Millions of sociopaths roam the planet. They inhabit all segments of the population. They are male, female, rich, poor, old, young, all races, all religions, all education levels, all demographic groups. Most of them are not in prison, so they move freely among us, living their lives by exploiting others.
Many take pride in their ability to manipulate others. Some who are criminals view crime as fun. They see nothing wrong with their behavior. As long as they keep succeeding, sociopaths will continue to behave the way they do.
So how do we make them fail?
Sociopaths only want to win, so failure is losing. Failure is not being able to exploit others, or at least not being able to get away with exploiting others.
I see four steps to shutting them down, and they all revolve around education.
1. Educating the public about sociopaths. This is the first step. So many Lovefraud readers who have tangled with sociopaths have told me, “I didn’t know these people existed!” Yes, they exist. Sociopaths live among us. And they are dangerous to our mental, emotional, psychological, financial, sexual and physical health.
This is why I launched Lovefraud. This is why I’m embarking on the Lovefraud Education Program to teach high school and college students about sociopaths. (If you’re in a position to bring the program to your school, please contact terry@anderlypublishing.com.) And there are so many more people who need to be educated, including therapists, lawyers and judges. We all need to know the warning signs of sociopathic behavior, so that if we see them, we can respond appropriately—especially by running away.
2. Exposing known sociopaths. This, I believe, is the only strategy that really works against sociopaths. We can’t count on winning judgments against them and actually collecting our money. We can’t count on them being prosecuted or locked up. Sometimes the only way to keep them from harming others is to blow their cover.
We do need to be cautious about this, as I explained in a previous article, Exposing the sociopath. Many of you may not be able to skewer your exes publicly, as I did with James Montgomery. But you may be able to quietly speak your truth in your community, profession, church or wherever you know the predator is trolling for new victims. In the future, a few words of warning, coupled with growing public awareness of the disorder, may be enough.
3. Stop breeding sociopaths. Sociopaths are hard-wired for sex. They have a lot of sexual magnetism, and many Lovefraud readers have said that sex with the sociopath was the best they’ve ever had. But a consequence of sex, of course, is children. And because sociopathy is a highly genetic disorder, children born of sociopaths are at risk of inheriting a predisposition for the disorder.
One of the big things I hope will be accomplished through the Lovefraud High School Education program is to help young people understand that romantic relationships with sociopaths lead to nothing but trouble. If more people refuse to get involved with sociopaths, that will mean fewer at-risk children.
4. Appropriate parenting for at-risk children. Although sociopathy is highly genetic, inheriting the genes doesn’t necessarily mean that every at-risk child will grow up to be a sociopath. It is the interaction of genetics and the environment, including parenting, which actually creates the disordered individuals.
Many people realize, after a child is conceived or born, that their partner is a sociopath. If this is you, you need to take steps to raise the child so that he or she does not develop this disorder. I realize that this is immensely difficult and complicated, especially when the sociopathic parent will not let go of the child, which is often the case. But the healthy parents should try, as best they can, to teach the child how to love and feel empathy. (For information on how to do this, read Just Like His Father? by Dr. Liane Leedom.)
Perhaps with education, perseverance and time, our descendants will see the end of sociopathy. And they’ll thank us for taking the first steps to hasten the demise.
Thank you so much for this site!!
Newly married, my husband’s ex has issues. Can’t diagnose of course, but given what I’d heard from him, and I read Snakes in Suits (she’s an exec) to read more about this, and so much rings true. Including her having targeted the job my husband had and that she pursued (prior to “taking the pill” to get him to marry her, so she could back out of that job and go for one that pays more), and she pursued her next boss, is now married to him, and has the same job he had, though at another company.
I’m afraid for the kids, really. They take really well to my giving them affection and are still fairly young (8,11). I’ve seen her traits in them sometimes, and they scare me to death. In one, I saw an incredibly well crafted bruise painted on their cheek. When I rubbed it, it smeared, and not yet knowing fully about mom, I laughed. The kid gave me that apparently well-known blank face, turned and walked away. At 7 years old. That really, really freaked me out. Given I had laughed, the kid had the perfect out, and could laugh, or be a smidge embarrassed but smile (and I think normally would have). I definitely need to look up the Just Like His Father book!
I’m fairly obsessed with how to expose, and I dream of the perfect, non-scandalous way to simply speak the truth (versus withholding, which I think women -paths use against men’s ego; they can’t possibly admit having been so duped), and anonymous communications. It sometimes kills me thinking of how much she pulls off with no one thinking anything bad about her. Somehow, in spite of the continual lies and manipulations, my husband still trusts her to come up with half of their kids’ college, which speaks volumes to me about how crafty they are. He acknowledges how manipulative she is, and how much she lies, and how much money she steals, but still somehow trusts she will come through with this [undocumented in the divorce decree] “promise”. I’m dying to understand how she pulls this off.
This one isn’t even charming, at least once she marries the poor guy. Continually putting the husbands (who I know, there is one more previous to my husband who I don’t know) down, criticizing them, pushing them to earn more money. And spending every cent they have, and goes past that, forcing them to take out loans etc. I just don’t understand how these otherwise very smart husbands continue to not see that all she does is to lie and steal, basically.
I’m basically afraid of her, though I laugh at her efforts which to me look so incredibly juvenile (pulling up her shirt at kids ball games to investigate something on her stomach (she’s in good shape)).
I am turning here to figure out how to best cope with her, given she’ll be close to my new family forever, about which I’m really quite aghast.
Justus5, that is a GREAT BOOK, thank you for bringing it up again. I can understand how this site would scare someone too…it takes the sheepskin off the wolf and it is an UGLY BEAST underneath that sheep skin.
Dear ONE BELIEVER, that is an excellent post and sometimes in trying to “get even” with them or expose them we DO shoot ourselves in the foot. Glad you realized that, but now that you do, don’t keep beating yourself up about it. The past is past. Forgive yourself. (((hugs)))
superkid10,
two others:
womansavers.com
datingpsychos.com
..although I don’t trust datingpsychos.com as much as I do dontdatehimgirl.com and womansavers.com
zim
Dear Newstepmom,
Welcome to our world….it seems that your husband doesn’t see the same thing in his ex wife that you do…so it may be that will cause you and him some problems down the road.
Trying to “educate” someone about a psychopath when they do NOT SEE what you see about the lies and manipulation is almost an IMPOSSIBLE JOB. “Outing” her may backfire in your face.
Just because it is EASY for you to see this in her does not mean that it will be easy for others to see it.
I suggest that you focus on making your marriage the best it can be, and bonding with your step children, get a copy of “Just like his father” and some of the other books recommended her on LF book store and in the BOOK REVIEWS. Learning about psychopaths is a big project, but one well worth while. Learning about healthy relationships and spotting the RED FLAGS of disordered behavior is a good thing.
Not all bad behavior is psychopathic, but it is all dysfunctional. So work on making your life better,, more functional, and your relationships better with those people in your life who ARE functional. Again, welcome to LF.
Onebeliever. My heart goes out to you. Somebody here said revenge is best served cold. Yours was fraught w emotion. Best revenge is a life well lived. Somebospdy here recommended the song MEAN by taylor Swift. Its inspiring. You have my support.
I just had a chilling revelation this morning.
First, the background story:
Spath did a con on a restaurant owner, B. He came up with an invention and B invested $10,000. He also got his main Supply S, to add another $30,000 or $40,000, can’t remember exactly. Then he wanted another $10,000 from B, but B’s wife got suspicious. She said, “Why would you give $10,000 much less $20,000 to someone who doesn’t even want you to know where he lives? He knows everything about us, and we don’t have any information on him.” So B, had to back out and lost his first $10,000. (A couple of years later, it turned out that the invention, had already been invented, in the 1930’s. So everyone lost, except spath.) But Spath hated B’s wife for not falling for his scams and slandered her constantly. Spath continued to be friends with B.
A few weeks later, Spath was in B’s restaurant in the bar. It was near 2AM closing time, but the place was empty. 3 people walked in. 2 guys and a girl. They ordered drinks and B served them. Then the 3 whipped out their ID’s and showed that they were cops. And B had been too distracted by Spath and hadn’t asked to check their ID for legal drinking age. He got busted. He had all kinds of legal problems to deal with after that. Spath came home and told me about it. And he had that look that he has when he’s just manipulated another con. I know now that Spath maneuvered those cops to do that sting. It fits his MO perfectly.
I’m pretty sure that he begins these maneuvers by creating hate in the cops, towards a targetted individual. He convinces them that they should do this because B’s bar sends so many drunks out on the road, blah, blah … anything to instill outrage or hatred.
He also does this thing where he keeps all his relationships clandestine and compartmentalized. He pretends he doesn’t know certain people, then nobody would believe that he was involved in the cons. He sends his minions in to do the dirty work and they will never admit that they were taking orders from him. BF, told me that the last time he saw him, they walked into a casino and Spath said, “My name is Steve and you don’t know me”
Well that brings me to another Spath tell:
At one time, he told me that a retired US Marshall had a hangar 2 doors down from his. The Marshall had worked for the witness protection program as an Eraser (erasing identities).
When my sister was marrying the trojan horse (who is also a cop) , they decided to get married in Hawaii and spath was mad that I was going to Hawaii and he refused to go. He said, “you can tell them, that I’m never going to interact with them again, tell them, “You don’t know me anymore.” Then, he gave me two tee-shirts he got from the Marshall. They were funny teeshirts that said, “Federal Witness Protection Program” on one side, and “You Don’t Know Me” on the other side. When trojan spath saw them, in Hawaii, he insisted that they put them on and that I take their picture for spath. OMG, it was all a tell.
But here’s realization I had today:
Spath is addicted to manipulating cops. He can’t stop. That’s why I know that this is what he will continue to do. I’ve finally got his act all the way down. These are his methods:
Meet the cop, assess the cop for hooks, make sure the cop will pretend not to know him, sick the cop on his mark.
There is no gain here. Only revenge.
Ox Drover .. you wrote
“Gray rock only works with SOME of the psychopaths, being “boring” to my psychopathic son ain’t gonna work”..neither is NC, he is a STALKER, and even though ignoring them (NC) and being Boring (gray rock) works for SOME psychopaths, for some there is no answer as long as they are alive and/or free. Some of them just will NOT quit or move on to another victim. They have had ’N-injury’ if you escape them, and they cannot stand that, they must get revenge at ANY cost, even to themselves. Even when they lose, it is always someone else’s fault and therefore they must seek revenge to even the score”
Sister, do I GET that one! Even when the move on to the next victim, some STILL won’t stop SPATHING their ex victims. Mine, I think is a stalker, too.. his favorite tricks these days, I think, are
1. entering his victim’s email addy into junk marketing email lists;
2. call-hangups (I call them “breather” calls)
3. entering his victim’s phone number into “robo” marketing call lists
Even though I remain “gray rock” and NC with him.
Zim
oh..and don’t think they won’t get another (2nd) cell phone to use, or a “disposable phone” with an “unavailable” or “non trace” #, to make those harassing calls. I thought, “well two can play (that game)”.. I, too, could probably call back that #, from a pay phone, make a couple of “breather” or “hang-up” calls on him, too, but that would be a waste of my energy and time [Too bad, sucka spath! NOT gonna bite! ha ha..hope it RILES you..causes you BLUE BALLS! Too bad you never wore underwear, otherwise they’d be “in a bind” or you’d probably pee in them from fright and frustration. Ha ha]
Zim
Zim,
I think that might be a red flag: they don’t wear underwear.
Why is that?
Can we take a poll here?
Who’s spath did or didn’t wear underwear?
Mine did not.
skylar,
I’ve always suspected that he didn’t wear undies because either:
1. he’s a flasher
2. so any gay guys he meets up with in those “glory holes” can have easier access to his butt or his “package” .. don’t mean to get crass here, but..
Dang! How many of you felt that earthquake today? And what states are you in, if you did?
Zim