(The following article is copyrighted © 2012 by Steve Becker, LCSW. My use of male gender pronouns is strictly for convenience’s sake and not to suggest that females aren’t capable of the attitudes and behaviors discussed.)
Let’s be honest. The term “sociopath” has become so commonplace, a very good thing (reflecting the increasingly spacious public awareness of exploiters), that it sometimes seems that pretty much every jerk we confront we’re tempted to call a “sociopath.”
Now, there’s way more “upside” to this than “downside.” And I’d say this applies to terms like “abusive” as well. And thank goodness the concept of “abuse” is now much more widely understood—it’s wider public reach, along with the lay public’s greater access to issues like “narcissism” and the various diagnoses associated with it (like sociopathy), are wonderful and important developments.
At the same time, a small consequence of this is that these “labels” can be thrown around with some recklessness and, frankly, often are. Not every act of deception, manipulation, not every outburst of anger, not every act of insensitivity, is perpetrated by a sociopath, malignant narcissist or abuser.
All of us, at least most of us, are capable of highly insensitive and destructive behaviors, or behaviors perceived as such by others. This doesn’t diminish their seriousness or their destructiveness; after all, non-sociopaths can murder while a great many sociopaths won’t, and maybe even can’t.
Many non-sociopaths are guilty of acts of harm that don’t make them sociopaths—acts that many sociopaths themselves, at the end of the day, will be able to say, “Well, hell, I didn’t do that!”
And so we want to be perhaps somewhat disciplined around the liberality with which we’re tempted, whenever outraged by another’s selfishness or insensivity, to hurl the epithet, “You sociopath!”
Sure, we’re all happily addicted to the Investigation Discovery channel, which leaves us, naturally, with the conviction that 47% of the population must be hard-core sociopathic. (No, Mitt Romney didn’t allege that percentage.). Watch the ID channel every night and you can jack that number up to 68%.
I mean I heard a customer leave a Rite Aid the other day, annoyed about failing, apparently, to get a refund on a product, and scream at the manager, “You sociopath!” Now her anger may have been very justified, but the diagnosis seemed a bit rash and, based on the evidence, a bit thin.
Nor would it have surprised me to hear the manager scream back defensively, “Who’s the sociopath, lady!?” He didn’t, in a demonstration of great diagnostic self-discipline.
As the lady walked past me, she muttered, “What the hell are you looking at?”
Well, I was looking at her. Was there some law against that? I half expected her to stop in her tracks and lay me out right there.
But I think we need to remember this about sociopaths—they demonstrate a very longstanding pattern of deeply disturbing behaviors, characterized by gross, shocking, outrageous transgressions against others, with pathological indifference to the suffering and trauma their behaviors cause others.
When you are dealing with an individual with this history, with this track record, you are dealing with a seriously disturbed individual who absolutely deserves to be diagnosed with a “warning label” such as “warning: sociopath,” or “warning: abuser,” or “warning: malignant narcissist,” or something of the sort.
For the rest of us, inexcusable, selfish and hurtful behaviors should never be condoned, whether we are their perpetrators or victims. We can’t excuse destructive behaviors. We must confront them, and if we are on the receiving end, we need to put ourselves in positions of safety as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, the next time someone cuts you off on the road, even recklessly, although Robert Hare, Ph.D., might call him a “psychopath,” we need to remember it’s possible, too, that he’s just a lousy driver, in a rush from his own foolish making, or maybe just a good-old fashioned jerk. But he may not be a sociopath, and probably isn’t.
Even though it’s so sorely tempting to flip him the finger as you shout, “You ”¦.ing sociopath!”
Ox Drover
Ah, come on Hens, tell me it ain’t true that a bunch of them get voted in? Heck I live in one of te most politically corrupt counties in the US…and I’m related to most of the crooks, but they are MY crooks!
MoonDancer
Hello Athena,
They can’t get rid of me here at love fraud…
I always read your post Athena.
Hey everybody I have had a good day, ain’t that a nice change?
Delores
Over-diagnosis? Like when they discovered bacteria or cancer!! It was there all the time, they just could not see it because it did not have a name or a definition. I have read everything I can get my hands on including the DSM IV which really needs work. Hare is probably the best authority other than us, their survivors.
Personally it seems similar to me never being able to see a wild deer. Their camouflage made me blind to them until I finally saw the first one. Now I see them all of the time. Same is true of psychopaths. You cannot see one until you see the first one and then you know what it is.
MoonDancer
betsybugs…your deer analogy is spot on ~! they are everywhere..
Ox Drover
Hens and Betsy,
While there may not be HUGE NUMBERS of people who would score over 30 on the PCL-R and “qualify” as a genuine card-carrying blue nosed psychopath, there are plenty of people who are HIGH IN P TRAITS…people that we do not want to have as our “best friends”—so the thing is that we need to be able to SPOT THE TRAITS…
dishonesty
irresponsibility
lack of empathy
rude, crude and indescent
mean and nasty
hateful to others
being mooches
blaming others for their own problems that they caused themselves
jealousy of others
lazy
and the list goes on…
The thing is that if we associate with TRASHY people we will get up smelling like garbage….
So when we learn about the RED FLAGS (Donna’s book is a good place to start) and then we must learn to HONOR THOSE RED FLAGS and get the heck away from people who show those signs of dysfunction or P traits. We don’t need them in our lives.
kim frederick
Well, I kicked butt today, and got off the hook. I will not have to pay back the 50 bucks, and I will not be suspended. My boss got on the phone with her boss, and had my back. Spath still has a job, though, unfortunately.
One of my regulars, who is also a friend of mine knew of the issues I was having, and he broached a conversation in spath’s presence about taking the towels from a motel room, then feeling so guilty, washing and bleaching them, packaging them up, and sending them back….we talked, (loudly) about temptation, falling short of the mark, conscience, integrety, shame and remorse. We agreed that we had something in common, and then I said that was the difference between us the sociopath. Spath was listening and asked, “what’s a sociopath?” She was holding her cell’phone, and asked me how to spell it….she was gonna google it, so I spelled it, but then I told her what a sociopath is. I said they are people who live their lives, lying, conniving, cheating, and theiving everybody and everything because they have no real ability to care about anybody but theemselves. They have no conscience, no remorse, and they have no empathy. They are usually well-liked because they can be quite charming, but, they are really snakes. She stopped googeling, got up and walked out of the dining room. 🙂 High five!!! Can I get a TOWANDA?
skylar
TOWANDA KIM!!!!!
😆
MoonDancer
Towander ~!
Eralyn
Wow Kim,
You don’t even sound like the same person who posted that earlier!
Good Job! High Five! TOWANDA!
Could someone please tell me what Towanda is……lol????
I am sure you deserve one!! That’s excellent.
I have never had the opportunity to define a sociopath to their face when I suspected them. I think it would be weird to see their face while they have that “AHA” moment. ….
kim frederick
Eralyn, my friend said it was so clear to him that she “got it” that he felt it in his gut, when she walked out of the room.
Towanda is our victory cry here on LF. It comes from a scene in “Fried Green Tomatoes” where one caatty woman steals another woman’s parking spot….so, the other woman just plows into her, and yells, “TOWANDAAAAAAA.”
Not sure who the LF members were who started our tradition, but would sure love to hear the story.