I recently watched a series of programs about crime investigation. For some reason, two were especially memorable. A young and strong policeman suddenly falls ill and dies a few days after excruciating pains. Diagnosis - natural death, heart attack. After about 6 years, an equally young and strong firefighter suddenly dies just as suddenly with the same symptoms and the conclusion of pathologists. What happens, of course: we all walk under God. However, it was strange that both were husbands of the same woman, although the relatives of both deceased did not even know about it. Thanks to the efforts of a criminal journalist, who learned from conversations with a poison specialist that such deaths could have been caused by antifreeze poisoning, the corpses were re-examined, and traces of antifreeze were found in the tissues of the victims. So, including other additional evidence, it was proven that the same woman killed both.
Another crime. A woman and her two minor sons were admitted to the hospital. The woman was dying. In a few days, all her hair fell out, she lost weight up to 45 kg. The boys were in a little better shape. When the woman's blood was examined, it turned out that she had been poisoned with thallium. Thallium was also found in the blood of the boys and her husband. Thallium is a heavy metal, extremely poisonous and of very rare use. People were worried: what is it? Is the water flowing into their area poisoned? Maybe some other product in their area? A group of experts hurried to the home of the sick. Thallium was tested for water, plates, garbage - everything. And the source was found. Thallium ended up at the bottom of empty Coca-Cola households. Having opened unopened bottles, they found thallium there as well. The specialist was sent to the Coca-Cola factory. It turned out that it is simply not possible to poison one box of the product there. If the poisoning of the drink happened in a factory, then a whole batch would be infected, and a lot of people would be affected. The specialist also managed to find out that the only chemical that did not change the taste, color, did not produce more gas, etc. could only be thallium. It means that the one who poisoned the drink had a very good knowledge of chemistry. .... I will not dwell on the details of the study now, although they are very interesting.
It turned out that the whole family was poisoned by their neighbor, whom the boys sometimes annoyed with loud music. With a very thin instrument, he opened the lids, poured in the poison, and then very carefully sealed them again and left the Coca-Cola box on the neighbor's doorstep. I don’t know why they considered him theirs. Maybe they themselves left the box on the doorstep, and the neighbor, having done his dirty work, returned it to its place. Their houses were quite far from other houses. And the neighbor's house was not very close. One way or another, the woman died, and the boys and husband managed to escape. The neighbor was jailed after a very long investigation.
So these two criminals have never regretted taking the lives of other people. Not the slightest sign of remorse. They were called sociopaths. That's when I became interested in this term. And here's what I found out.
According to the book TheSociopathNextDoor1 in 25 people is a sociopath. And here it is said only about one of their types. This type - active sociopath... He can only pacify himself for a while and put on a mask of decency. The rest of the time, he doesn't hold back.
The second type is passive sociopath, most of the time behaves quite decently, accepting the leadership of some external authority, such as religion or law, or becoming attached at times to some stronger person. These people are not guided by the usual considerations of humanity, but simply obey their accepted interpretation of what is written in the "book."
Further material is taken from Wikipedia and from here - http://www.naturalnews.com/036112_sociopaths_cults_influence.html#ixzz1xGpbp5kp.
Signs of sociopaths (not all here; others - later in the text):
1. heartless indifference to the feelings of others;
2. disregard for social rules and responsibilities; they fully "understand" social norms, but ignore them;
3. inability to feel guilt, remorse, shame and benefit from life experience, especially punishment;
4. a pronounced tendency to blame others or put forward plausible explanations for their behavior;
5. often lie, use pseudonyms, deceive others in order to gain profit;
6. are impatient and irritable, often aggressive and easily get into fights;
7. take risks without caring about their own safety or the safety of others;
8. are unable to plan ahead; irresponsible, not inclined to systematic work.
Sociopaths' personality traits often lead them to commit crimes and, as a result, to stay in prison, however, they never regret committing a crime , but only about being caught on this. They can self-actualize as leaders of sects, criminal and fraudulent groups. They often become drug addicts or abuse alcohol, but not so much because they avoid reality, but because indulge their desires.
McWilliams describes this " personality disorder»As based on deep inability to form attachments to other peoplefrom their own parents to their own children. From her point of view, the sociopath does not see attachments between other people, and interprets their relationship solely as mutual manipulation. In accordance with his perception of society, a sociopath also builds his relationships with people around him: on manipulation, in order to satisfy his own desires. Since a sociopath has no attachments, other people's needs and desires have no value for him, and he acts, focusing only on his own.
Sociopaths can't love ... They can play with love and compassion to get what they want. However, the very feeling of love is not known to them.
May produce extremely positive impression, in order, subsequently, to use it to your advantage. Many have charm and sex appeal. Love to be in the spotlight.
Have no remorse, or rather have no conscience or have it in an extremely underdeveloped form.
Sociopaths are masters exaggerate, sometimes to the point of absurdity... For example, an ordinary person will say, "I threw up yesterday." A sociopath will say, "I vomited a 9-meter tapeworm yesterday!" A real sociopath would even add: “... then the worm climbed onto the wall and jumped at me. He tried to strangle me! " You can laugh at this explanation. But there are many who are believed by their followers. Since no one can confirm or deny such stories, because no one was at the described event, the sociopath can add whatever details he wants. He may say, “After I ate this, I had a 3-hour erection,” or “The Dalai Lama wanted to anoint me as a spiritual leader, but I refused, telling him that I only needed faith, not official recognition. ".
When presented with evidence that the sociopath was not telling the truth, the reaction will always be aggressive towards whoever offers these facts... He never responds to the accusations presented, but attacks the messenger. Could call him a government secret agent, a spy, or even an alien from the planet Zong who is plotting something dangerous against him.
If someone from the group of his investigators begins to doubt his chosenness, then this member is expelled from the group and the rest of the group works to undermine his reputation.
If a sociopath is caught with a suitcase full of money just stolen from the bank, he will immediately declare that he SAVED the money that was stolen by someone else and wants to give the money to the real owner. Those. necessarily make himself a hero... If they begin to ask him about the details of how the money came to him, he will immediately begin to attack for doubting his honesty.
They are skilled at presenting themselves as heroes with high morale or even saints, however, in fact, they have the mind of criminals who steal, humiliate, deceive and often turn one group of people against another, which leads to hatred and even bloody showdown. However, they think of themselves as real saviors and, and simply cannot understand that in fact they themselves are the organizers of this hatred.
It is impossible to argue (even with all the documents and evidence) sociopaths.
Sociopaths never apologizebecause they think they are always right.
Many sociopaths consider themselves spiritually more developedand have very high intelligence, but they use it not for the benefit of other people, but in order to deceive others. Many well-known serial killers were sociopaths.
Sociopaths can speak ... They are masters of monologue that are often intriguing and hypnotic. (E.g. sociopathic killer Charles Munson http://www.youtube.com/watch?v\u003daIfGj_55FHI).
They are often convinced that what they say becomes true... For example Munson, the killer of many people, in the video above (3:05 pm) says: “I never killed anyone! I don't need to kill! I think it's! I have it here (points to his forehead)! I do not live in this physical world. "
Their speeches capture the imagination and sound logical, truthful and authoritative. They can be very hypnotic. But if you listen to their speeches later on in the recording, beyond the reach of their charm, then people notice that what they say is absurd and even dangerous. However, people under the influence of active sociopathic gurus believe them to such an extent that they create false memories for themselves, passing fantasies as reality. Those who are deceived by them can kill themselves only in order not to deceive the expectations of the group.
The members of Johnson's group (referring to those who survived) believed until then that their organization was based on love, life and light, until they were freed from the hypnosis of their sociopathic leader.
The ultimate goal of a sociopath is to destroy himself and take with him as many willing victims as possible. The sad fact is that when a sociopath kills himself (and several of his followers are killed with him), he is always replaced by another sociopath seeking power, influence, and sometimes fame. They always want to be in the spotlight, so they want to get on TV in any way in order to secure more fans.
Another sign of a sociopath is his fascination with something dead (corpses and everything related to death), rotten (eating some rotten food), dangerous (snakes, scorpions, poisons, drugs, etc.), which is disgusting for an ordinary person. Jim Jones, for example, was fascinated by death, and killed sizeable animals in order to then perform their funerals.
Many sociopaths often make their followers drink or eat something very strangee, which normally a normal person does not consume. They often use some kind of poisons. For example, sociopath Jim Jones, who killed over 900 people by convincing them to drink poison ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v\u003dD7IxGGfpSWk). Or another sociopath, Marshall Applewhite, who caused 39 people to poison themselves (see here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v\u003dAqSZhwu1Rwo). Look at their faces. People loved them and believed them, even to death.
The most prominent example of an active sociopath is Hitler. All the hallmarks of a sociopath were well expressed in him: a brilliant orator, a born liar, a complete lack of compassion for others, dominance, aggressiveness, and resorting to spirituality to justify one's actions.
Sociopaths today are found in all walks of life, but mostly where specialized professional knowledge can be dispensed with: in New Age societies and other spiritual organizations.
Are sociopaths a modern phenomenon? Of course not. They have lived among us since the very creation of the world as tares left by God until the Day of Judgment (Matthew 13: 24-30). These are the Nephilim, children of the fallen angels, angel-human hybrids. These are not people without conscience and compassion, but non-people. Sociopathy cannot be cured, just as you cannot make a person a cat or a crocodile with the help of pills. They are a completely different kind of creature, not created by God.
They were those ancient heroes and gods that legends tell about. Heroes ??? Gods ??? Only in their imagination, like all sociopaths.
A very small percentage of sociopaths realize that they are deprived of something (soul) and turn to psychotherapists. These are the ones that have more genes from a person (or something else that we do not know about yet). They still have the hope of salvation through faith. Those serial killers with dead eyes, whom, after long conversations, were still able to be persuaded to formal repentance and put a cross on them, have no such hope. There is no place for them on the new earth.
Be careful: your neighbor down the stairs may be a sociopath. All you can do is stay away from him.
The experiment involved 300 people. Women suffered, men shrugged their shoulders ...
Would such a person blush? © flickr.com
Women of all times and peoples so often and so hopelessly sadly accused men of lack of conscience that this, in the end, interested scientists. There is no smoke without fire - what if it really isn't in a strictly scientific sense, without emotions?
The experiment involved 300 men and women. They were offered various life situations “for virtual living”, and then asked to describe their feelings as accurately as possible. The “performances” were programmed to arouse feelings of guilt of one degree or another and had a purely everyday plot: “I came home at dawn on the wedding anniversary,” “I didn't wash the dishes,” “I promised not to drink, and now - again!”, “Left with girlfriends to the sauna "," I forgot to sew him a button. "
The findings were overwhelming: men did not "register" any worries inside themselves until the speech came about their guilt ... before themselves. Excessive alcohol consumption, shirking from workouts in the gym bothered the gentle soul of men much more than the "forgotten" visit to the mother-in-law, who spent the whole night at the current toilet waiting for her beloved son-in-law, who promised to "twist and grease something," but ... forgot.
Well, men's souls do not feel guilt from such trifles and that's it! Nerve receptors are silent, the mechanism does not turn on ... And it is useless to appeal to something that does not exist in principle ...
But why?
Men are accustomed to thinking globally, scientists explain, without exchanging for trifles. They don't want to waste their nerves on something that doesn't matter. In the head of every man there is an invisible border between "significant" things and "trifles". And if anniversaries, bouquets and mother-in-law fell into "trifles", no reproaches will throw a man off balance. The most they can do is express their sincere surprise at such a hot reaction from a cute one.
The situation changes if a man is reproached for inattention to himself, to his beloved. For example, a regular reminder that smoking kills his lungs throws a man off balance - after all, we are talking about himself, a priori falling into the “global” column.
Accept men for who they are! - psychologists advise. This will save you energy and preserve your relationship.
Perhaps they are right ... It is foolish to ask a caterpillar to fly over the garden - not given, so not given!
But they have a lot to learn!
Psychologists classify guilt as the most unconstructive of all emotions. And the ability of a woman to suffer from remorse for not being able to console her friend who had a falling out with her husband, did not wash all the old mother's underwear in one sitting, but allowed herself a "bachelorette party" - a fair amount of stupidity. Besides, it has nothing to do with the concept of "conscience."
Conscience is what pushes a person to self-improvement, a desire to become better. Feelings of guilt are a stupid reaction to other people's expectations, nothing more. A black hole into which your energy goes. And a great tool for manipulating you.
So men, without being burdened with pangs of conscience, do very right. And you need to learn from them, and not waste your energy trying to change what a priori cannot be changed. And it is not necessary.
Join the group, leave your commentsIn everyday life, we often say phrases: "A person without conscience", "shameless", "no shame, no conscience", "completely lost conscience", "live according to conscience." What is conscience? Conscience is the noble element of the soul.
However, not every person has a conscience. Some have it, others have it dormant, for the time being, and still others, it is absent altogether or is lost due to the zombie or degradation of the soul. Those people who have a conscience, and act according to conscience, according to the principle: "Do with others as you would like to be treated with you."
A conscientious person weighs his actions, corrects mistakes, restrains irritation and negative emotions. Even when you really want to answer the offender with rudeness to rudeness, he finds words and expressions to stop an unpleasant conversation, a scene. Such a person can lose loved ones, friends, but he will never lose himself, because he has a conscience - a good counselor in life. A sense of conscience in an extraordinary way protects its owner from the loss of the most important thing - honesty and decency. Those who have their conscience dormant for the time being, one day realize that they have lived their lives wrong, violating natural laws.
The conscience of such people wakes up, and with it comes the problems associated with working off everything that has been done in life not according to conscience, but the way one wants. Repentance comes: "Why did I do this then?" Sometimes this "why" hangs in the air, because it is impossible to correct the situation, the problem - it just took time, and with it the people who participated in this situation.
Let's talk about the third - who have no conscience at all. I think that they are the most unlucky in life. A person without conscience is an aggressor, a ruthless person. It seems to him that he is strong, cunning, dexterous. He is lucky, and everything works out for the time being, for his soul is slowly smoldering. Today he deceived, tomorrow he stepped over love, friendship, family relations, betrayed someone or sold for money. Sooner or later, such a person becomes lonely, unnecessary to anyone. And even those for whom he worked especially hard leave him. There is nothing worse than oblivion and loneliness. There comes a time when a person meets his conscience. It gives rise to a feeling of shame in the soul, for all those actions that have already been committed and remained in the past.
The past cannot be returned, not corrected, and already there, in conscience, not to enter. In the present, because of this, chaos and imbalance occur, we are losing the most precious thing we have. Conscience clearly regulates all values \u200b\u200bfrom spiritual to material. Therefore, a person without conscience clings to material values, losing the most important - spiritual. And then they say about him: "He has no shame, no conscience."
Those who have a conscience cannot understand those who have no conscience at all. Do not try to explain to a shameless person that he is doing wrong, unworthy - he will never understand you, because he has no conscience, which means his views on life and values. It should be noted that a person who does not have a conscience is energetically infectious to others, he, like a parasite, wants more and more, but, as a rule, at someone else's expense. And since he has no conscience, he is not able to love, regret, be merciful. Do not knock on closed souls, just give all the problems associated with this person to the will of the Higher Forces and time - this way you will save your bright soul from destruction.
If you were completely free of conscience - no moral hesitation and no guilt - what do you think you would do with your life?
When I ask people this question, as is often the case, the typical response is "Wow" or "Stunned", followed by silence, during which the audience wrinkles their faces in mental effort, as if someone asked them a question in a half-familiar language.
After that, most people grin or laugh, apparently amazed at what authority the conscience has in their lives, and answer with some version: “I have no idea what I’ll do, but I’m sure it will not be what I'm doing now. "
One particularly creative person chuckled after “wow” and a short pause and said, “Maybe I'll be the dictator of a small country or something like that.” He said it as if it was more sensible and more impressive than the socially valuable professional career to which he actually dedicated himself.
Wouldn't it be smarter to have no conscience? Would we be happier? We know that large groups of people will be in trouble: whole nations of sociopaths, all for oneself. But realistically, on an individual level, will you or I, as individuals, be happier and richer if we can get rid of the limitations of conscience? Of course, from time to time it seems that this is so. Dishonest people are in positions of power and corporate thieves are buying golf streams * and yachts, while we do business and make “reasonable” car loan payments.
But what is the truth? Psychologically, are sociopaths really better off than we are, or is it a happy lot to have a conscience?
In a pragmatic irony, we have been selected from the beginning by nature to be social beings, inclined to share what we have.
Even our brains are designed to be emotionally connected to each other and to have a sense of conscience. Rather, all but a few of us took this path.
Benefiting from a different but equally pragmatic selection process, some have evolved as outcasts, indifferent to their siblings, with emotionally disabled brains that hatch completely selfish plans. From the perspective of the 21st century, looking through the eyes of a psychologist, which of these two ancient communities, conscientious or sociopathic, better disposed of their human nature?
Losing victory
It would be difficult to refute the observation that people who are completely unburdened by conscience sometimes gain power and wealth without hindrance, at least for a while. Too many chapters in the book of human history, from its first lines to its most recent records, are built around the astounding successes of military invaders, conquerors, oligarchs and empire builders.
These individuals have either died too long ago or are too privileged to be formally assessed as a clinical psychologist would like. But given their well-known and well-documented behavior, we assume without even knowing the scalePdthat a significant number of these individuals are unlikely to have any pervasive sense of duty based on emotional attachment to others. In other words, some of them were and are sociopaths.
Worse, brutal conquerors and empire-builders tend to hold their contemporaries in awe, and throughout their lives are often viewed as role models for all of humanity.
Undoubtedly, countless thirteenth-century Mongol boys fell asleep to tales of the indomitable Genghis Khan, and everyone wonders about the modern heroes we offer our children: Will they eventually go down in history as motivated by merciless self-interest?
Lack of conscience also works well for sexual conquest.
As an illustration of this aspect, we can consider the offspring of the same famous tyrant: the eldest son of Genghis Khan, Tushi Khan, is said to have become the father of forty sons, by virtue of his origin, using the right to choose from among the most beautiful captives. The rest of the defeated, along with their sons, were killed as usual. One of Chinggis Khan's many grandchildren, Kublai Khan, the founder of the Yuan dynasty, was the father of twenty-two legitimate sons and added thirty virgins to his harem every year.
At the time I write these words, nearly eight percent of men living in the former Mongol Empire, that is, sixteen million people, have nearly identical Y chromosomes. According to geneticists, this means that about sixteen million people living in the twenty-first century bear the stamp of Genghis Khan's legacy: the 13th century, filled with genocide and rape.
Genghis Khan is an exception among sociopathic tyrants because he did not die a violent or shameful death. Instead, he fell from his horse while hunting, in 1227. There is no doubt that most of those responsible for genocide and mass rape commit suicide or are killed, often by the hands of fed-up, angry followers. Caligula was killed by one of his guards. Hitler is believed to have put a pistol in his mouth and burned his body with diesel fuel. Mussolini was shot, and his body was hung by the legs in the town square. In Romania, Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena were killed by a firing squad on Christmas Day 1989. Cambodian Pol Pot died in a two-room hut, where he was held captive by former associates, his body was burned in a heap of garbage and rubber tires.
Global sociopaths tend to end up poorly, and this sharp downward trend is evident in smaller ones as well. Ultimately, sociopathy appears to be a losing game, regardless of its size.
Hannah's father, for example, lost everything that could have been dear to him. By the time he was fifty, he had lost his job, his position in society, his beautiful wife and loving daughter - all for the pleasure of being a petty heroin gambler, and he would probably die from a bullet in the head from some other petty criminal.
Luke, my patient Sydney's worthless ex-husband, also lost everything of value: his wife, son, and even the pool. Super-Skip, though he recklessly considers himself invulnerable and too smart to be overthrown without finding the SEC's sympathy, is likely to discover that he is neither when the Commission takes him seriously.
"Doctor" Doreen Littlefield, even smart enough to play the real doctor, instead drifts like a fake into increasingly obscure places, playing the same tiresome games with worthy people she envies until the places run out. where she can hide. By the time she’s fifty, her travels and her uncontrolled greed will empty her bank account and turn her face into the wrinkled mask of a bored seventy-year-old woman.
The list of such sad endings can go on and on. Contrary to what seems to be a fairly popular belief, dishonest behavior ultimately brings no more than a fair share of good in life. Rather the opposite. You could even say that one way to determine if a dubious person is a real sociopath is to wait until the end of his life and see if he has ruined himself, partially or completely. Does this person really have what you would like to have in your life, or, on the contrary, is he isolated from others, burned out and suffers from boredom? Perhaps the power ended with a deafening fall?
Since we started keeping records of wars, occupation, and genocide, historians have often noticed that the human race has given birth to a certain type of disastrously immoral villain over and over again. As soon as we get rid of one, the next appears in another place on the planet.
From the point of view of population genetics, there is probably some truth in this legend. And since we do not understand these people, since their psychology is alien to most of us, we often do not recognize and do not stop them until they have harmed humanity in incomprehensible ways. But, as Gandhi pointed out with surprise and relief: "In the end, they always fail - think about it: always!"
The same phenomenon occurs on a smaller scale. Ordinary people without conscience sow pain in their families and society, but in the end they come to self-destruction. Petty sociopaths will live long enough to dominate the rest of the inhabitants of our imaginary island, perhaps circulate a number of genes, but in the end they will probably be suspended by their legs.
Some of the reasons for this failure are obvious, especially in cases where notorious despots like Mussolini or Pol Pot are killed and mutilated by embittered former followers. If you oppress, rob, kill and rape a large enough number of people, some of them will unite against you and take revenge. We can see this in the much less epic story of Doreen Littlefield. The odds were always against her and in the end she pissed off the wrong person.
But there are additional, less obvious reasons for the failure of a shameless life in the long run, reasons that are more related to the psychology of sociopathy than to the rage of other people. And the first is boredom, simple and straightforward.
Is that all there is?
While we all know what boredom is, most normal adults don't experience outright boredom very often. We are tense, in a hurry and anxiety, but we rarely get bored - in part because we are tense, in a hurry and anxiety. Time without everything, when we don't need to be somewhere, is usually perceived as a respite, not as monotony.
To experience what boredom is, we must look back to childhood. Children and teenagers are often bored, so boring that they can hardly stand it. Their perfectly normal developmental need for constant stimulation of continuous learning often goes against the monotony of long commutes, rainy days, and classrooms.
As a child, boredom can be excruciating, like a chronic headache or intense thirst in the absence of drinks. It can hurt so much that the poor child wants to scream loudly or throw something noisy at the wall. Extreme boredom is possibly a form of pain.
Luckily for us, adults don't need constant stimulation. Despite our stresses, we tend to live in a perfectly tolerable arousal phase without suffering from overly intense or overly weak stimulation - with the exception of sociopaths.
People who are sociopaths claim that they need additional stimulation almost constantly. Some use the word addiction to mean addiction to thrill, addiction to risk. These addictions arise because the most (perhaps the only) sure-fire remedy for understimulation is our emotional life, so much so that in many psychology texts, the terms “arousal” and “emotional response” are used almost interchangeably.
We are stimulated by our meaningful connections, conversations with others, happy and sad moments with other people - and sociopaths do not have the emotional life to live it.
They never experience the sometimes harrowing, sometimes thrilling constant upsurge that is inevitable in genuine affection for people.
Laboratory experiments using electric shock and loud noises have shown that sociopaths have much less pronounced even physiological reactions (sweating, palpitations, etc.), which are usually associated with anxiety of expectation and fear. To get adequate stimulation, sociopaths have only their games of domination at their disposal, and these games very quickly lose their freshness and become obsolete.
Like drugs, games have to be played over and over again, more and better, and depending on the resources and talents of a particular sociopath, this may not be possible. And so, with sociopathy, the pain of boredom can be almost constant.
The tendency to temporarily eliminate boredom chemically is one of the reasons sociopaths sometimes become alcoholics and drug addicts. A large-scale study of comorbidity published in 1990 in the Journal of the American Medical Association estimates that 75 percent of sociopaths are alcohol dependent and 50 percent abuse other drugs. Thus, sociopaths are often drug addicts in the usual sense, apart from literal risk dependence. Drug culture, with its peak experiences and dangers, attracts the unscrupulous for many reasons, and sociopaths feel right at home in this culture.
Another study, published in 1993 in the American Journal of Psychiatry, found 18 percent of intravenous drug users and people with dissocial personality disorder were HIV-positive, while among intravenous drug abusers who did not have dissocial personality disorder, this figure is only eight percent. Sociopaths' higher likelihood of contracting HIV appears to be due to their propensity for risky behavior.
These statistics take us back to the question I posed in chapter one: is lack of conscience an adaptive behavior - or is it a mental disorder? One working definition of a mental disorder is any psychological condition that results in significant "disruption of life": that is, severe and unusual limitations in a person's ability to function as one would expect given their health and intelligence.
Common sense tells us that the presence of any of the recognized psychiatric disorders — major depression, chronic anxiety, paranoia, and the like — is likely to result in a regrettable "disruption of life." But what about the absence of something that we usually regard as a purely moral trait? What about lack of conscience?
We know that sociopaths almost never seek treatment, but do they suffer from "disruption of life"?
This problem can be approached by considering what makes sense in the life of a sociopath: victory and domination, and then pondering the next strange question: why do all sociopaths not achieve high positions? Given their concentrated motivation and freedom of action, which stems from a lack of conscience, they should all be formidable national leaders, or leaders of the international level, or at least high-ranking specialists, or dictators of small countries. Why don't they always win?
Instead, most are obscure people who confine themselves to dominating their young children, or a spouse, or perhaps a few colleagues or subordinates. Quite a significant number of sociopaths are in prison, like Hannah's father, or at risk because of their careers or lives. Very few are as fabulously rich as Skip. They became even less famous. Never leaving a noticeable mark on the world, most of them move down the path of life, and at the end of middle age they completely burn out. They can rob and torture us for a period of time, but, in essence, their lives fail.
From the point of view of a psychologist, even those who occupy prestigious positions and those whose names are famous are failed lives. For most of us, happiness comes through the ability to love, through leading our lives in accordance with our highest values \u200b\u200b(most of the time), through a feeling of sufficient satisfaction with ourselves.
Sociopaths cannot love, they have no high values \u200b\u200bby definition, and they almost never feel comfortable on their own. They do not feel love, they are immoral and prone to chronic boredom, even the few who have become rich and powerful.
They experience inner discomfort for many reasons, not just boredom. The absolute self-absorption of sociopathy creates an individual consciousness that is aware of every slightest pain and spasm in the body, every transient sensation in the head and chest, whose ears, from acute self-concern, are directed to every radio or television program that reports on anything from bedbugs to ricin. Because his cares and attention are directed exclusively to himself, a person without conscience sometimes lives in the throes of hypochondriac reactions, in comparison with which even the most capricious anxious neurotics seem rational. Cutting yourself on the edge of the paper turns out to be a significant event, and herpes on the lip is the beginning of the end.
Perhaps the most famous historical example of a sociopath obsessed with his body is Adolf Hitler, who was a lifelong hypochondriac with an overwhelming fear of cancer. In an attempt to protect himself from cancer and to get rid of a long list of other supposed health problems, he devoured "drugs" specially formulated by his favorite physician, Dr. Theodore Morel. Many of these pills contained hallucinogenic toxins. Thus, Hitler gradually poisoned himself for real. Most likely, it was because of this that the tremor (real) in his left hand became noticeable, and by mid-1944 he refused to be photographed.
Sociopaths sometimes use their hypochondria as a strategy to quit work. They feel great for a while, but then it's time to pay the bills, or look for work, or help a friend move into a new apartment, and suddenly they have chest pains or lameness. Imagined medical problems and ailments often provide special treatment - for example, the last chair in a crowded room.
In general, they have an aversion to constant effort and organized work projects, and of course this desire for an easy life limits success in the real world. Getting up every morning and working for extended periods is almost never considered an alternative.
Sociopaths believe that a simple scheme, a one-off deal, or clever provocation is much preferable to a daily commitment to work, a long-term goal or plan. Even when sociopaths are in high-ranking positions, these are positions in which the amount of actual hard work (or lack of it) can be easily hidden, or where others can be manipulated to do the work. Under these circumstances, a smart sociopath can sometimes keep things afloat with showy performance spikes or gossip, charm, or intimidation.
Sociopaths pretend to be detached observers, weather-makers, or priceless sensitive geniuses. They require frequent weekends or sabbaticals, in which their activities are somewhat mysterious. Constant work, the true key to lasting success: tirelessly, enduring boredom, delving into details, is too close to responsibility.
Unfortunately, this same self-limiting factor applies even to sociopaths who are born with special gifts and talents. The strong commitment and day-to-day work required to create and promote your art, music, or any other creative endeavor is usually impossible for a sociopath. If success can be achieved by chance, only by an episodic effort, then it can be. But if art requires long-term personal investment, it’s hopeless.
A man without a conscience treats his talents in the same way as other people. He doesn't care about them.
Sociopathy is almost always a solo job; another strategy is chosen only temporarily, but almost never in the long term. For the obvious reason of unrelenting self-interest, people without conscience play badly on a team. The sociopath only acts in his own interests. When he interacts with another person or group of people, he tries to do so through lies, flattery, and fear mongering.
These paths to success are much weaker and less durable than true relationships, leadership, and personal involvement, and goals that could be achieved in partnership or sustained group effort tend to be ruined by the sociopath's exclusive self-care. This path to ultimate failure is usually taken by notorious tyrants, as well as countless lesser-known sociopathic employers, colleagues, and spouses.
When a sociopath gets caught up in the manipulation of others, all other goals are overshadowed, and as a result, “disruption of life,” albeit of a different kind, can be as severe as the constraints imposed by severe depression, chronic anxiety, paranoia, and other mental illnesses. The emotional bankruptcy of sociopathy means that the sociopath is forever deprived of true emotional intelligence, the ability to understand people's motives and what is their indispensable guide to life.
Like Doreen, who actually believes that you can increase your influence by humiliating others, like Skip, who imagines himself immune to society and its rules, like a defeated dictator wondering why a hate-burning crowd of "his people" , does not go to negotiations with him, a person without a conscience, even a smart one, is usually short-sighted and surprisingly naive, and he is simply doomed to die of boredom, financial ruin or a bullet.
"Do you have a conscience or not?" - angry mothers shout to children. It turns out that science has long found the answer to this question. Psychologists not only found out at what age this quality arises in a person, but also determined when a personality begins to form
There is no acting in the genre of children's photography, only sincere emotions. The result is determined not by the professionalism of the model, but by the trust won by the photographer. Portrait of a girl by Anna Azbel
When does something appear in a person that distinguishes him from animals and from other people? This was found out in the 1970s in the USSR in the course of very simple experiments. The room, in the middle of the room is a chair, on it, swinging his legs, a toddler of about three sits and looks attentively at the candy that lies at a decent distance from him. A tall, thin brunette explains to the kid that his task is to get the candy without getting up from the chair. The child nods his head, begins to fidget and stretch out his arms, trying to grab the "prey", but the chair is obviously too far away. The man watches the baby's attempts for some time, and then leaves the room, supposedly on business. Left alone, the boy immediately jumps off the chair and takes the candy. The returned experimenter - and we are observing one of the classic psychological experiments - praises the child and gives him a second candy, which immediately goes into his mouth, and the happy child goes home.
A five-year-old boy sits next on the chair. The scientist gives him the same task and goes out into the corridor. Like the three-year-old, the older subject jumps up from the chair and grabs the candy. But then something strange happens. When the experimenter praises him, the boy looks away, and completely refuses the second candy offered as a reward for the test. The man insists, and eventually the child begins to sob, as if the sweet candy has suddenly become bitter.
A tall man who subjected children to irresistible temptations is the outstanding Soviet psychologist Alexei Leontiev. And his experiments with sweets are a clear demonstration of the birth of conscience and personality in general. A three-year-old baby obeys only biological motives: he sees a delicious candy, wants to eat it and does everything possible for this. The five-year-old also wants to eat candy and, following the biological call, breaks the rules, that is, the social motive to obey the adult. It is the subordination of biological motives to social motives and the resulting conflict, according to Leontiev, that is the main sign of personality formation. The older the child, the stronger the “vertical of power” of social motives over biological ones. For example, already seven-year-old children most often do not violate the instructions and patiently sit on the chair until the experimenter returns.
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PARADOX Conscience in exchange for freedom In many situations, betrayal is more beneficial than being honest. For example, in the beloved prisoner dilemma. Its essence is this: you and your accomplice decided to rob a bank and were caught. The police put you in different cells and offers a deal: if your accomplice is silent, and you testify against him, you will be released, and he will receive 10 years in prison. If the accomplice also testifies against you, both of you will be imprisoned for two years. If you and your accomplice refuse to testify against each other, the police will release both after 6 months. Most rationally choose the option “to betray” - and in the end they find themselves in a worse position than if they acted in good faith. The prisoner's dilemma is also realized in the real world: it is on it that the arms race or the reluctance of countries to reduce CO2 emissions is based, although they all agree that an increase in its concentration in the atmosphere threatens catastrophic consequences for the planet. |
That is, conscience is an alarm that goes off when biological motives take over. It would seem that small indulgences will not do harm, but in reality they are fraught with a revolution in the hierarchy of motives, which will ultimately destroy the personality. By forcing us to experience physical suffering, conscience saves a person from collapse.
But conscience and the ability to subordinate biological motives to social ones alone are not enough for a person to be considered complete. Leontiev believed that it is finally formed in adolescence, when a person not only obeys social and moral motives, but also realizes his own motives and independently builds their hierarchy.
Photo: Anna Azbel
Illustrations: Vladimir Kapustin