A reader says: “I kept wondering what was going on in his head. I could never follow his thinking. I think he might have been into alcohol and drugs and that in itself messes the brain, and along with his other personality disorders, sure makes for a confusing relationship.”
The thinking patterns of the psychopath are indeed weird. It seems there are biological and intentional reasons for this. In others words, he is unable to think very logically PLUS he intends to mislead. No wonder he is hard to follow!
Below I list several factors which together make the psychopath a most bamboozling character.
The odd speech of psychopaths
The psychopath makes “frequent use of contradictory and logically inconsistent statements”, says Robert Hare in ‘Without conscience.’ E.g. “A man serving time for armed robbery replied to the testimony of an eyewitness, “He’s lying. I wasn’t there. I should have blown his fucking head off.” It is as if, says Hare, they have “difficulty monitoring their own speech”.
Psychopaths may also construct strange words: ‘unconscientious’ for unconscious’, ‘antidotes’ for ‘anecdotes’. Perhaps there is something about the brain of the psychopath that contributes to his odd speech.
Drug and alcohol abuse
With their poor ability to tolerate frustration and their high need for stimulation (same thing?), the psychopath is likely to abuse drugs and alcohol which obviously affects the ability to think. Chronic abuse damages the brain.
But, as M.L. Gallagher recently writes, he speaks in riddles purposely too.
The intention to deceive
This doesn’t need much elaboration here. The psychopath wants to get something. He may simply take it by force. Otherwise he will use his cunning to fool the other person. (Interestingly, the illogicality of his arguments doesn’t stop him successfully conning one person after another.)
Logical fallacies
Most of us use logical fallacies when we argue or try to persuade. Some of these are errors in our own thinking, some are conscious manipulations. Just accentuating a different word can make all the difference: “Mom said that we musn’t throw stones at the windows” (i.e. she didn’t say anything about hitting them with a tennis racket).
We can fully expect that the psychopath, with his flawed thinking plus his intention to deceive, will use every logical fallacy in the book. Bear with me for a couple of paragraphs.
Take the example the logical fallacy, the ‘ad hominem argument’. It has two types, circumstantial and abusive. In the circumstantial ad hominem argument the circumstances of the other are confronted instead of the evidence: “Of course you don’t accept that it’s OK to be a loan-shark. You’re a Christian and Christ drove the money lenders out of the temple.” (But that’s irrelevant; if I was Jewish what would your defense be then?)
In the abusive ad hominem argument the opponent is attacked instead of their argument: “You criticise me for loan-sharking, but three years ago you were arrested for drunk driving.” (What does that have to do with loan-sharking?)
Paramoralism
But the psychopath uses fallacies with an evil twist. Whenever possible he’ll use a logical fallacy as a paramoralism. In other words, he won’t use a fallacy only to win a point but also use it moralistically in order to corrode the other’s moral thinking.
How would a psychopath argue ad hominem? Several readers have mentioned precisely this example: “What kind of Christian are you to accuse me of this?” (Again, the other’s Christianity is irrelevant to the topic at hand.) Can you see the difference? Unlike the examples above where the opponent’s Christianity is used to score a point or bring the argument to an end, here the other is being denounced as a bad Christian. An open-minded person is likely to say to themselves, “Maybe he’s right. Perhaps I’m the bad one here.”
Perhaps you have an example to share of the bewildering speech of a psychopath?
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For glimpse into the wacky thought-processes of the narcissist see this article.
My favorite one:
I Know I lied to you. I cant say how sorry I am. I am working at being a better man now. You also have done cruel things to me over the years. We both need to change…
Hello???
Or what my x said, “I know I said some really shitty things to you, I promise I’ll never do that to you again”. Then, ” I’m soooo damn mad at you cause I said I’d never do that again, but YOU MADE me….”
My favorite ones…
“I know I lied to you but the truth really upsets you, so from now on I’m just not going to tell you the truth”!
“yeah, I had a little sex with her….it was harmless, your making a big deal out of nothing”!
PUKE!
Yep, I agree, Puke.
be so hello, Mike be such painting nows. i be so in the computer i tells him to take himself a break. this be so Des.
be so our delvyn be so tells of ourselves
” …there be always pockets for Dark intents to slip in, to interfere, to distort, to convince truth with subtle lies”Dark can’t possess what is not offered, can’t go where not invited, can’t create or take against will”so; but it can manipulate, whisper our fears (that are only false evidence that we haven’t dealt with), and go/ do wherever/ whatever it hasn’t been directed not to. Keep in the Light of G-d; stay on Path of Light. We are sanctioned by the Light of G-d; we need not fear; we need only hold to the truth we know in our hearts. We will not fail, except through our own fears..love, light, peace and hope… that is the promise..”
delvyn be so reminds us of the pretender:
“…although it is truth that all is one, and that unity contains all creation, all realms, all time, it is my perception that Lucifer has made several choices with negative consequences, that he is condescending toward the race of man, and subtly clever in his word. He neither heals nor advances any creation unless there is benefit for himself. Such dark intent lies within us all: that is the truth of free will. We are free to choose or not to choose: dark or light of G-d intent. We are free to look beyond any action to see if it harms another, even in a tangential sense, and accept responsibility for it, or not. Lucifer cannot wash the blood of innocents off his hands, no matter how often he states that he only helped them achieve what they wanted. He is present in all worlds, all realms, all creation…seeking to rationalize behavior that, in the aware heart, one knows has harmed someone else. The only way that he can do this is by believing his own lie….” shared by our Delvyn
Des
My S woman’s brain pattern is so true to form of a sociopath. She told me of how she was considered into MENSA as a child. (Never said she actually made it). She claimed to be very spiritual and that some people were afraid of her. That she weirded out alot of people. At the time I told her straight out-I had never been afraid of her.. not even while I was half asleep and she whispered under her breath “I hate You!”. She follows the sociopaths cycle of making all these impetuous plans and never following through with any of them. “Let’s go to Florida and get a trailer. Then the next day she wanted to go to Seattle to live. These bright ideas seem to come right out of left field to me. No doubt she had these grandoise ideas about her person and plans she made. They were all reg flags staring me in the face and I ignored them all …or excused them away.
The more I read on here-it’s amazing that all of these men are EXACTLY alike and most of these stories are so identical as well-particularly the cell phone thing and the text messages. Most of our relationship was based on the cell phone and text messages because he had the ugly wife at home. She had been there through his medical training for 25 years and would “take him to the cleaners for everything he had if he left her”.
He went to her at night to have dinner. He would sit in front of the TV and watch all his cop shoes and text me the entire time-telling me how he wanted to be with me instead and how he loved me and missed me so much. He had the choice, he could have done something about that. The fact that he was over there not doing what he wanted, was something that he could have changed at anytime. They weren’t having sex. He would take her over to his friends’ houses to hang with their wives. She shopped with their wives. Her would dress her up in a fancy dress with expensive jewelry on occasion for some event for work. He always told me that he SO wished that he could bring me instead.
When she found out about us and kicked him out and he moved in with me, she told me that this had happened with the other three women prior to me-even though he claimed that I was the first and the only one who mattered. She was surprised to find out about me because he had swore and promised that it would never happen again. He hadn’t done anything,to her knowledge in 10 years and THEY hadn’t been intimate in over 6 years. She had told him after the last affair that if he EVER fellow in love with someone and needed his freedom, she would have given it to him without fighting-just as long as he let her know before he actually cheated. She would have let him go if he would have come home and said-I’m sorry-I met Erin. We are really good friends but I have fallen in love with her and I need to go. He could have done that instead of lying. That’s why I’m so angry. I am angry at him and WAY ANGRY AT ME for allowing someone to disrespect me that way. I can’t have too much anger with him disrespecting HER though-because this crazy woman allowed him to do this multiple do this multiple times before me. She knew what he was and still stayed because he had a lot of money and she enjoyed benefitting from that. She told me that she knew he didn’t really love me because he didn’t buy me expensive jewelry. How messed up is that? He bought me things that were important to me-police equipment for my new job. He’s crazy. She’s crazier. I am SO glad I no longer have any contact with either one. I gave them both an earful before changing my phone # and e-mail address.
hmm some of this sounds like psychosis? Similarities re speech?
what?
Dear Erin1972,
Whatever her relationship with him is or was is really beside theh point in your relationship with him.
Your relationship with him was built on YOUR EXPECTATION that what he was telling you about THEIR RELATIONSHIP was true.
Unfortunately, what he was telling you about their relationship was not the truth.
WHY she stayed with him, knowing he was a seriall cheater and took him back, kicked him out, and took him back again, doesn’t make her any more disordered than we (other victims) have done, many of us have let them lure us back into the web even after we caught them in lies.
In my opinion the wife is just as much his victim as YOU are. She fell for it again. He smoothed over her anger at again being lied to. Sure they don’t have much of a marriage in my opinion, but do you think for ONE MINUTE that if he had cheated on her “because she was ugly” that he wouldn’t have ALSO CHEATED ON YOU? Of course he would have! If he had left her and married you, he would quickly have started cheating on you.
His cheating was not based on the fact that she is “Ugly” or anything else, it is totally based on the fact HE IS A LIAR AND A CHEAT WITHOUT A CONSCIENCE.
If he DOES stay with her for the money ONLY or she stays with him for the MONEY ONLY, what does that make either one of them? They are both robbing themselves of a life. He will cheat again, and she probably figures that, or maybe he has again convinced her that he really loves her or she has decided that the “money” is worth putting up with him and his cheating, but that doesn’t make her a BAD PERSON, if she put him through medical school I think she deserves the finacial rewards his career that she bought and paid for brings.
But the bottom liine, Erin, is whatever their relationship is or isn’t, HE IS A LIAR TO YOU, HE IS A CHEAT TO YOU—and I think you are angry at yourself for believing him as much as you are angry at HER for being “ugly” and still getting what, for a while anywaY, YOU THOUGHT WAS THE PRIZE.
Personally,, I think YOU won the “prize” getting away from a cheater, whether right now it feels like you are a “winner” or not, I think YOU got the best end of that deal. (((((Hugs))))