Psychopaths In The Shadows Of Our Lives

Republished April, 2007 blog post.

 “Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it.” – John Lennon, before his murder by Mark David Chapman

He appears to be gregarious and outgoing, full of confidence, strong, and knowledgeable.

Male or female, he makes you feel like you're the center of his universe.

On the job, in romance it seems that he will do anything for you. He will do anything you ask, and tells you everything you want to hear.

His apparent caring and concern for yours and others well-being knows no bounds. He seems to be the kindest man you have ever met.

He tells you in great detail how he has suffered, and risen above his suffering, struggled to get on with his life despite his past victimization by evil people, and how he dealt with those people. He brags about the terrible things he has had to do to defend and protect his honor, his integrity, his family and friends, and how he had no choice. They deserved what he did to them, they were evil.

He's the epitome of the bad boy doing good.

You're heart goes out to him and you want to help him ... poor soul.

His perfect wife stands by her man. She is quieter, let's him have the floor, but on a one to one, she is aggressive, almost hysterical in her defense of him. She idealizes him, idolizes him.

At work, if you're below him on the food chain, he helps you rise up the ladder, and covers your butt, and will expect you to cover his in return. If you're above him on the food chain, he keeps you informed of everything that's going on, offers suggestions and advice, and appears to contribute to the business. You cover for him because he's such a good guy.

He appears to be invincible ... he can do no wrong ... .

He tells you how important truth, morality, and ethics is to him ... he emphasizes this asset repeatedly. "What you see is what you get!" is his catch phrase. He wins prizes and awards for Honesty and Integrity.

His perfection knows no bounds, despite his apparent humility.

How did you get so lucky as to have this man in your life? He seems almost too good to be true.

 

That's because he IS too good to be true ... he's a Psychopath.

He has a strange almost piercing stare.

He misinterprets everything as an attack. He assumes that everyone is out to get him and he has to get them first.

He takes other peoples ideas and presents them as his own because he is incapable of imagination and creativity.

He constantly makes contradictory statements. He lies about everything and everyone. He wins people's trust then manipulates and plays them against each other.

His patrons and puppets are constantly covering for him. He's just not that good at his job.

He's involved with several different women, all of whom seem to choose to be unaware of his other relationships. He is incapable of human emotions such as love or affection.

All relationships whether they be charitable, personal, professional and organizational exist solely for the purpose of being exploited and to establish an otherwise undeserved positive reputation. He extends favors and "helps" people for this purpose alone and expects the favor to be returned 10-fold, on demand, and whether it involves criminal acts or not.

All people in his circle must be malleable and under his control. He will not allow relationships to develop among them unless the relationships benefit him. When they no longer benefit him he moves in to destroy them.

Everything is about appearance, and deception. Creating the appearance that he is an emotional, caring man by mimicking those who are not psychopaths. Creating the appearance that he is competent and making a contribution by stealing other people's ideas. Scratch the surface, and it's all a carefully crafted illusion.

Everything that goes wrong is his Targets' fault. He will accuse his Targets of doing the very things that he is doing to them. He is incapable of showing maturity and taking responsibility for his actions.

Those who cannot be manipulated, exploited ... that is, those who see through his shady exterior, are, in his mind, enemies, and therefore his Targets.

Those who stand in the way of him accomplishing some task (he is incapable of looking to the future and establishing long term goals) are his enemies, and therefore his Targets.

Actions, that he interprets as harmful to him (innocent or not) result in his Retribution.

He will go to extreme and unimaginable (for the normal human being) lengths to destroy his Targets and anyone who defends them.

He lives to see the Target suffer and takes sadistic pleasure in watching the suffering. He is incapable of feeling empathy and compassion, of putting himself in someone else's shoes.

He will never act alone because he is a coward. He will manipulate and recruit his social circle on the basis of lies and his alleged victimhood. He needs others so that he can hide behind them and have them engage his targets on his behalf. 

If he is wealthy, he will bribe the corrupt, mentally ill and greedy to participate. If he isn't wealthy he'll recruit the mentally ill, unethical or corrupt amongst his social circle.

If he's exposed, he'll shift the blame to his recruits.

All problems are resolved by destroying the Target, in short, he is a predator and the Target is his prey. He is incapable of negotiating solutions.

If all else fails, those who are his Targets, who see his real face, understand who and what he is, will be accused of being mentally unstable.

Welcome to my world, one with psychopaths in the shadows of my life, and one's who have been targeting me since I was a 16 year old teenager.

Do you have a Psychopath in your life?

 

Internet References:The Psychopath Next Door

"He is emotionally and cognitively handicapped. He is not capable of cogent or coherent thought or speech." (cf.Hervey Cleckley's 'Mask of Sanity') 

The following are excerpts from: www.cassiopaea.com

 

"He does this to create a false empathy with his victim. The psychopath will try to make you believe he has normal emotions by spinning some sad tale or professing profound, moving experiences; the truth is, most psychopaths go through life as in an incubator, touched by few and having no real compassion for others; but they will lie to convince you that they have normal emotions. The pity factor is one reason why victims often fall for these "poor" people."

"Lying, deceiving, and manipulation are natural talents for psychopaths...When caught in a lie or challenged with the truth, they are seldom perplexed or embarrassed -- they simply change their stories or attempt to rework the facts so that they appear to be consistent with the lie. The results are a series of contradictory statements and a thoroughly confused listener." [Hare]. 

"The psychopath is primarily distracted and impressed by his own grandiose self-representation, which often leads to him unwittingly telling people things that lead to his detection. They often forget the lies they told and tell contradicting tales, which often makes the listener wonder if either the psychopath is crazy, although in this case the psychopath isn't really crazy -- he's just forgotten what lies he's told."

"The most amazing thing, however, is their selective memory. A psychopath might not remember the promises he made to you yesterday, but he will remember something from the past if it suits his purposes in some way. They often do this whenever they're confronted or caught in a lie."

"Most psychopaths are very arrogant and cocky. However, when charming a potential victim, they say all the "right" things and make you believe they are kind-hearted souls; not always, but often enough. The truth is, psychopaths are not altruistic and do not really care about friendships or ties."

"In general, most psychopaths will brag endlessly about their exploits and "bad" things they've done (often called a warning sign, which will ward off careful souls), but more often than not, the woman who is fascinated by him will not listen to reason, even if she is warned by others who know him about his past behaviors.

 

Why? Once again, because the psychopath makes her feel so "special."

"...Histrionic...women are particularly attracted and vulnerable to psychopathic males. The hysteric-personality-disordered female is likely to be enamored of the psychopath...She is able...to reciprocate in this projective-introjective cycle by predominately idealizing the psychopathic character. Her need for attachment and dependency complements his desire for detachment and autonomy; she perceives others as all-giving and benevolent, and he perceives others as all-taking and malevolent. 
 

The hysterical woman is immune to developing a healthy suspicion when details or circumstances don't fit (also relating to the illogicity of his thoughts/behavior) or do not corroborate the psychopath's oral version of his history." [From "The Psychopathic Mind" -- Origins, Dynamics, and Treatment J. Reil Meloy].

"Tim Field, a noted author and researcher of psychopathy, believes that the psychopath picks out people who can see through him: "A bully's (sociopath) apparent self-esteem and self-confidence is actually arrogance, an unsustainable belief of invulnerability honed from his willingness to act outside the bounds of society to ensure their survival. Targets (or victims) are people who can see through the arrogance to perceive the empty shell behind it - and bullies can sense who can see through them, furthering the target's elimination." [Bully OnLine]. This usually happens in the workplace, and in situations where the psychopath has let his mask drop."

"If you try to deal with psychopaths in an ethical manner, you will be in for a shock. Dr. William Higgins claims that you "can't negotiate or bargain with psychopaths.""

 

"The truth - when twisted by good liars, can always make an innocent person look bad - especially if the innocent person is honest and admits his mistakes. 
 

The basic assumption that the truth lies between the testimony of the two sides always shifts the advantage to the lying side and away from the side telling the truth. Under most circumstances, this shift put together with the fact that the truth is going to also be twisted in such a way as to bring detriment to the innocent person, results in the advantage always resting in the hands of liars - psychopaths. Even the simple act of giving testimony under oath is useless. If a person is a liar, swearing an oath means nothing to that person. However, swearing an oath acts strongly on a serious, truthful witness. Again, the advantage is placed on the side of the liar." [Robert Canup]

"This highlights one of the unique things about the psychopath: their seeming inability to conceive of the abstract idea of "the future".

It has often been noted that psychopaths have a distinct advantage over human beings with conscience and feelings because the psychopath does not have conscience and feelings. What seems to be so is that conscience and feelings are related to the abstract concepts of "future" and "others." It is "spatial-temporal." We can feel fear, sympathy, empathy, sadness, and so on because we can IMAGINE in an abstract way, the future based on our own experiences in the past, or even just "concepts of experiences" in myriad variations. We can "predict" how others will react because we are able to "see ourselves" in them even though they are "out there" and the situation is somewhat different externally, though similar in dynamic. In other words, we can not only identify with others spatially - so to say - but also temporally - in time.

The psychopath does not seem to have this capacity.

They are unable to "imagine" in the sense of being able to really connect to images in a direct "self connecting to another self" sort of way.

In short, the psychopath and the malignant narcissist - is a predator. If we think about the interactions of predators with their prey in the animal kingdom, we can come to some idea of what is behind the "mask of sanity" of the psychopath. Just as an animal predator will adopt all kinds of stealthy functions in order to stalk their prey, cut them out of the herd, get close to them and reduce their resistance, so does the psychopath construct all kinds of elaborate camouflage composed of words and appearances - lies and manipulations - in order to "assimilate" their prey.

This leads us to an important question: what does the psychopath REALLY get from their victims? It's easy to see what they are after when they lie and manipulate for money or material goods or power. But in many instances, such as love relationships or faked friendships, it is not so easy to see what the psychopath is after. Without wandering too far afield into spiritual speculations - a problem Cleckley also faced - we can only say that it seems to be that the psychopath ENJOYS making others suffer. Just as normal humans enjoy seeing other people happy, or doing things that make other people smile, the psychopath enjoys the exact opposite."

Colonel Russell Williams, a man placed in charged of Canada's largest military base and top secret military base in the Middle East. 

Steve Raucci, a man placed in charge of the entire Schenectady, New York, School Board Maintenance Department 

If we are serious about wanting to maintain a corruption free, democratic society, is it really a good idea to put psychopaths like these in charge of anything????