May, 2008 I brought to your attention the tragic case of Dr. Amy Castillo, a pediatrician who lost her court fight to protect her children from their psychopathic father. Unfortunately, I have to inform you that another two children have been lost and another mother named Amy is left asking how we let her down. Yes I said we let her down. The judge who allowed the children’s father, Michael Connolly to have unsupervised visitation was representing all of us.
We have to put our heads together and figure out how to change the system. Children need and deserve protection from sociopaths. Mothers and fathers like Amy made a mistake in marriage and love, that shouldn’t mean the children conceived should pay the ultimate price!
According to the Chicago Tribune Connolly, like Dr. Castillo’s ex-husband told people he would kill the children. “In court documents dating back to 2005, she (Amy) detailed her estranged husband’s threats against her family and fought unsuccessfully to keep him from having unsupervised visits with their two sons. Michael Connolly violated the orders of protection against him six times, police records said, and he often vowed to kill himself rather than be separated from the boys.”
Now I often tell people not to believe sociopaths. Here is the official Lovefraud exception to that rule: If a sociopath says he/she is going to kill someone, believe him/her.
I ask that everyone reading this blog write their lawmakers and submit editorials to newspapers about the need to protect children. Not just physically but emotionally too. I also welcome your ideas about what we as a community should do.
One other thing, let’s get the word out that family members have to stop covering for sociopaths and enabling them. Don’t let pity cloud judgment, and stand in the way of safety. The Tribune quotes Connolly’s aunt as saying, “I feel sorry for Michael”¦I know that sounds terrible, but he must have been so tormented.”
(Thank you to Rune, who brought this story to my attention)
I would also like to contribute something to our white board. A baseline description of what we are talking about. I think it’s important that we have an umbrella definition of sociopaths that breaks through the mass-media impressions of homicidal maniacs (while not excluding them.) A phrase that we can allows us to develop specifics in our arguments.
So here is what I suggest: Sociopaths are destructive emotional cripples.
The only thing of importance that I can think of adding is that they are incurable. But I think that is something we can make a secondary fact. The more important point is that they are destructive. Even if they could be treated, they are still destructive.
How they are destructive is something we can develop, depending on the audience. And this leaves us a clear path for developing our lists of protective strategies that we would want to present to various audiences — from knowledge to what needs to be done.
There are people who are working on these issues, such as the California Protective Parents Assn.
http://www.protectiveparents.com/
Thanks, Donna. That’s a really helpful link. Hard to read. But a lot of good information.
My last comment explained with a bit more clarity:
1. It’s a good idea to stick with scientific credibility. Anything that sounds conspiratorial, paranoid, fringe, or histrionic could be taken as such by authority which probably receives and round files that kind of stuff every day.
2. IMO, Political figures tend to be persuaded more by movements within their constituency, than they “want to do the right thing”, so grass roots efforts to popularize a simple rational explanation of what most normals have at some time experienced, but not been able to clearly explain, is a must.
3. Powerful figures are also usually “players”. They cannot be allowed to confuse sociopaths with other “players”.
Thanks, Donna,
You know, Guys, we might be more effective if we were to join with a group of people who are already working on this. I will check out that link later today, don’t have time right now.
At the time MADD was formed I don’t think there was a group working on that, but they have really become quite effective (not effective ENOUGH) but they have made a huge start and have a national presence.
If there ARE groups out there already, national or local, I think we also need to find them and to think about joining in some of their efforts—both donations of funds if we can afford it, or offer to do leg work in our areas for them.
I think we can ALSO keep going with our own letter writing and publication agenda as well….the more the merrier!
I appealed to (what I saw to be) honest, legitimate authority twice about sociopaths. But that was back in the day when I couldn’t clearly explain what I was taking about. Both times my concerns were brushed off as “typical office fun and games” or “personality conflicts”. And both times, that authority was eventually ruined by the very sociopath I had been warning them about. If I had only been able to better tie my own interests with those of said authority. If I just had the wisdom about how to approach those guys again today to discuss for mutual benefit: “How could I have warned you better?”
S O S, you wrote:
If I just had the wisdom about how to approach those guys again today to discuss for mutual benefit: “How could I have warned you better?”
I love the communication principle in that sentence. There is a wonderful book, quite old now, which was written for women entering a male-dominated workforce, called “Games Your Mother Never Taught You.” And one of the best chapter was about asking for a raise or a promotion. You go into these meetings talking about the money they are or will be making because of the change you are requesting.
Thinking about how to talk about sociopaths — or however we ultimately decide to define the objects of our concern — we have to think about why anyone would care. First to listen to us at all. And then to take steps that we are promoting. And, of course, the best arguments always begin with the listener’s self-interest.
So what happens when you throw someone without conscience into any social mix — whether it’s a family, a work environment or a church? What happens to the social dynamic, the individuals and what we would call in the business world “the asset value”? Which would be the total of all the material and non-material assets of the group.
There is so much literature scattered around about the impact of sociopaths on their environments. But not much is organized in this way. Still, from our own experiences we know what to look for. Fear and power plays increase in the group. Material resources change ownership, out of the group and into the sole hands of the sociopath. Human resources lose value as they become demoralized, distracted by unproductive dramas, and ultimately alienated or emotionally broken. Social or organizational structures become increasingly dysfunctional around this destruction of group resources.
I think to make this case, we have to come prepared with both credible literature and our own documentation of events (if we’re inside the group). Any one of the three areas of decreased value mentioned above can be a starting point.
Sometimes just laying information on the proverbial table, and walking away can be the most effective thing. People resist knowing they have a problem, and tend to shoot the messenger. Better to just drop it off, say “Now you see what I see,” and let it sink in.
That would be my strategy. But as you say, it used to be hard to talk about this. It’s getting easier the more we talk here. And some of us are getting really articulate.
Maybe this brainstorming exercise will help us become more articulate and more credible. That is my hope.
Oxy, that’s a good idea if we can find another group that shares our interest in educating the public about sociopaths. Or if we can find one that is interested in what knowledge and experience we can bring them in identifying them, dealing with them and minimizing the damage.
One of the important things that we potentially offer is help before the damage. Or ways to see through and deal with something that seems like “inexplicable bad.” By clarifying the differences between these people and empathetic people, we can also start making demands on the systems. For empathy, for conscience-based standards of behavior.
It’s a little strange to think that we’d have to make a point of this. We assume that this is the ordinary reality. But it’s not if sociopathic behavior becomes institutionalized or generally accepted as good or understandable.
So we can fight at a different level, and arguably one that is more powerful. Because in protecting our children, or warning people who might be involved with sociopaths, or identifying destructive behavior in the workplace, we are helping to avoid expensive, painful messes that ripple out to affect more and more lives.
Again, if we’re lucky enough to find someone work the same path, I think that would be great. Or a group that sees how our message can add value to theirs. But I hope we don’t get subsumed into an effort that focusses solely on the victims.
The real power of what we have to say is that we are talking about the perpetrators. Naming them, describing them, surviving them, avoiding them and occasionally outsmarting them. The perpetrators come before the victims, and to the extent the we can make it harder for perpetrators to operate, we make this a better world.
Do I sound bombastic. Sorry. I’m passionate about this. But I could have my mind changed, if you think I’m wrong.
I don’t think there is a broadbased group dealing with educating the populace about the Cluster B’s. The closest I can think is the Society for the Scientific Study of Psychopathy. See http://www.psychopathysociety.org/
They have a strong research focus. The young woman who conducted an online survey some time back with LFers is a student member. I applaud the researchers for promoting understanding of the disorders but I lament that fact that so much of their findings stay in the ivory towers.
Another group worth mentioning that has been affected by Cluster Bs with tragic results is the Support Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP). See http://www.snapnetwork.org/
In addition to the target groups in need of education that Kathy has summarized, I’d like to jump off from SOS’s earlier post on Blagojevich and add journalists. They are the gatekeeps of public opinion and knowledge and have absolutely no clue. I had the same reaction as SOS when a reporter referred to Blago’s behavior as “baffling.” It is NOT baffling; it is textbook behavior for a Cluster B!
Another really important target for cluster B education is psychology faculty as a group. Indeed they will be training the future mental health workers who need to understanding the disorders.
I’ve mentioned Hervey Cleckley’s before, but his laments are worth mentioning here as well in that as early as 1941 he decried the scant references in the medical texts to psychopathy. The situation has not changed – even in the psychology texts. I looked at a psych text in August and was struck by how much more ink was devoted to schitzophrenia and eating disorders (which are statistically rarer than Cluster B personality disorders and create havoc for far fewer affected parties) than was devoted to the cluster Bs. ASPD was mentioned but featured a picture of Hannibal Lector. Though the caption added that most antisocials are not serial killers, the use of such an emotionally compelling photo will only increase the misperception in the students’ minds that all antisocials are killers. And of course such killers are rare …. so hey not a disorder worth thinking about…
Okay, enough ranting. I’m probably preaching to the converted anyway. 🙂