One of the good things about the conviction of Jerry Sandusky on almost all counts related to molesting 10 boys was that his lame personality disorder defense did not fly.
Histrionic personality disorder? Huh? That was the prevailing reaction when defense attorneys claimed that the former Penn State assistant football coach wrote those “creepy” letters because he suffers from histrionic personality disorder.
Several experts in personality disorders were quoted in news reports stating that even if Sandusky does have histrionic personality disorder, it would not be an excuse for the molestation.
Why not?
It’s quite simple: Most people with personality disorders are not delusional. Those with antisocial, borderline, narcissistic and yes, histrionic personality disorders are not “hearing voices” or out of touch with reality. (By the way, the American Psychiatric Association is in the process of revising its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Histrionic personality disorder isn’t even included in the new version.)
Over and over, Lovefraud readers tell me about outrageous deceit, manipulation and conscienceless behavior in their own interactions with personality-disordered individuals. Here is the common denominator: Sociopaths know exactly what they are doing. They just feel entitled to do what they want, and do not care who gets hurt in the process.
I was worried about the introduction of “personality disorder” as a defense in a criminal trial. Because it was permitted in the Sandusky case, would it open the door for all the defense attorneys in the country to blame their clients’ crimes on personality disorders? This would be a serious problem, because researchers estimate that 47 percent of male and 21 percent of female prison inmates have antisocial personality disorder.
For the most part, people with personality disorders are quite capable of making choices about their behavior. They know the difference between right and wrong, although they may have no emotional investment in doing what is right. They can follow society’s rules and laws when it suits their purpose.
Jerry Sandusky was convicted. I hope this continues to mean that when these disordered people commit crimes, they won’t be able to get off by claiming the psychological equivalent of, “the devil made me do it.”
Back_from_the_edge
IT IS ALWAYS ABOUT THE SPATH.
Truthspeak
Bluejay, Sandspathsky is a master manipulator, and he had PLENTY of enabling to help him damage these kids.
OxD, the third-person is a HUGE tell in all of the letters. He’s separating himself (what he TRULY is) from this “loving, loyal” and bullshit illusion that he’s trying to portray. He cannot say, “I,” or, “me,” because that would connect him, on all levels, to his manipulations. He had to put DISTANCE between the illusion and the monster.
Just my 2 cents, there
bluejay
Truthspeak,
They are all master manipulators – our’s too. In Jer’s letters, he say’s “we…,” like he’s speaking for the dark (spiritual) influences within himself. That’s my thinking. In one of his letters, Jer talked about dark clouds. I’ve relayed this experience before, but years ago when we were on a family vacation to Tennessee (before I knew that my ex was a spath), I saw what looked like a dark, black cloud in front of the spath’s abdomen (I was outside, standing on the lawn, looking up at the spath, who was standing alone on a house’s deck). To me, it’s interesting that Jer talks about a dark cloud. It makes me think that there is a spiritual connection (undetected by himself).
darwinsmom
quoted from the creepy letter article:
“I Am A Great Pretender
Yes, I am a “Great Pretender.” I pretend that I can sing. I pretend about many things. However, I can’t pretend about my feelings and want you to always remember that I care.
Not always a pretender ”“ “Jer””
TOTAL SPATH TELL + 180° LIE
Everything else, except the last to victim4, was total uninspired lovebombing, and then blame projection… GAG!
skylar
I too wonder if the third person is a tell. Is he disassociating?
The creepiest part, for me, was his use of the word, “care”.
Oxy, I agree with you that it sounds like word salad. It’s like the syntax is off. He knows the words but not the music. He knows the word care is important, but he doesn’t feel it. Though I do believe that he is obsessed with people caring about him. Like my spath and yours, he has realized that he can only manipulate people if they CARE about him first.
Darwins’s mom, yeah the entire manipulation attempt is 180 degrees the opposite of the truth. He can’t possibly care, yet he demands that his victim care about him.
It really is repulsive to read.
darwinsmom
bluejay,
that is very interesting! Of the seven chakras there are 3 that can hold emotions – the sacral one (in the abdomen), the solar lexus (ego) and the heart. The difference of those emotions are that sacral ones are feelings that have a direct emotional impact on us as a sensation (such as being in love, hope/fantasy because creativity resides there too; but also upsetness over someone actively hurting you; or primal fear in a dangerous situation). The feelings will give a sense of ‘need or craving, create a desire’ (desire is not the same as imposing will).
The solar plexus emotions are purely cognitive feelings and related to ego (possession related feelings, such as envy and jealousy, but also rage and frustration of not having what you feel entitled to, and fear of losing face with rationalisation as a consequence). These ’emotions’ have a very cognitive quality, rather than a ‘sensation’ quality. And while entitlment and willfullness is a sign of an ego in overdrive, it is not something we can function without. At a normal healthy size, ego is the seat of your will and hence the motor to actually try and get your needs and desires realized.
The heart emotions are more like ‘social’ type of feelings – feelings with regards to an injustice (not just to yourself), sympathy, love for another human being (that is if they’re happy, you’re happy too), caring… If anger is a sacral emotion and rage an ego emotion then wrath is the heart version of it. So the heart emotions are not solely ‘benign’ feelings. Actually, I think wrath is eventually a ‘positive’ emotion as well, because it is always related to seeing or knowing the possibility of others beside yourself getting hurt. Wrath is the feeling described in God in the bible to clean the whole mess in one sweep; it’s the tough side of ‘love’. It’s often the emotiona spark that caused plenty of the known and succesful revolutions in history.
And if ‘hope’ was the feeling at the sacral chakra, then faith is the sole remaining emotion, which resides in the crown chakra. This feeling is what makes you believe ‘Life’s Being Good,’ even if it is far from perfect
Anyhow, what can this have to do with spaths and the observation you made about the black cloud? Spaths would lack all emotional sensations except for the ego ‘cognitive’ ones. They go straight from an opportunity in real life (sex, money, drugs, etc) to ‘I will have that!’ There’s no creative process of hope, no slow inner world desire building. There sacral chakra would basically be a black hole (which is not actually a hole at all, but a microstar that just eats everything up without it ever escaping again, not even light). They wouln’t have heart emotions either, because they cannot empathize and bond with other human beings.
In any case, so ‘seeing’ a black cloud or black hole at the stomach area would to me mean having a vision of their emty sacral chakra.
darwinsmom
sky,
For all the supposed ’emotional’ display I found it extremely tedious to read those letters. I simply couldn’t concentrate much or long on the lovebombing blablabla. That’s why I guess I used the word ‘uninspiring’. You can sense that this man is trying to talk the talk but doesn’t know the walk.
Interesting observation on the use of the word ‘care’!
I also found the allegorical material he used totally superficial, cardboard and cheap – movie characters?!!! Not that I find Forest Gump a bad movie character, or all that superficial. But well, movie characters are a) easy b) not actually a genuine example of a human being anyway as it was a character acted by an actor. Sometimes I think movies and their characters are the sole ‘humans’ spaths can somehow try to ‘understand’. Hello, it’s FICTION!
skylar
Darwin’s mom,
yeah movies are fiction and the characters are actors, but then, SO ARE SPATHS! 🙂
So how do you expect them to know the difference? THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE.
Well, actually there is one. In a movie, the actors know that they are acting and that there is more depth in life, than the character they are temporarily playing. With a spath’s fictional life, they really don’t see that there is a difference. They can’t feel the depth of an emotion and they can’t imagine what it would be like if they did. They are amused by our reaction to their dramatic displays.
Spaths are story driven characters. Once they tell a story and someone seems to react like they believe it, it becomes “real” to them. That’s as real as anything gets to a spath. That’s also their vulnerability. You can tell them any story and they believe it.
Both actors and spaths, do what they do to manipulate our emotions. Actors do it to entertain us, while spaths do it to entertain themselves.
Stargazer
Under what circumstance should an adult man ever be telling a boy how much he likes his “special touch”? I think I can feel my dinner coming back up.
darwinsmom
Sky, you said, “yeah movies are fiction and the characters are actors, but then, SO ARE SPATHS! 🙂
So how do you expect them to know the difference? THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE. ”
That was exactly what I was thinking. 🙂