A Lovefraud reader frequently sends me links to stories in the Daily Mail, a tabloid based in the United Kingdom. Here are some recent articles:
Newlywed ”˜murdered his wife of just five months after she discovered his affairs on Facebook’ (September 3, 2010)
Bigamist who claimed to be decorated Falklands hero to woo fifth wife then fleeced her of £50,000 (September 6, 2010)
Cheating husband bludgeoned wife to death before going Christmas shopping with mistress (September 9, 2010)
Internet Romeo conned dozens of women out of £500,000 pretending to be terminally ill (September 15, 2010)
Here at Lovefraud, we can recognize that the bad actors in all of these cases are likely sociopaths.
The signs are all there. One perp was called, “The man with the golden tongue.” About another perp, a cop said, “he targeted vulnerable women, gained their trust and then fraudulently obtained money for his own needs.” The man who murdered his wife conducted an elaborate charade for four days, using her phone to send texts to family and friends saying that she had left him.
A different story
Yes, I’d say these guys are sociopaths. But to the Daily Mail, they’re just sensational stories.
The Daily Mail has a circulation of nearly 2 million. That means every day, nearly 2 million people read these stories. Can you imagine how helpful it would be if the Daily Mail actually pointed out that there is a common denominator among all these cases? That they are, in fact, sociopaths?
For example, here’s the type of information I’d like to see added to the “Internet Romeo” story:
Good-looking, charming and apparently a successful professional, David Checkley seemed perfect to the women he courted on dating websites.
In reality, however, the 52-year-old was a serial fraudster who cheated his victims out of half a million pounds.
One lent him £10,000 after he claimed to need money for a vital operation to cure his fictional Parkinson’s disease.
Others gave him cash for invented business dealings as he posed variously as an architect, property developer, fighter pilot and Vietnam War veteran. One woman ended up losing her house.
Here’s where I’d elaborate:
How did this happen? How did so many smart, successful women fall for this bloke’s stories?
“In cases like this, the perpetrators often have a personality disorder,” explained one expert. “Often, people who charm others and then take advantage of them are sociopaths.”
The term “sociopath,” the expert explained, does not necessarily mean someone is a serial killer. Rather, a sociopath is someone with no conscience and no empathy for others. They can appear to be charming, glib and charismatic. They often seem to be a lot of fun. But they are social predators, whose aim is to exploit people to get what they want.
So why don’t the media explain what a sociopath is, or connect the dots so that people can start to see the pattern in the behavior described in these stories?
First of all, most reporters are clueless about this disorder, just as we were once all clueless. They went to the same schools and live in the same society as we do. If we never learned it, neither did they.
Secondly, even if the media realizes someone is a sociopath, actually saying it creates all kinds of legal problems. The media are in the publicity business, and publicity gone bad can turn into defamation. The Daily Mail has lost some big libel suits, and I’m sure would prefer to avoid them.
Media suggestions
So what could be done? Here are suggestions for the Daily Mail and other media:
- Publish informational stories about sociopathy, explaining how prevalent the disorder is, and what the symptoms are.
- Watch for stories in which someone has been diagnosed as a sociopath in court, because, in the U.S. at least, anything said in court can be published without fear of defamation.
- When someone is diagnosed as a sociopath, explain what it means, and what kind of behavior the person exhibited that is typical of a sociopath.
If the media could add education to the sensationalism, a lot of people may learn to recognize the behavior and avoid being victimized.
If I were a cynic, I’d say that the media might not want to do this, because then they’d have fewer sensational stories. But I don’t think they’d have to worry. Unfortunately, there are so many sociopaths, and they are so good, that it will be a long time before the predators run out of victims.
SocioSibs,
Thank you so much! We’re all in this together.
As far as I’m concerned, you cannot talk about sociopaths without talking about gaslighting.
Hopefully, everyone knows that gaslighting is standard operating procedure for a psychopath.
So, if you can become proficient at recognizing gaslighting, your chance of getting into an abusive relationship is greatly reduced…..provided you don’t ignore the red flags.
Gaslighting is something you can call someone on right away, and you can warn your friends when they are being gaslighted, as well.
It’s great to know the characteristics of a sociopath, but not everyone who is charming and superficial is a socio.
If someone shares common interests with you, is this person a new friend or are they just mirroring you???
Like BloggerT7165 said a few weeks ago, “There are a million and one ways to come at someone.”
So, I think it’s a good idea to take a hard look at HOW someone is coming at you.
For example, someone who does not take “NO” for an answer is someone who wants to control you….even if they are showering you with flattery the entire time.
And then, there is the Pity Play that can be used in a million different ways.
I swear….it’s not a coincidence that Pity and Psycho both begin with P, if you know what I mean.
It’s great to get the bullet points out there about sociopaths.
But that’s not going to keep people from being conned.
It’s impossible to tell if someone is lacking a conscience when you first meet them, unless it’s a serial killer coming at you with an ice pick.
The key to not getting conned is about learning the insidious techniques socios use to hook and destabilize their victims.
The way they manipulate others into accepting their twisted version of reality (gaslighting) is what sociopaths do best, my opinion.
Dear Sociosibs,
Maybe I mistook the purpose, I clicked on “stories” and it wouldn’t let me “read” unless I “joined” and gave my name/email etc.
On Love Fraud anyone can READ and not have to post or “register” that was what I meant. Maybe I mistook what your purpose was in how your site was set up.
There is another blogger here that you might be interested in contacting, look on the left side of the LF blog links and click on “female offenders” on the BLOGROLL. That is the site of BloggerT who is a professional therapist with much experience in psychopathy. He has worked in prisons and other such places and is a great one for RESEARCH links. His site is really great and he is also a great guy! Very much into the RESEARCH end of things. I think you will like his site. He regularly posts here. I enjoy his posts very much and he contributes a great deal of information when he does post.
I’m always teasing him about “adding FACTS to my rants!” LOL
One of the things that his blog concentrates on is the FEMALE offenders who are largely ignored by the media and by even LAW ENFORCEMENT as sexual offenders. I think he intends to branch out into female offenders in general not only sexual ones.
I happen to have a personal agenda against sexual predators, having been personally acquainted with one of THE worst, Charles “Jackie” Walls III of Lonoke, Ark. who is now doing life without parole in the Arkansas prisons. There h as been a nationally done 1 hour doc. on Jackie as well as many written media and you can google the Ark Dept. of Corrections and see more about him. Ark puts their convicts on line!
I knew Jackie was a jerk, and I did not like him, though his father is one of the finest men ever to walk the earth and his late mother as well. Great family. He is a MONSTER! He volunteered for 20 years or so with Scouts and they think he molested over 1,500 kids through the years as well as was responsible for several suicides and murders as well. HE IS THE DEFINITION OF EVIL.
He even molested a nephew who later suicided and got one of his victims to kill his family after the victim had confessed to his folks what was going on. That was how Jackie was eventually caught when the kid was caught.
At the time I knew Jackie, I went to church with his family, my mom worked with his dad and I was a close friend of the family. I had NO idea what a psychopath was, and really didn’t know what a “real child molester” was or that such things REALLY happened in “Mayberry USA” where we lived. Since then I have known several who were convicted by a court of law and did prison time. In my opinion ALL sexual predators are psychopaths, though I know that there are those that think they can be redeemed. Dr. Anna Salter who is one of the experts in this field believes as I do, though she doesn’t use the “P-word” she does believe they are NOT EVER REDEEMABLE.
I wish more experts would use the P-word or the S-word! ANY “word!”
OxDrover:
Sometimes I feel like I’m on ESP with you or something.
We posted 2 minutes apart, and we both mentioned BloggerT7165 in our posts.
What’s up with that???
His ears should be ringing right about now.
Dear Rosa!
LOL I do think that brilliant minds do run in the same directions! Yours and mine of course!
You know it is interesting. This morning an elderly neighbor of mine whose wife died a couple of years ago who is VERY poor and very lonely, and his rotten worthless kids did him out of everything he owned except a BARE roof over his head (literally) anyway, he came walking up my driveway this morning and fell into my arms sobbing that he needed to borrow some money (about $20) because his truck was out of gas on the road not far from my driveway and he needed to go to town.
Of course I would have given him the last half of my last biscuit without a second thought. HOWEVER. Hanging on the arm of this man was a “meth ho” that was so stereotypical that it made me want to SCREAM.
She also wanted to know if I had a cigarette!
I sent son D to the store with a gas can to get fuel for the old man’s truck, and I gave the old man all the cash I had in the house about $35 bucks, and then they left for him to drive her to town for some appointment she had at the medicaid office.
I didn’t want to “pry” too much but I did pry a bit, and it just FROSTED MY COOKIES that METH HO had moved into the old man’s house and was using up what few resources he had. I think his total income is somewhere in the neighborhood of $350 a month plus food stamps. His house is gone because his grandson had the old man mortgage it and give him the money. Yea, I know, the old man brought it on himself by enabling all these free loading kids and so on. But you know, it just made me so tooth-grinding mad for this METH HO to be using him like she is.
You’d be proud of me though, I didn’t say a word to him, or try to “rescue” him, or try to find someone to put her out of his house or anything on that line. I guess all-in-all, the poor old guy is better off with that flea bitten bag of bones with rotten teeth than living there without anyone. It still makes me grind my teeth! URGGGGGGGGG!!!!!
It does pith me off though that she will buy cigarettes with THE MONEY I GAVE HIM. LOL
Rosa It is because we have experienced it, lived it and survived it that we have all this wisdom. Yes we can try and educate other’s about these trait’s in people and if they recognize the trait’s we are talking about then they too have been involved with one. But for the lucky one’s that think we are crazy, it’s like trying to explain how a heart attack feels, it’s different for everybody. For me Life Lesson learned from experience, the whole encounter was a test.
Well said, Henry.
I tend to repeat myself alot.
Good points Rosa – gaslighting is not an easy thing to explain though but I think you;re right that it;s a major symptom of the disorder and a major cause of damage in targets – we are trained to distrust our own perceptions about what is happening. And once that happens it;s the psychopath who writes history and forms the script that makes up our current and past life. Gaslighting and its destabilising effects give them ultimate control.
The other major symptom is lies.
And gaslighting in combination with lies stops us from seeing the entire pattern as any time we bring up a problem from the past it is denied or our interpretation of it is denied.It is an insidious cycle and one behaviour allows the other to continue.
Hens you are so right that we can only be wise in recognising it now that we have experienced the minutae of the disorder.
Donna it is my hope that in the future formal academic research on non jailed sociopaths will be carried out with this community. Our knowledge needs to be linked with theory and the developing body of knowledge on sociopathy that is forming worldwide. I am so glad you developed this site and this community – I don’t know what I would have done without it. I was devastated in walking away from the sociopath and couldn’t see how I could possibly recover and survive on my own. But I have and now that I’m stronger, I want to contribute to helping others and spreading what I know about the disorder.
It is frightening how vulnerable those people are who are highly empathic as well as ignorant to the reality of personality disorders. It’s an ambush from left field that nobody expects or knows how to respond to. I’m so glad you just didn’t hide away from this – most people do. They’re so embarrassed at the abnormality of their experience with the sociopath and the effects on them that they don’t talk about it and they don’t learn about it.
Those voices are lost. And alone. And they shouldn’t be.
I have taken such comfort away from what I have read here. It has encouraged me, cheered me, made me think, allowed me to grieve and let go and shown me a path towards a much better tomorrow. It is the people here that have done that. And the people are here because of the site that you developed in response to your experience.
You are to be applauded and I hope that all who give their time here receive the recognition they deserve in this important education and support community. There is nowhere online like this despite the proliferation of sites from former targets. Thankyou. Thankyou. Thankyou.
Hens … lovely to see you again. 🙂
Kathleen I have lost the thread you responded to me on. But please know I read every word and am following the ideas closely in practice. I also discussed the ideas with others to get some perspective.
There is hope after being with a sociopath. Life is so much better out of their shadow. I am sending a wish out today to anyone who is sitting small and lonely inside a horrific relationship where all their power has been taken by someone who has no soul. My wish is that you will believe life is so much more than present reality. But only when you cut contact with the sociopath. I hope you will take the first step towards that today for yourself. Life is sweet on the outside and everything is fine 🙂 You will be okay 🙂
Dear Ox Drover,
“I clicked on “stories” and it wouldn’t let me “read” unless I “joined” and gave my name/email etc.”
Thank you for explaining. Actually you’re referring to 2 different pages. There is no “joining” my site, and right now the only people who can get to the “stories” are specific people for whom I’ve set up access with a username & password. Here’s an explanation of those 2 pages:
CONTACT ”“ This is the contact page for anyone who may have questions, comments, resources to add (to the Resources page), or a story to tell. Filling it in or not has nothing to do with joining anything and is unrelated to the Stories page, except that one who may wish to submit a story can start the ball rolling with this contact method. To guard against proceeding recklessly, I do insist on knowing who a person is and how to contact her/him IF s/he wants his/her story to go up on my site. However, anyone can read all but the Stories section at present without ever filling in or sending the contact form. Which brings us to”
STORIES ”“ This is where stories about specific sociopaths will ultimately be uploaded. For now it is still password-protected for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that the only story up so far, and still incomplete, is about my sister. There’s a ton of evidence there that I’ve tracked down about her, and I’m treading cautiously and one step at a time at the moment because of a current situation that is dangerous to myself and my family because of her. Initially I intended to use that story to help protect myself & family; ultimately I intend for it to be a starting point for more people’s stories that can be more easily accessible.
Everything other than the Stories section IS accessible to anyone online without having to join anything at all. To reiterate, there is no joining at my site. I know it’s not a great site; as I wrote previously, I’m an amateur. So your feedback is welcome, as it hadn’t occurred to me that the site could be so misconstrued.
Also, since my son is in Scouts, the story you wrote of stayed with me when I watched that show. I’m sorry you knew that guy.
And thank you for mentioning BloggerT, whose posts and site I have seen and appreciate. Most of what I find online highlights men who con women, so I would like to see more about female predators. I’m related to one who has devastated many people, including her immediate relatives, a husband, boyfriends, friends, neighbors, employers, and whole families. My investigation has turned up witnesses to her heartlessly killing numerous animals beginning in her childhood, all the way through to finding carcasses & skeletal remains sprawled on the property she abandoned just 2 years ago. She has a young-adult daughter who I now realize has always been in grave danger, who has ended up in different ERs too many times with unexplained causes for comfort. So I’m heartened that BloggerT is illuminating the female sector of sociopaths.