, autistics, personality disordered, bipolar, etc. etc. etc. just all suddenly become like your average empath. Does that hurt your feelings, empaths? That I don't feel compelled to convert to your cause, despite no longer being 100% sold on the sociopathic lifestyle?

Sunday, November 1, 2015

Early childhood intervention -- a missed opportunity

From a reader:

I talked with my friend - I've written you about him before - Professor Psychopath. He's from a family with high-functioning psychopaths on both sides. His dad is/was a compulsive gambler, lives off various women, delights in knocking people out in street fights, etc. The mom had similar men in her family - they were literally royals (in their home country). PP is a professor with a lot of bad habits - things like driving down the street the wrong way for thrills. He's as Machiavellian/cold-hearted as they come.

He shared the following with me: when he was young, a teacher noticed he was really shy and had some issues suggesting he might need some help. They did a full battery of tests. The parents kept the information from the kids because - they said - they didn't want the kids to feel bad/good depending on their IQ ranking - all of the kids had genius IQs. These days two of the kids have PhDs in STEM and the other one was a successful entrepreneur. The parents didn't tell them that they'd done general psych tests, so they thought they were just IQ tests.

So today the dad gave him his scores from the psych tests. All he said was something about the IQ, and was proud (as if he had anything personally to do with having an IQ, passing it, on, LOL). Our guy learned today (30 years after the fact) that they'd done personality tests too.

He was surprised to see that they'd had him pegged when he was still a child. They figured that he was very smart, but with lots of problems relating to others, including social anxiety, OCD and aggression. They noticed all things that have made his life (and those in his family) difficult: OCD, social anxiety and lousy impulse control. They noted he had a great ability to strategize and scheme, but little ability to complete things. Total desire/inability to do assigned tasks - he wouldn't follow orders . He did work on tasks that he found interesting.

They didn't label him a "psychopath" or "sociopath", but they did say that given his body/age, they were recommending that he get some psychological treatment and learn to emotionally connect with others and control his anger, lest he become a bully in a few years (which he did). The OCD and social anxiety eventually became debilitating, at which point - decades later - he got treatment. After he got the treatment for anxiety he went on a tear, traveling around the world seducing women. A bit like Walter White (Breaking Bad) the high levels of social-anxiety (manifesting as emotions like fear, shame, envy) kept him in check. Once that lessened  his lack of a conscience, need for stimulation and antisocial bent led to him doing a lot of extreme things.

When he looked at the results, he felt disappointed. The teachers had tried to help. And nothing came of it. He wonders what might have happened if they'd intervened earlier.

He figures his narcissistic dad was too involved in his gambling habit to care. He's so self-absorbed he probably didn't read the report much, and probably ignored the negative stuff. The mom had her head way up her ass - but had she said anything about the kid needing help, the dad would have shut that down - if only because he needed to run the show. He didn't to be the guy with the screwup kid.  It wasn't hard at all for PP to put himself in his dad's shoes (they are VERY similar) and realize how his dad would have thought/felt about the report: "hey, MY kid is super smart. Of course he is. Chip off the old block." And that was it. He didn't act on the information that he could act on.

So PP wasn't too resentful about his dad. He said he had compassion for him; the dad really couldn't have done otherwise. I thought about my own family - very similar situation and way of relating to it - which is why he'd told me. FWIW, my dad only raised me because the government paid him to do it. He took custody of me weeks after it became possible to get paid to raise me due to my mother killing herself. I had to move out of the house as soon as the government checks stopped coming. He spent the money on his hobbies. When my extended family told me about my dad's behavior and motivations, it all made sense. I wasn't particularly bothered with him; what else was he going to do? The most irritating thing for me was that he couldn't be honest about his motivations.

I gave some thought to the phenomenon of diagnosing kids and the families dropping the ball. I know a family with Aspergery/ADD kids. I helped one of them (in his 50s) to do basic tasks that he'd never learned to do. It took me being patient, focused on the goal, creative, etc. I really made a positive difference in his life - the family is very grateful. When they expressed that to me, I was mostly angry with them - why hadn't they done the same thing? It wasn't like it was hard - how hard is it to hold a gun to someone's head to get them to do something? And it would have really helped him out. But then, spending time with them, it was clear why they couldn't help - they were all too Aspergery/ADD/Catlady to make it happen. As soon as the going got rough they would have folded. They were really lucky to have a kind psychopath in their lives.

Anyway, this got me thinking that psychopathic families will relate "psychopathically" to the news they are "special" (with a shrug, or perhaps a prideful, "yes, we're really at our best in crises"). If they get serious about change, they'll detonate their lives - really burn them to the ground - and set up a life with structure (join the military/monastery) and try again. Aspergery/ADD/Catlady families will wring their hands and start a self-improvement program (and then quit it 6 weeks in). Stupid families will be too stupid to integrate the information and do anything.

So in conclusion, perhaps it makes sense that extreme traits in families - creativity, psychopathy, stupidity, ADHD - exist because they are self-sustaining. Eg society will try to get the underclass to behave more like the middle class; it won't work. Society will try to get the psychopaths to behave - they'll ignore it. Society will try to get the ADHD/Aspergery people to retrain their brains - but perhaps they'll be too distracted/upset to make changes. Or maybe not - perhaps this is just overthinking it.

Friday, October 30, 2015

How do empaths want to be treated?

A reader asks a question that amazingly hasn't really been addressed before (at least not to my memory). And I know that because I myself couldn't come up with anything helpful to say, perhaps due to my own somewhat limited success in this area:

I recently read your book and have started exploring your website. It's relatively easy to find articles on dealing with having a partner that is a sociopath (even though most of them say "run before he rips out your intestines and feasts on the bodies of your loved ones"), but I am curious on your perspective on how a sociopath should go about dealing with an empath.

My fiancée and I have two rules when it comes to my sociopathy; don't be manipulative towards her and don't completely "click out" when I get pissed. It is working rather well so far but I would like to know your thoughts on the matter.

I suggested that perhaps it would be most efficacious to ask the empaths who sometimes visit if they have any advice for how a sociopath could be more effective or better meet expectations in a relationship with an empath.

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Degenerative brain disease causes pseudo-psychopathy

From a reader:

I found another article you might be interested in.
It's about a psychiatrist who started experiencing a degenerative brain disease (frontotemporal dementia) that eventually got him to exhibit behavior reminiscent of criminal socios.

I'm not saying that's why sociopaths are the way they are, but there might be some connection (e.g. similar brain areas being affected).

Here's the link to the article:
A Criminal Mind

Monday, October 26, 2015

Sociopaths on television: Doctor Who

From a reader:

I suspect you've heard this from many, but the latest Doctor Who seems to have borrowed not only your style but your name. You really might value seeing the latest episode, "The Woman Who Lived", about an involuntarily immortal woman who has lived so long she has ceased to feel or care, and who happens to be a thrill~seeking, nihilistic, face~changing highwayman in a mask. Being Doctor Who, the romantic morality goes places I would prefer it didn't, but Ashildr/Me is still a fascinating portrait.

DOCTOR: Anyone in that village would have died for you.
ME: Well, they're all dead now, and here I am. So, I guess it all worked out.

DOCTOR: Ashildr...

ME: That's not my name. I don't even remember that name.

DOCTOR: Well, what... what do you call yourself?

ME: "Me".

DOCTOR: Yes, you, there's nobody else here.

ME: No, I call myself "Me". All the other names I chose died with whoever knew me. "Me" is who I am now. No one's mother, daughter, wife. My own companion. Singular. Unattached. Alone. Anyway, I should get started. Jump on, I'll give you a ride. You can help me.

You can find the episode here:
https://www.animmex.com/video/10635/doctor-who-2005-s09e06-the-woman-who-lived

​~~~

​I read your book two years ago, and it started a process of self~understanding which has finally brought peace and sense to a perplexing life. In the process, I've gained an education in psychology and the diversities of the human condition more valuable than my degree in philosophy. Thank you.

I'm an escort, dominatrix, and live~in mistress, residing in a tolerant country which allows me a more~or~less openly antisocial lifestyle. I feel next to nothing for others, and in what people call morality I experience as something like a logical fallacy. I live a reasonably peaceful life entertaining people, but I think I could commit genocide and feel only curiosity, power, and excitement. "I am my freedom", to quote Sartre, and I would not wish it any other way.

[Continue on for spoilers]

in case you haven't seen the episode I should warn you (I didn't want to spoil), that the episode suddenly pulls Me's sociopathic personality at the last possible moment.

"Redeeming", softening, or retconning evidently sociopathic characters (Sherlock, Dexter, Rick from Rick and Morty, Capaldi's Doctor from last season) seems to be a thing television writers feel compelled to do. Just like lesbians used to be portrayed as going straight once they find the right man, and Jews were once supposed to convert to Christianity by the end of the play.

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