This past week I was talking on the telephone with my student and research assistant when he was mugged by a group of 5-7 thugs. One hit him from behind, knocking him down and another punched him in the abdomen. Ironically, among the items stolen was a copy of “Without Conscience” by Robert Hare.
Yesterday, my student asked me, “Those guys in the group who do have empathy and guilt, how do they feel about doing this? What makes them do it?” To which I replied, “I don’t think they feel a thing. They are likely all psychopathic (sociopaths). No one wants to admit just how many of them there are. So they draw an artificial line based on the PCL-R (a psychopathy test) and say these thugs are psychopaths and these thugs are non-psychopaths. They call them non-psychopaths even though their scores on the test are far from normal. They do this because they want to hold on to hope that most of them can change.”
Dr. Reid Melloy, a forensic psychologist with years of experience working with criminals has a method of classifying them that I think is more correct. He has four groups, not two, based on the PCL-R, non-psychopaths, and mild, moderate and severe psychopathy. I do concede that the thugs that assaulted my student likely had the syndrome to varying degrees; and we know the ring leader is likely severely affected.
That gets me to a recent article that received a great deal of news coverage. In one Fox News article were comments from experts who in the past I have criticized for irresponsible public comments. The article discusses data from a study published in a top journal, it doesn’t give the title but it is, The Antisocial Brain: Psychopathy Matters a Structural MRI Investigation of Antisocial Male Violent Offenders.
The title should say, “the degree of psychopathy matters”. When you see stories like this you have to watch out because my colleagues have rotating definitions of psychopathy that they pull out depending on what they need to fit their data. In some studies like this one, they use a cut-off high PCL-R score. In other studies they separate offenders into groups depending on whether or not they show empathy and remorse. So groups may contain the same PCL-R score but be defined in terms of differing symptoms.
The study basically showed that higher scores on the PCL-R are associated with a higher likelihood of finding a shrunken “emotional brain”. Before you go writing me asking that your ex be forced to undergo an MRI which will prove the presence of psychopathy, let me tell you what is not in the news article. You cannot use an MRI scan to diagnose psychopathy.
A diagnostic test has to be sensitive, meaning that it picks up your ex and everyone else with the condition. Well we already know that there is mild, moderate and severe. So do we want the test to pick up the mild or the severe group? That will depend on what your ex actually scored on the PCL-R. I am sure that a “mild” case of psychopathy, does not make for a good life partner. That is why for the purposes of Love Fraud any comparison between “ASPD” and psychopathy is meaningless.
A diagnostic test also has to be specific meaning that only psychopaths show the abnormality. There is no test for psychopathy that is sensitive and specific enough to be useful. This article only shows us the obvious, that very high levels of psychopathy are more likely to be related to observable changes in the brain than are lower levels of psychopathy.
Since the brain produces behavior, their brains have to be different. The behavior they produce is different. All of the thugs who attacked my student to steal “without conscience” have something wrong with their brains.
Yes, I do think they ARE AWARE that evil lurks inside them.
Like Skylar’s experience, mine is the same.
My spath said,
“I AM SHALLOW”
“I AM SELFISH”
“I AM EVIL”
“I WILL RUIN YOUR LIFE”.
WTF! Who says that??
Yeah, but if they have no conscience, how can they even perceive that they have done wrong and therefore have to look over their shoulder?
That’s the thing THEY KNOW the difference between right and wrong as everyone else perceives it. They just don’t care. They are consciously choosing different. And they have no regret. Their looking over their shoulder all of the time is merely a SURVIVAL thing with them. Nothing about conscience at all.
callmeathena: mine said the same things to me, once.
I should have listened. That is how they reel you in with their sob stories and the pity ploy….”I am not worthy…” Looking back, I can honestly say: “No, you are not. Good Bye.”
The only conscience they have is when it concerns them. Their well being and what they want. All other times, it doesn’t exist.
Dupey
Louise
I do think they *generally* know the difference. They just don’t CARE.
They know to pay before walking out of a store with a shirt in hand.
They know to pay their taxes.
They know not to shit on the street and to find a bathroom. Maybe they know these things by observing others, and not inherently, but they know.
Early on, I was talking to my spath’s teenage daughter. She said of her dad, “I don’t know if he doesn’t know the difference of right from wrong, or, if he does, and he just doesn’t care”. She got confused too.
There is probably a lot of nuance here, as they are shallow and selfish people.
But they know the obvious things.
Where my spath fell apart was the non-obvious things. He would say he loved me, but his ACTIONS and the follow through wasn’t there. It didn’t make sense to me.
Until it did.
Spath.
Athena
Louise,
Spaths lack a moral compass. Doesn’t mean they don’t know right from wrong.
I think it gets complicated when it comes to emotions and feelings though. Because that is were empathy would come in..
It is one thing to KNOW that stealing is wrong.
It is quite another, for the spath to deal with a persons “feelings” after they got caught stealing from you.
A spath doesn’t even know how to deal with these kinds of feelings or emotions because he/she doesn’t experience them. They only know what they are experiencing at that moment. Pleasure after the scam possibly?
A spath doesn’t connect the dots the same way we do. They don’t know how we feel. Because they don’t FEEL this way.
They feel pleasure over someone elses pain?
Studies have been done on even “normal” people when we wear many different “hats” in life. Our moral compass sometimes has to shift, depending on situation.
A good example of this is a medic in war. He is also a soldier. He saves lives, yet as a soldier he is called on possibly to take a life.
A spaths moral compass doesn’t shift…It is just lacking. It isn’t there to begin with.
Combine lacking empathy, lacking moral compass, lacking any accountability for ones actions, lacking conscience…..Not much left is there?
Maybe, Witsend, that’s a good point of differentiation.
They don’t get the feelings and empathy part of right & wrong.
They do know to pay for items at the store, to stop at a red light.
I looked at a note I wrote to my spath a while ago. He and I were dating when suddenly he screwed somebody else and married a third person.
I asked, “where is the truth?”.
Best I can figure, is there ain’t any truth.
Great thoughts, Athena, Dupey, Witsend…thanks so much…this helps me realize things more!
I was never anything but a truly nice and caring person to this ‘being’. Over the whole entire course of our acquaintance. I was never rude or demanding; never disrespectful – everything a real friend could be to another; right? I am not saying I am PERFECT, because we all know there is nobody PERFECT, but I was real good to him and looked out for him and he became JEALOUS of me and my strength and the fact that I AM STRONGER THAN HE IS. THAT is when the battle started. When I said, “No, your actions are inexcusable to me and I am not tolerating it anymore.” “IT” said: “You seem like such a nice lady.” I told him: “I am; a nice lady who isn’t taking any more bullshit.” And that was that, pretty much. If this “THING” can do this to me, after everything I have been to “IT”, it can and probably is and probably will always find no problem doing it to anyone else along the way. We need to pay attention to what they have shown to us – do we really want to be stuck in that? That dysfunction, that drama, that chaos? You may not think this takes a toll on our physical bodies, but I am here to testify to the fact that it absolutely DOES. You have to turn it off and turn it around in order to survive.
My point, here, is this: If “I” was nice to him, against everything he had ever done to me, WHY does he still wish me ill well? I have never done anything to him, although I could still, to this moment. Instead, I let him ‘walk’. And I did that more for ME, than anyone else. Just to get it off my table, so I could move on to more important things in my life, like trying to survive my heart condition.
If you are currently in a period of NC, I would highly suggest and recommend that you do NOT break it for any reason. I realize that there are those of us who co parent and I am not talking to you, because I do understand. But for those of us who are NOT tied to them, there is no reason to even look back. Just slam that door and don’t look back. Even after you do THAT, you are still going to have a journey to get back to yourself. Do you understand what I am saying? Shutting them out is the first step to recovery from this. Not having to deal with it all nor listen to it all anymore. Yes, we can feel sorry for them, just not to the point of enabling them. Continuing with our attentions of them is only giving them a license to continue on with their poor behavior. Please: take my word for it.
Feeling sorry for them is not an option. They would not feel sorry for you as they were sucking out your last breath and I absolutely do believe this. When you question yourself and feel sorry for them, you are only giving them what they want: your misery.
They don’t have a moral compass. They know right from wrong but they always choose the path that brings THEM something instead of others. They PRETEND to have feelings and emotions but THEIR PERSONAL WANTS eclipse any real emotions they may have and if they do, they are fleeting.
No, they don’t know how to deal with these feelings they leave behind. That is why they run and shut the door on us, leaving us no ‘resolution’. They only care about not inconveniencing themselves. They don’t know how to connect those social grace thought, feelings, skills, the same as we do. And, yes, they are only in touch with what they are experiencing at that moment. Half the time, I have learned, they don’t remember things they have said and/or done; while some may say it is from convenience, I believe it is truly an unawareness on their behalf after they have become so skillful and conditioned.
The only SANE thing to do is get it away from us and keep it away from us and we should not feel guilty for wanting to survive. There is nothing we can do to change them. They are who they are and they are never going to change. All we can do is protect ourselves from them and pray for them.
Dupey
My ex was paranoid. His thought patterns could be extremely skewed!
Increasingly, towards the end of our relationship and whenever he used to accuse me of thinking or being a certain way, I would laugh out loud and say no, spath. Not everyone thinks like you. When I realised that most of the stuff he had been paranoid about were things he’d had done to him or more importantly, done to others I began to see much more clearly.
He always described his exes as vengeful and bitter. Rubbish. That was pure projection and of course extra bull to cover his own sorry arse, irresponsible, feckless ways.
IMO, the spath ex had a conscience when it suited him. He knew how to act like he cared. The only thing he cared about was the spath. One of his favourite sayings……
“it’s my life …..if I’m not happy then I’m out of here”
Well, after 20 or so years of broken relationships isn’t it time it gave up and just moved to the middle of Alaska. I mean, this thing cannot maintain any relationship…….unless of course it’s where it is in the position of authority. And who is going to put up with that for a lifetime?
Rant over. 🙂
(((strongawoman))) Oh yes, Dear, I think they all are.
Their thought patterns ARE askew. Yes. They become paranoid as they review their nasty deeds and that puts them on a permanent paranoia. I mean, if you went around threatening people and pushing people around and putting them down, wouldn’t you be paranoid? I think “IT” is more paranoid than “I” am, to tell you the truth, which is evidenced by him not being here. Imagine that. But you can never underestimate.
Yes, they always describe their exes that way. It makes them feel better. Gives them ‘absolution’ for their wickedness. They always tell the next one about the last one, in order to gain good compliance and your acceptance. Uses jealousy as a weapon.
Yes, they have a conscience when it suits them and what they are after. The only thing they do care about is themselves. Well, if they are not happy, then get to movin!!!!
They will never have a lasting, important and deeply meaningful relationship because they are incapable of that being the way they are. If others find that acceptable, that is on them, but I certainly do not. I am sorry for him, yes. I cared for him, deeply, yes. But I cannot stand beside nor behind someone who threatens to murder me on a whim. Least of all a psychopathic stalker. I can not be made aware of this putrid life and person and condone anything about his life nor existence. It is all unacceptable to me and I am so grateful we don’t have children together.
Thanks for listening, guess MY RANT is over for a moment too.
(((strongawoman)))
Dupey