Donna Anderson’s important latest post reminds me that one topic which will never be worn out is that of the psychopath’s lies and their impact on others.
This week I want to very briefly introduce yet another take on this inexhaustible topic. Everyone lies, but there’s something else at stake in the case of the psychopath’s lies.
To illustrate: you might say about any regular (non-psychopathic) person, “Things would be better if s/he was to lie less often. Her/his soul or psyche would be healthier as would her relationships.” That’s true. Now try this on for size and notice how wrong it seems: “Things would be better if the psychopath was to lie less often. His soul or psyche would be healthier as would his relationships.”
Weirdly, this is patently not the case. The psychopath will be just as sick/evil no matter how many or how few lies he tells. It’s not a quantitative but a qualitative matter.
It is commonly said that a defining characteristic of psychopaths is that they are pathological liars. This is right if you mean that they are profoundly dishonest and not to be trusted. It does not mean, though, that psychopaths lie a lot. They do lie a lot and those lies cause havoc. But as I hope my illustration above shows, lying less will not make them better people.
So, how does this work? The thing about psychopaths is that even their truths are lies! Or rather, whether or not they happen to be telling the truth or a lie at any particular moment is not what makes them psychopathic. What makes them psychopathic is that they use and destroy people; truth or lies are for them just so many weapons for pursuing their prey.
M.L. Gallagher said a lot when she wrote this:
He is the lie….
From hello to good-bye. I love you to I hate you. You’re beautiful to you’re ugly.
It was all a lie….When friends or my family ask, but what about this, or what about that, I tell them. It was all a lie. There was no truth in him.
If I spend my time trying to figure out fact from fiction, all I am doing is trying to prove I wasn’t so stupid. See, this was true. That’s why I fell in love with him.
Truth is. I fell in love with him because I believed his lie.
When I discovered the truth, I was so enmeshed in his lie, I couldn’t find the truth in me. And so I sank.
Yes I know. How better to get into the mind of these people? I can bet Team Six knows EVERYTHING about Al Queda.
I will look at the archives. Thanks Kim.
Adamsrib,
Well, I hadn’t thought about it that way! I wouldn’t want One/Joy to make her boss fall in love with her!! then she’d NEVER get any work done. LOL!
Sometimes, like at work, there is no way to avoid an N.
What I was meaning to say is that he expects everyone to cower in a corner while he rages. If nobody does that, but instead, just goes on as if he doesn’t exist or else just gives him a cookie, or smiles at him, or laughs at him, or sits him in a corner, then he loses the purpose for his rage.
I can see how it would work with a boss. It’s a good technique in a work environment just not with a “love interest”. That only deepens the drama.
Of course one would have to modify that technique when dealing with a boss. Remember the scene from 9 to 5 with Dolly P , Lily T and Jane F? Maybe you are too young to remember but I am thinking of that scene where they have the boss on a rope in his chair hoisted in the air. HILARIOUS!!! 🙂
Kim, don’t worry I am not on a Recon mission for the other side. Just saying… 🙂
Oh, adamsrib, I never thought you were.
Kim just came from the archives. I knew about the book but had not read it! WHOA! I agree with what Ox says about it:
“Frankly, this book made me uncomfortable while I was reading it, I think possibly by showing me “red flags” of power plays that I had experienced in the past, but had not quite recognized at the time I was being played. However, I do think the knowledge I gained by reading this book is well worth the slight discomfort. It isn’t a book that you can “zip through” quickly, but one that must, like the textbook that it is, read and ponder, and even re-read, and ponder again.”
I was sickened just reading the list. Green uses the same format in the Art of Seduction. It is less icky and more of a fun PsychoBabble read but still powerful in the wrong hands.
What is positively AMAZING is these guys like Turd know this stuff instinctively-trust me he did not learn it from a book. That is what is so scary. That evil nature of his. UGH!!
Hilarious thread!! LOL!!!
Skylar,
In my observations, you can interrupt a cause for rage in normal people, but not possible for spaths b/c they don’t operate on cause/effect system to control themselves. In my experience, when a form of abuse does not work, they merely up the ante until they think they “win”.
Spaths can wobble but they never fall down. (when we are not being predictable it can confuse them momentarily, but they rebalance quickly.)
If you can control an “spath”, then they weren’t an spath. IMHO
Good. Just feeling like I am still proving myself here. I am aware that I have the uncanny ability to clear a whole room with just one sentence. It’s a bit of a curse I am afraid but I am working on that.
Adamsrib, What makes you think that? I remember you from before and always enjoyed your posts. I think we all feel that way, sometimes. I think it’s because we still doubt ourselves and aren’t very confident…sometimes more vulnerable than others. I am,personally, glad you’re back. You got a lot to offer.