The connection between love and politics—that was the topic of commentary in yesterday’s paper written by Gregory Rodriguez, a columnist for the Los Angeles Times. The article, Love and politics in a cynical age, got me thinking about the consistency of behavior.
Rodriguez summarized how Americans have come to view the private lives and public lives of the people we elect to represent us. He wrote:
The truth is that we don’t generally associate politics or politicians with happy marriages and deep romance, let alone fidelity. The constant revelation of scandals and peccadilloes in the halls of power have trained us to expect the worst of those—particularly the men—we elect to shepherd and protect the interests of society. Somewhere along the line, Americans have even bought into the notion that a politician’s private life, in particular his love life, has little or nothing to do with his efforts on behalf of the public good.
In other words, people seem to think that just because an elected official cheats on his spouse, it doesn’t mean we can’t trust him with our tax dollars.
Not everyone holds this view. Ross Perot, who ran for president in 1992, famously said that at his company, EDS, lying, cheating, stealing and adultery were all grounds for dismissal. If he were elected, he said, the same standard would apply. Perot said:
“If a man’s own wife cannot trust him, how can the American people?”
This, I think, is a legitimate question.
Different behavior
People often ask me if a sociopath will be “different” with a particular person. For example, can a sociopathic man who hates and harasses his ex-wife love his children? Can a sociopathic woman who takes advantage of her family be true to her new boyfriend?
The short answer is no. Exploitative people exploit anyone who has something that they want.
The long answer is that exploitative people may seem to authentically care for particular individuals, but it’s probably just part of an overall scheme of manipulation. The sociopath is just softening up the target, preparing for the right time to strike.
Here is one of the most dangerous thoughts we can ever have: “Well, yes, he (or she) treated that person badly, but he’ll never do that to me!”
Remember: The best indication of future behavior is past behavior. If you know that a person has behaved in a deceitful or exploitative way towards someone else, sooner or later, the person will behave that way towards you.
Compartmentalize
So why do we compartmentalize? Why do people seem to believe that how our elected officials conduct their private lives has nothing to do with how they conduct their public lives? Why is it that when we hear of a powerful person who has a solid marriage, we are surprised?
Maybe we’re beaten down. Maybe we’re totally disillusioned. After all, stories of deceit, betrayal and treachery have been around as long as humans have told stories. Maybe we hear of so many scandals—from cheating spouses to tax dollars wasted—that we simply expect the worst of people.
Perhaps public life has simply gotten too easy in America. It’s not like the Revolutionary War, when men risked their lives and fortunes to stand up to the British. No, politics today is all talk and no consequences. That makes it an excellent career choice for sociopaths—all they have to do is be charming, charismatic and deceitful.
Sociopaths, after all, want power, control and sex. By getting elected, they have access to everything they want.
Liu Xiaobo
That’s why it’s so refreshing to hear about people, in this day and age, fighting the good fight from a foundation of love.
In the article that I quoted in the beginning of this post, the author, Gregory Rodriguez, also wrote about Liu Xiaobo. Liu is the Chinese dissident who recently won the Nobel Peace Prize. He, of course, was viewed as a subversive criminal by the Chinese government, and was not allowed to go to Norway and accept the prize. Rodriguez explained how his absence was handled in Oslo:
Actress Liv Ullmann read aloud the statement Liu released last December as he was awaiting trial for “inciting subversion of state power.” At the top, he sermonized against hatred (“enmity can poison a nation’s spirit”), but his ending was an exquisite love letter to his wife, Liu Xia.
“I am sentenced to a visible prison,” he wrote, “while you are waiting in an invisible one. Your love is sunlight that transcends prison walls and bars, stroking every inch of my skin, warming my every cell, letting me maintain my inner calm, magnanimous and bright, so that every minute in prison is full of meaning. But my love for you is full of guilt and regret, sometimes heavy enough to hobble my steps. I am a hard stone in the wilderness, putting up with the pummeling of raging storms, and too cold for anyone to dare touch. But my love is hard, sharp, and can penetrate any obstacles. Even if I am crushed into powder, I will embrace you with the ashes.”
Rodriguez viewed Liu’s words to his wife as a sign of passion and commitment, and the bad behavior in the private lives of elected officials as the opposite. The point, Rodriguez wrote, is that love begins at home.
How people conduct their private lives is absolutely relevant to whether or not they should be elected. People who cannot be trusted by their most intimate loved ones cannot be trusted by anyone. And people who feel genuine love and compassion for their families can extend their love and compassion for the greater good.
Eva,
I think you are right. It really doesn’t matter who says something if that something they say is true. Just because someone is a lawyer, doctor, whatever, doesn’t mean that they are always right. What a person states has to stand on its own merits and yes lay people can and do known a lot about disordered people and have extremely valuable information and insights to offer.
LL,
As I said it is different talking about your own personal experiences (like your ex for example) and people compared to a total stranger with a few seconds of a video and giving them such a serious label. That is also different from saying that a behavior is bad or wrong. I also agree with you about judging for yourself. Of course you should and you should speak up if you think someone or something is being hurtful, harsh, abusive, etc. Which is what I did btw. Oh and a disordered or abusive person is different than saying psychopath. There are people who are abusive and disordered that are not psychopaths and I 100% agree with talking about behaviors and signs to watch out for.
There may be some pecking order here but I almost never post here anymore and other than this brief flurry probably won’t again for quite awhile so I am not sure I am anything more than a drive by poster
Blogger,
thank you for your heartfelt apology, I accept it.
Did I understand Oxy correctly? Do you personally know the Williams family? If so, then I would like to apologize for offending you in regard to your friends. I can understand if you have a personal connection, that you would get angry at me for my comments. It never occurred to me that a person here would know these two people personally.
That said, I would like to clarify something. You know how gay people have “gaydar” and spaths are known to recognize each other. Well people who have a particular type of abuse also recognize each other. Ted reminds me so much of my brother. His attachment to his mom reminds me of mine and my brother and sister to our mom. Also, my father is still controlled by his mom – from the grave.
When she said, “please don’t disappoint me” it triggered me. Why does this have to be about her? Why doesn’t she say, “Ted, you need to do well for YOU. Because YOU deserve to do well.” That is the difference between LOVE and CONTROL. I’m only now learning it, and I have a very sharp radar for people who want to control, now.
Blogger,
Is it safe to assume you’re a therapist? I would like to share a story with you if I may:
When my 20 year old son was a child, he had ear infections almost constantly. He was number 4 of my 6 children and I had seen ear infections quite a few times, enough to know when one was coming on. I can’t tell you how many times I was sent home by many a pediatrician denying my reality that my children had an ear infection,only to return two days later to have the child re-examined to find that yep, she/he had an infection.
This happened numerous times with my son. So often in fact, that he ultimately had MANY times where his ear drum ruptured. Fun. I BEGGED the Pediatricians, who were caring for my son to do SOMETHING because it was out of control. Get rid of one infection, another returns. They also tried putting him on antibiotics for months at a time. BIG MISTAKE…and I KNEW it! So what do you think was the outcome for my son despite all of my efforts as his “lay” person mother, versus five or six pediatricians who thought THEY knew more or better? My son is now 40% deaf in one ear, 60 in the other. When he was FINALLY referred to an ENT Specialist after YEARS of this and BEGGING, well, they finally put tubes in his ears, removed his adenoids, etc. Fixes the problem, right? Wrong. The tubes fell out three months later and after MORE insistence with the Specialist, and further investigation, my son was found to have an ABNORMALLY small eustachian tube. Because someone has a degree, and went to school, spending thousands in student loans to get that accomplishment (I understand this, not downing you, as I’m now in process), doesn’t mean that there is the POTENTIAL that the lay person who has HAD THE EXPERIENCE, might know just what they’re talking about. ANd in this case, nothing like a lay person Mom who loved her son so much, she just wanted him WELL…..not deaf. But we’ve worked with that too now. My point being here, Blog, is that sometimes the best teachers are those who have lived through the experience. I don’t know if you’re familiar with Lundy Bancrofts work, but what most impresses me about it, is that he LISTENS AND BELIEVES HIS VICTIMS OVER THE ABUSER AND THEY HAVE PROVIDED MORE TEACHING ABOUT THE ABUSER THAN THE ABUSERS THEMSELVES. Neato, huh? 🙂 I’m sure you have some stories to share as a result of your work and I would love to debate you about those things, however, in this case, the best teacher is not the perpetrator, but the many many victims whose stories are astonishingly similar with symptoms of the disorder and how it has affected all of our lives. A Spath is NOT going to own up to anything, but his/her victims will. But I’m guessing that if you don’t already know that, you may now have a willingness to do so, but my guess is that you already know 🙂
Blogger!! LOL, well seems we posted over one another, but that’s okay we also understand one another it seems, which is a good thing
I’m sorry you won’t be posting much. This blog has been great for me.
Nice to meet you and nice to see reconciliation of misunderstanding with sky. THat’s heartening for me. SOmething I saw little of. 🙂
Hi Blogger
I think so, that most people without the diploma in psychology know more than most of psychologists due to the nature of this pathology. Many of these creatures manage to behave sane apparently outdoors. Just those very close to them, or the sporadic victims they choose, realize that the person is disgusting and toxic.
Some of these persons work with appearances very well. And if the apparences are ok even psychologists without experience with psychopaths are going to say that the psychopath you bring for consultation is more sane than yourself.
The theory is very necessary, and thanks it exist thanks to some good psychiatrist and also some good psychologists, but still the pathology scares most of the public so we would need to trust our own experience and the theory avaible provided by the best experts or we could end up believing psychopathy is not something seriously negative.
Sky,
Thank you for that response and I feel that this was mostly my fault because of the way I chose my words. Yes you are right in that some people can be more sensitive to certain clues that many other people would over look. For example that video that was talked about on here at some point about the psychopaths watching people walk down a hallway and being able to pick out the vulnerable. Well it is not only psychopaths that could, many observant people, including a lot of people who have been victimized, were also able to do that.
One problem, I think, is language and words. It is very messy if you move away from using them in a clinical sense in regards to this area. Really it doesn’t matter much if a person is a (insert disorder here) if they are hurtful/abusive because no one deserves to be abused and by thinking a person is not a psychopath can lead some to stay in an abusive environment longer because of false hopes. So I think, at it is just my two cents opinion, that trying to focus on “psychopathy” is a mistake in some ways. It is good to talk about it but there are a lot of abusive people that are not and it gets very confusing to try and figure out who is what when in fact it really doesn’t matter because abuse=wrong no matter who or what they may have. Of course it does make a difference in some ways (like being wolves in sheep’s clothing, dangerousness, etc) but the end result is still that abuse = get away from it if all possible.
I also should apologize because the labeling thing is one of my pet peeves and I should know to be more careful when I comment about it. Let me see if I can do better here. It is like seeing someone and telling them they have inoperable cancer (labeling) instead of looking at someone and telling them they look ill. If that makes sense. If you say the first you need to make sure you are really sure and can back it up where as the second one is not so bad if it is wrong. Does that come across better and make sense?
LL,
I see your post as I am typing this in another window. Funny because I had an experience almost identical to that with the ear though it wasn’t my ear. It got so bad that the infection at through the ear drum and the ear doctor was saying operate but the insurance doctor said no. Of course it could have been fatal because it had made it to near the brain and so the ear guy operated (the regular docs are the ones that caused the surgery to be needed) and charged us 0 dollars out of the $5,000 the procedure cost. Never even sent us a bill.
And LL I worked with high risk sex offenders for awhile in the prison system and trust me I know very well how some people can appear to own up to something while actually not and in fact are lying and manipulating the whole time and a good number of people fall for it. Same with the clergy sexual abuse. As for the offenders, they do have something to teach. First and foremost they teach that what someone says means little, it is what a person does (especially when they do not know they are being observed) that often tells the truth.
And yes I am a huge victim advocate and, so far, the people I have helped have impressed me, saddened me, and have instilled in me a huge respect for them and that they managed to keep going day after day considering what some of them have been through. As for stories, yes I do and the reality they relate is not pleasant (and is why I find scary books and movies dull I think, I have seen the real thing and to warp a saying, yes Virginia there are real monsters in the world.
I had a person who had been suffering for a loooong time because of, well sadistic torture is what it really was, severe psychological abuse along with sexual and physical abuse. That person gave me this and stated that they felt this is what they had been doing and as they “put it down for awhile” it helped them to eventually put it away and because they had not been “putting it down for awhile” it jut increased the suffering. It was wonderful insight on their part and I wish I could take credit for it but I can’t:
A lecturer, when explaining stress management to an audience, raised a glass of water and asked—how heavy is this glass of water”?
Answers called out ranged from 8 ounces to 2 pounds.
The lecturer replied, “the absolute weight doesn’t matter, it depends on how long you hold it. If you hold it for a minute, it’s not a problem. If you hold it for an hour, your arm will ache. If you hold it for a day, you may have to call an ambulance. In each case, it’s the same weight, but the longer you hold it, the heavier it becomes”. He continued—and that’s how it is with stress management. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, the burden will become increasingly heavy and we won’t be able to carry on any longer.”
As with the glass of water, you have to put it down for a while and rest before holding it again. When you’re refreshed, you can carry on with the burden. So before you return home tonight or any night, put the burden of work down, don’t carry it home. You can pick it up again tomorrow. Whatever burdens you’re carrying now, put them down for a moment if you can. Especially at this time of the year. So friends, put down anything that may be a burden to you right now. Don’t pick it up again until after you’re rested for a while. Here’s some great tips for helping you do that:
•Just accept that some days you’re the statue and some days you’re the pigeon.
•Keep your words soft and sweet in case you have to eat them
•Wear things that make you look good in case you die in the middle of it
•Nobody cares if you dance well, just get up and dance with someone
•If everything is coming your way, you’re probably in the wrong lane
•Birthdays are really good for you. The more you have, the more you live!
•Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once
•Truly happy people are one’s who enjoy the scenery on a detour
Sky,
I’m speaking for Blogger here (I hope not out of school) I’m not sure he is a “friend” of that family, just that he KNOWS them.
BTW while I consider Blogger T my friend, he and I have some very VERY active debates, and in many ways he has changed my thinking with his LOGIC and good sense, as well as the research he continually refers to. Though I have SOME professional experience in psych, he has MUCH MORE experience in psych than I do, and with a heavier type of client/patient as he has worked in prisons which I haven’t. He also has had a personal up front experience with psychopaths as well, which most of us here have had (I think I can safely say ALL, but will just say MOST to be sure).
I don’t think anyone is trying to diminish your personal experience with psychopaths, Sky, and I know for one that I am not, and my experience with Blogger has been that he is not personally aggressive or demeaning even if he completely disagrees with me and there have been plenty of those times!
Learning, medicine is not an exact science, and I can relate to your frustration with your son’s ear infections, as both a medical practitioner and as a mother of children, believe me when I say I know your frustration from BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE! My youngest son was born with his cranial sutures closed (the soft spots) and I knew he was an “odd looking kid” but I did not at that time know WHAT was wrong with him or that he URGENTLY NEEDED an operation on his skull to make room for his brain to grow! NEITHER DID MY DOCTOR, NOR THE FIRST NEUROSURGEON I SAW, but I kept on until I found a neurosurgeon who looked at him and IMMEDIATELY KNEW WHAT WAS WRONG WITH HIM, and what to do about it. At that time I was not medically educated and so I did not know that you couldn’t get into see a top neurosurgeon without a pass co-signed by God himself! I got into the man that they had called to operate on Robert Kennedy, and without any insurance (My insurance only paid for Kaiser in network and he was not Kaiser network) With his letter I went BACK to Kaiser and said “I want to see the head neurosurgeon or my lawyer will be here tomorrow” and guess what, I saw the top guy the next day and he operated on my son in time to keep him from being brain damaged. BTW my pedi-doc was a wonderful young man who did know something was “off” and supported me through the fight.
No, going to medical school doesn’t always make a physician know everything they need to know, or nursing school, or mechanics school, or lawyer school, and there are those that have 30 years experience or those that have 1 year experience 30 times! (NOT the same!)
One of the things I am addicted to is learning, and trying to keep my mind open to new learning, even when my short term memory isn’t all that great! New ideas. New thoughts. New outlooks, new ways of doing things that WORK. Refining old things to work better.
Oh Blogger. Sure wish you’d hang out some more. When I saw your post above (have not read it all the way through yet) you said you worked with high risk sex offenders. Something I am now well versed in as my son was a juvenile sex offender. I’d love to share about that perspective as well. It’s amazing to me that I did not fall for the machinations of my son once found out, but I easily did my POS. Hmmmmm…..
Blogger,
There was a sentence in your post “yes, Virginia there are monters in the world”.
Gratifying, given my experience, really. The fog is slowly starting to lift in understanding my experience from a different perspective and this site has been critical in lifting the fog and CHANGING my thinking into the rational, yet changing human being I am 🙂 And I’m beginning to welcome the pangs of change where before it just frightened me mainly.
Blogger, I got a crash course education in sex offenders and their thinking because of my son’s offenses. He was caught early and went through one of the best and intensive treatment programs in our state. The staff there was AMAZING! I learned FROM them and they learned FROM me! I learned a lot about my son too. They did a FULL and INTENSIVE psych evaluation on him and he suffered from depression and Generalized Anxiety disorder but was (THANKFULLY) free from serious personality disorders. I thank GOD everyday for having had the courage to toss him on his ear and put him into treatment immediately upon discovery. He is a wonderful human being and I’m VERY proud of him. He worked VERY hard on himself, his treatment and he faced ALL of his demons head on, no matter how painful. It was for all of us as we were included in his treatment. But such a great outcome. I do know that that isn’t the case with a lot of sex offenders, even the juveniles as a lot of those guys where he was wound up back in “big boy prison”…and that was disappointing for my son to see while going through the process….some can be salvaged as youths, others cannot, but it’s worth the effort if no rigid personality disorder is in place. I WISH I could speak with you more about these things and get your perspective from the professional side of things with regards to psychological issues from a therapists perspective.
Love the ending of your post LOL! I’ve seen that list before.
Ox, I’m glad to see that things turned out well here. What I learned from posting here and watching Sky and Blog post is that if you are NOT personality disordered you CAN disagree or even misunderstand, but this is where empathy comes in where it did NOT with my POS (Asking forgiveness, receiving it, coming to an agreement) which releases the soul of the hellacious despair that is NOT had in dealing with a Personality Disordered person. What a breath of fresh air this was for me to see!!
I’m learning. A LOT and like you Ox, I love to learn more. I’m open to seeing differences of opinion and seeing both sides 🙂