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Classification of Corporate Psychopaths

Note: This is page devoted to all IT professionals who suffer from psychopathic bosses. Only those who already suffered or still suffering from one of those types can understand the level of pain as well as stakes involved in dealing with such individuals.

If you are reading this page, you probably have problems with you boss and suspect that your boss might be a sociopath ;-). It might be true, or may be not. May be he is just an authoritarian, which does not make your position easier. Now what ?

We will use umbrella term for both corporate psychopaths and authoritarians calling them "toxic managers". They are really dangerous predators of corporate jungles in general and IT jungles in particular. Presence of such individuals in the role of the manager puts a tremendous stress on his direct reports.

Psychopaths are people that are so different from normal people that they can be truly called aliens. And those dramatic differences cannot be understood in terms of antisocial rearing or development. They operate using different set of assumptions and it is the latter that makes them the "monsters" of the corporate world, "criminals without criminal offences". Psychopath is the person who fails to recognize, much less to empathize with, the personal human dignity and rights of subordinates. They do not feel remorse at lying or manipulating, and they will lie without limit. That "addition to lying" is probably the most telling early about psychopath. Typically the "invent" their past. They have trouble with teamwork for the same reason. They will say one thing to one person and something different to someone else.

And it is difficult to understand how alien they are from "common people". To a certain extent they are insane, even criminally insane. Please note that "sanity" does not mean perfection; it merely means sufficient engagement with the real world and society to allow us to survive both day-by-day and in the long term – thus “sane” individuals usually tend to obey traffic laws, learn from their mistakes and practical experience and, in the case of moral sanity, they recognize in others their worth and their capacity for joy and suffering.

Furthermore, sanity implies an ability of introspection: capacity to critically evaluate one’s experience, to distinguish fact from fiction, and to tune behavior, to adapt to the real world. Insanity, by implication, suggests a significant level of detachment from reality. For example, a psychopath can not recognize the human worth and the capacity for pleasure and pain in others. In this sense he/she is living in an "unreal" world. The world were no empathy exits. It is often combines with other psychological disorders such as paranoia.

In popular literature, psychopath is often defined as someone who displays several distinguishing characteristics, such as deceitfulness, compulsive lying (lying even when they're is no real need to hide the truth) impulsivity and a lack of remorse. Typically such people have a superficial charm, which they exercise ruthlessly in order to get what they want. In this sense women are a much more dangerous type of psychopath. That implies that working women, especially in IT have an enemy more formidable than men. Female psychopaths usually see everything in terms of competition and female aggression. They have zero respect for their own gender. Just the opposite. Statistics suggest that a woman is the target in eight of every ten cases of bulling. But, paradoxically, in six of 10 cases, it is a woman who is the bully. They despise and attack female subordinates and try to undermine their more successful/competent female peers.

In the latter case they assume that they have achieved their success by using charm/sex/chicanery. They also use their gender as a bulletproof vest against males, claiming discrimination when it is convenient to them. This dirty trick of "fake victim" works wonders in modern bureaucratic organizations. Female-to-female aggression is also observable in primates. Dominant female try to suppress reproductive success of competitor females in various ways including subjecting them to constant stress via harassment and intimidation and/or attacking offspring:

Holmstrom (1992) summarizes his review by saying that indirect strategies were observed among female great apes during the following three circumstances:

1. In the power struggle among females, by cannibalistically feeding on the competitor's offspring;
2. against the male, in sexual contexts by refusal of cooperation to sexual access; also in competition for food, and feeding on the male's offspring;
3. through the offspring, by rearing the young and transmitting models of behavior from one generation to the next. The female thus prevents and restrains certain kinds of action in the offspring, permitting and favoring others. Accordingly, the social intelligence of higher primates should not be underestimated. As Byrne and Whiten (1987) have shown, chimpanzees are also fully capable of faking nonverbal signals, in order to deceive competitors.

See The psychopath in the corner office page for the exploration of connection between corporate psychopaths and ordinary criminals.

In Snakes in Suits, the authors argue that corporate psychopaths follow a "PPP" pattern that involves three types of players:

• Pawns. Psychopaths recruit pawns such as lower-ranking employees or peers, whom they can manipulate.
• Patrons. Patrons are higher-level managers whom the psychopath wins over. They often provide cover for psychopath. It is at them all the charm is directed (which makes behavior of sociopath similar to the behavior of authoritarian). Because the psychopath seems charming to higher-ups, he or she can counter accusations.
• Patsies. The patsies are pawns and patrons whom the psychopath has abused, taken advantage of, cheated, blamed, or ridiculed

One needs to understand that being a target of a psychopath is a permanent position. One horrifying detail in the definition of personality disorders is rigidility and inflexibility of patterns of thought and action (a good example is compulsive lying --a defining feature of a sociopath that distingushes them from authoritarians) (Wikipedia ) :

Personality disorders form a class of mental disorders that are characterized by long-lasting rigid patterns of thought and actions. Because of the inflexibility and pervasiveness of these patterns, they can cause serious problems and impairment of functioning for the persons who are afflicted with these disorders.

Personality disorders are seen by the American Psychiatric Association as an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates markedly from the expectations of the culture of the individual who exhibits it. These patterns are inflexible and pervasive across many situations. The onset of the pattern can be traced back at least to the beginning of adulthood. To be diagnosed as a personality disorder, a behavioral pattern must cause significant distress or impairment in personal, social, and/or occupational situations.

Related term Antisocial personality disorder is defined as:

Antisocial personality disorder (abbreviated APD or ASPD) is a psychiatric diagnosis in the DSM-IV-TR recognizable by the disordered individual's impulsive behavior, disregard for social norms, and indifference to the rights and feelings of others.

The World Health Organization's ICD-10 diagnostic manual uses [term] dissocial personality disorder instead.

Such people distort and change meaning for the most ordinary social interactions: A simple difference of opinion, for example, can quickly escalate into a major and violent conflict.

There were several attempts to classify corporate psychopaths into various categories. Most of them are naive and completely unscientific. Many of self-help books represent Cargo Cult Science and vastly underestimate/misinterpret the danger. That actually is applicable to this page too as by and large it is a summary of available research interpreted through the prism of personal experience. While the author has training as a psychologist he never worked in this capacity.

It goes without saying that good books on this topic are pretty rare. I have some book recommendations but they are of course far from being absolute.

Also "trait classification" method that prevails in the literature is very limited and somewhat unscientific. As such o least it overlaps with "popular urban mythology". Still even mythology is better then nothing and we do not have approach that his really better. We would distinguish the following non-orthogonal types (for example all psychopath are bullies):

1. Bullies or aggressive psychopaths.

   Aggression in inherent in psychopath and to tell that a psychopath is a bully is just to tell that the water is wet. So this is a sign that the boss is psychopath but it does not help in classification of the exact type. But for some sociopaths this pattern of behavior serves is the most favorite tactics that they use systematically. Those psychopaths have a distinct a tendency toward sadism and derive perverse gratification from harming others. They like to hurt, frighten, tyrannize. They do it for a sense of power and control, and will often only drop subtle hints about what they are up to (this is especially typical of authoritarians). At the same time they polish their aggressive, domineering manner in such a way to disguise any intimidation as legitimate corporate behavior. Such pathological personalities always seek out positions of power, such as teacher, bureaucrat, manager, or police officer. You can also distinguish several subtypes:

   • Authoritarian bullies -- this is the most dangerous type of boss for talented people. Like death sentence with delayed execution. They always have bouts of incontrollable anger. Some of them can be emotionally out of control and explosive each week or even each day.
   • Micromanager bullies (control freaks). This type does not need explanation. Not all authoritarians are micromanagers but all micromanagers are authoritarians.
   • Narcissist bullies. For them your humiliation is a way to make themselves more important and valuable. They are often "gatekeepers" that try to steal all achievements and appropriate all ideas of subordinates.

   Often bulling behavior is combined with paranoia tendencies (paranoiac self-defense). Again this category is fuzzy.

   • Many if not all corporate bullies can simultaneously be classified as paranoid managers.
   • Many of them are also belong to the category of micromanagers.
   • Dominant part also falls into the category of narcissists.

   I would like to stress it again that direct or indirect aggression is inherent in psychopath and to tell that a psychopath is a bully is just to tell that the water is wet.

   US National Center for Education Statistics suggests that bullying can be broken into two categories:
   • Direct bullying,
   • Indirect bullying which is also known as social aggression. The latter is characterized by forcing the victim into social isolation. This isolation is achieved through a wide variety of techniques, including refusing to socialize with the victim and criticizing the victim's communication manner or other socially-significant markers.

   Indirect bullying is more subtle and more likely to be verbal, such as the silent treatment, arguing others into submission, manipulation, gossip, staring, and mocking. While women can be as aggressive or even more aggressive then men they usually are more indirect. I would like to stress that gender differences in aggression are subject to review; human society is too complex and direct projection from animal world, for example, from great apes is of limited value. See important paper by Kaj Bjorkqvist Sex Differences in Physical, Verbal, and Indirect Aggression: A review of recent reseach

   Accordingly, one should not expect women to develop and use exactlyt he sames trategiesfo r attainingt heir goals as men do. If strategies for aggression and conflict resolutiona relearned, not innate, then women are likely to learn different methods than men. Important aspects are power and capacity, not only physical, but also verbal, and social. Human beings have nonphysical powers which are far beyond those of any other animal. Accordingly, human aggression has faces and forms, inconceivable within the realm of animal aggression. Extrapolations from animal studies are, therefore, misleading. Aggressive styles are also subject to developmental change during the life course. As indicated, animal aggression is mostly physical. Also among young children lacking verbal skills, aggression is predominantly physical. Verbal skills, when they develop, are quickly utilized not only for peaceful communication, but also for aggressive purposes. When social skills develop, even more sophisticated strategies of aggression are made possible, with the aggressor being able to harm a target person without even being identified: Those strategies may be referred to as indirect aggression (Lagerspetz, Bjorkqvist, and Peltonen, 1988; Bjorkqvist, Lagerspetz, and Kaukiainen, 1992).

   There are good reasons to believe that, as far as adult interpersonal conflict is concerned, physical aggression is really the exception, not the rule. Other means are more likely to be used.

   Burbank (1987) reviews anthropological research on female aggression. She finds females of different cultures having a large potential of aggressive means to use in order to get even with their husbands, such as, e.g., locking them out of the house for the night: she regards this as an act of aggression. Burbank (1987) found females seldom to resort to physical aggression against their husbands, but they did so, occasionally. The most common reason was that their husbands had committed adultery. Burbank found, however, that women are much more often aggressive towards other women than towards men.

   Here is one type from popular literature that fits the pattern:

   The Fearmonger Boss. People do what a “fearsome” boss says because they’re afraid of him, which actually encourages further intimidation. He always has a threat, and he constantly follows through with that threat in order to keep his employees acquiescent.

2. Paranoids. Paranoid managers are psychopaths for whom continual mistrust and misjudgment of environment dominates other (often no less pathological) personality features. Wikipedia defines paranoia in the following way:

   Paranoid personality disorder is a psychiatric diagnosis that denotes a personality disorder with paranoid features. It is characterized by an exaggerated sensitivity to rejection, resentfulness, distrust, as well as the inclination to distort experienced events. Neutral and friendly actions of others are often misinterpreted as being hostile or contemptuous. Unfounded suspicions regarding the sexual loyalty of partners and loyalty in general as well as the belief that one’s rights are not being recognized is stubbornly and argumentatively insisted upon.

   Paranoid managers are suspicious, touchy, humorless, quick to take offense and slow to forgive, self-righteous (That makes them remarkably similar to authoritarians). They are often argumentative and litigious. They seldom show tenderness and may avoid intimacy; often they seem tense and brusque. Paranoid personalities find causal connections everywhere; for them nothing is coincidental.

   They are constantly on guard and are hypersensitive to critique. They may take offense where none is intended. Often have problems with understanding humor. They appear cold and, in fact, often avoid becoming intimate with others. Often pride themselves on their rationality, objectivity and fairness. Paranoid managers rarely come forward to seek help from subordinates.

   Often paranoia combines with "toxic incompetence" as they cannot make decision on time (analysis paralysis), insists of creating tons of useless documentation and due to this skip important project milestones, etc. Fear of exposure of paranoid manager is blended into a pattern of pervasive distrust and suspiciousness. An inability to trust, doubts about others' loyalty, distortion and fabrication of personal histories, qualifications and facts, misinterpretation, and bearing grudges unnecessarily are generally hallmarks of the disorder. Pathological and instinctive aggressive counter-attack, the need to control others is also a prominent feature. They like to collect evidence of subordinates. Paranoid managers often can be classified as "raw bullies" as in relations with subordinates prefer to rely on brute force.
   

3. Micromanagers. Tendency to micromanages is often combined with paranoia and bulling but often demonstrate additional disorder: obsessive-compulsive disorder (OSD). Micromanagers are always authoritarian personalities and demonstrate typical for the latter category bouts of anger. Reverse is not true, some authoritarians avoid micromanaging. Micromanagers often have almost pathological neatness; the latter is especially typical for women. Especially dangerous are paranoid incompetent micromanagers (PIMM) that we will study in more detail on a separate set of pages that include but not limited to (remember that micromanager are just an incarnation of corporate psychopaths that got a special status in corporate mythology):
   • Understanding Micromanagers and control freaks
   • Slightly Skeptical View on Survival under Maliciously Incompetent Micromanagers and Control Freaks
   • Enemy at the Gate: Rules of Communication with Maliciously Incompetent Micromanagers and Control Freaks
   • Documenting Micromanager Behavior

   Micromanagers is one of the few areas were gender stereotyping might provide some survival benefits. Women tend to be more detail oriented, and female corporate psychopaths more often tend to behave like micromanagers. Female PIMM can be mean, evil, vindictive and quite petty. If a female boss is insecure about her skills and abilities she is more likely to exhibit PIMM behavior. Female PIMM are usually more skilled and use more often indirect aggression.

   Often micromanagers are simultaneously can be classified as paranoid managers. Among common traits are complete absence of trust in the staff, pathological need for control, pathologic dissatisfaction with results, and recurring "tantrums."

   Many of PIMM can be also classified as bullies but again they, especially female PIMM, prefer indirect aggression to direct. Usually, female PIMM encourage "little birds" to rest on their shoulders and whisper all forms of gossip. This, these minions believe, ingratiates them to their bosses.
   

4. Narcissists. Narsisstic managers are not that different from other types and also suffer from compulsive need for control ("control freaks"). Narcissistic behavior (aka inventive personality type) is compulsive desire to project positive image and resulting in volatile unstable behavior with emotional outbursts caused by insecurity and weakness rather than any real feelings of confidence or self-esteem. Very sensitive to criticism and do not accept slightest criticism from below. They often can be simultaneously classified both as bullies and micromanagers. As they need to steal all the achievements of subordinates to built their image they are typically "gatekeepers" who try tightly control all the communications channels with the superiors'. Can be quite paranoid and react inadequately on any threat to their projected image.

   The narcissistic bosses are characterized by "a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy," often evidenced as envy, taking advantage of others, an exaggerated sense of self-importance and entitlement, and arrogant or haughty behavior. There is not much hope for the poor shmacs toiling for the narcissistic personality-disordered boss who demands perfection, absolute loyalty, and 24/7 devotion to the job.
   

5. Manipulator bosses or Machiavellian boss ("wolfs in sheep closing"). Manipulative psychopaths are probably the smoothest of corporate psychopaths. Here we will mean a class of corporate psychopath who excels in manipulative behaviors including but not limited to flattery and seduction. All psychopaths use this to a certain extent but for this type this is a preferred tactic.

   When this feature is prominent their features typical for corporate psychopath are usually present too. They are very similar to paranoid managers in their behavior toward subordinates but unlike paranoids are capable sometimes using flattery and seduction.

   Also they prefer indirect aggression to direct. Often they have tendency to break rules and exposit "grey" area in their favor. This distinguishes them from paranoids, who other wise are very similar. They fear becoming less valued if their underlings get any recognition for exemplary work. Manipulator bosses are backstabbers who'll go to frightening lengths to look good to their superiors.

   Typically have a dual personality syndrome and behave completely differently with superiors then with subordinates. Here is how they are described in one of Monster career self-help articles:

   The Manipulator Boss

   Also known as the Machiavellian boss, this type is extremely intelligent and one of the most dangerous. The manipulator boss is highly focused, very motivated, and always has a secret plan. He looks at people as a means to an end. The world is a giant pyramid and the apex is his. People he touches or runs over on the way to the top are casualties he writes off. If you work for a manipulator, watch your back. Your best bet is to be open and honest with him. Volunteer information. Your boss, who has long forgotten what truth is, will be left impressed by it.

Again this typology and characteristics listed ad defining each type are imprecise and unscientific; psychopath are very variable and it is often difficult to fit your particular psychopathic boss into any of those classes. And you generally should not. This is exercise better reserved for modern "factories of illusion" (self-help books publishers) who are producing tons of low quality staff each year describing particular types although they are just facets of a generic psychopathic personality. In no way it should be blindly trusted either books or Web pages (including this one) in important career-affecting decisions.

Although you see manifestation of this personality disorder on your own skin, precise diagnostics is pretty difficult and you need to do your own leg work and collect evidence to understand what makes particular psychopath tick what are his favorite tactics. They key characteristic is the desire for domination and control. That's why there are often micromanagers.

You probably are better off consulting specialist and asking for a competent advice. At least you can enroll in community college and take course in criminal psychology: criminals and corporate psychopaths are just two sides of the same coin. Both this this page and relevant books should all be taken with a grain of salt. The author have spend more then seven years working as senior research associate in the psychology but like in programming that was a different area and this experience just ensured the knowledge of jargon, but does not guarantee talent or insight needed for this area.

Also few people have skills of clinical psychologists to correctly identify often complex blend of features in toxic manager. But you should try you best. Mistakes are unavoidable though. For example sometimes it was looks like the manager is a bully, but more precise analysis of behavior can suggest that you are dealing with paranoid incompetent micromanager (PIMM) and the most prominent feature is not open aggression (bulling) but deep paranoia and obsessive control. Documenting the psychopath behavior in your journal helps to view his behavior in historical perspective: suddenly you start to see patterns in attacks, outbursts and intimidation tactics used.

Proper methods are well described in literature for psychological research. Limited amount of materials related to PIMM can be found at Documenting Micromanager Behavior page on this site.

Please note that psychopath in management position almost always have patsies: they try to create a group of followers organized as cult. Such cults are not religious, it's simply exploitative groups characterized by high level of manipulation and extreme dependency. So they try to create the situation what you alone face a group (there is strength in numbers).

Learn to cope with psychopathic manager is a difficult tasks as many "features" of this creacher became known and reorganization after painful personal encounters. That's why you should stay only as long as absolutely necessary and should try your best to transfer to another department or other company. Remember you can't change this type of individual. Among possible defense moves we can mention to stick to your agenda, documenting every step and pointing abrupt changes of direction as well as providing feedback about projects you involved with.. Try to avoid getting sucked into his or her unreasonable demands. You don't want to end up being emotionally blackmailed.

No matter what is precise classification all toxic managers are cruel with subordinates and created out of the work environment "living hell". Incompetent, dishonest but scheming they charm the higher ups and climb on the back of others to achieve power. But it is important to understand that toxic managers would never achieves their goals and climb up the ladder without the disorganization and willful ignorance of his supervisors typical for some large corporations (Enron is a typical example here). Fish rots from the head.

As insightful page The toxic manager in the office a guide to toxic managers and toxic management in a toxic work environment states "We've all encountered them. Moody, aggressive, unpredictable, incompetent, always blaming other people. A compulsive liar with a Jekyll and Hyde nature, the individual, male or female, is always charming and plausible when management are around." Unpredictable outbursts of hostility, conflicting demands, inconsistent orders, random decision-making, inability to plan strategically, inability and unwillingness to communicate and co-operate, obstructive ... the list goes on.

Psychopathic managers prevent subordinates doing their jobs and prevent employees fulfilling their duties. Most employees in IT are competent and have both the desire and ability to do good work. What is missing in some organizations is an environment that encourages and enables the expression of that competence. In his book, Hall (1988a) states,

If we are to achieve excellence in our organizations and communities, we must be willing to reorient
We must make a presumption of competence in the workplace rather than incompetence, for high-level performance rests on the simple, yet not widely accepted, premise that people will behave competently if we will but let them. (pp. 29-30)

After some conversations with corporate psychopath you feel like you left the ring after facing opponent twice heavier then you and not playing by the rules. Everything will be your fault. You have a "negative attitude", you're a "poor performer", you're "not up to the job", and so on. If you get as far as alerting personnel or human resources management, it'll be a "personality clash". In truth, this is a projection of the psychopaths own negative attitude, poor performance, and incompetence.

The problem is that "toxic managers" are really toxic: they instantly destroy trust and tend to infect their departments with bad attitudes. It's really like a disease: they spread despair, anger and depression, which show up in lackluster work, absenteeism and turnover. They are also a major course of workplace burnout: toxic burnout. Coping with a toxic boss can take a severe toll on your life. It is like living with an abusive parent or husband; there are periods of calm where they are happy and not picking on you, but you always know that at some point it will start again.

The price of putting up with it is high. Researchers in Finland found that workers who felt they were being treated fairly on the job had a lower incidence of coronary heart disease, the leading cause of death in Western societies. [ABC, Oct. 26, 2005]. Often there is little you can do except to keep your head down and stay away from that manager as much as possible.

The best is to understand your tradeoffs and work not so much for the company as for improving your marketability for the next job. Forget about loyalty in such situation: set strict limits for yourself and stick to them. Stop working overtime, don’t take on extra tasks, never work through lunch. Have outside confidant: a person outside the company to listen to you, support you and, ultimately, to help you get out. The fact that they severely cripple the organization to which they belong is well known fact and does not require additional commentary.

Toxic behavior of superiors create level of anger when revenge became to sweet and pain that strips people of their self esteem and that disconnects them from their work too severe. Never go this road. Still for some people urge of revenge proves irresistible. That's why toxic managers are probably the leading causes of sabotage in modern organization (competing with outsourcing/Offshoring). "Fish stinks from the head!" and the higher toxic managers is, the more widespread is the damage he/she causes. Often large badly managed companies and government agencies attract such managers as due to their incompetence they simply would not survive out in the startup business community.

I would like to stress that psychopaths completely lack empathy for other people. That means that their are oblivious to sufferings they courses. Absolutely oblivious. They tend to be rigid and inflexible, have hidden agendas, and have an unusually hard time recognizing or respecting boundaries. They're weighed down by irrational beliefs such as "To be criticized means I'm a failure" or "If I follow orders, I'm weak". Disturbingly, individuals with personality disorders not only tend to dismiss the idea that they have a problem, but often see their unpleasant traits as strengths and take pride in them. For this reason, many such individuals respond poorly to therapy -- if they agree to seek treatment at all.

For example, do you have a manager who focuses so single-mindedly on rules, regulations, and productivity to the extent that actual real work grinds to a halt? Is she unsatisfied with any solution you proposed, work compulsively till all hours, avoid making decisions, and insist that her way of doing things is the only way? If so, your boss may be suffering from obsessive-compulsive personality disorder. This is not the same as obsessive-compulsive illness -- you're not likely to see her obsessively washing her hands. The best defense strategy: find a transfer or a new job. If you need to stay avoid arguments, keep a low profile, and steer clear of conflicts that you'll never win.

You also can shield yourself from your boss's unreasonable demands, the authors say, by finding out exactly what he expects from you and wants you to do. They suggest asking him what the most important project is (you may be surprised), and request guidance with detailed questions such as "Would it be all right for me to write out some ideas for you to review? Then you can let me know which ones to pursue further." Emphasize that there are only so many hours in a day, so he stops expecting superhuman achievements. And don't take personally your boss's lack of praise for a job well done: The problem is with him, not you.

Keep up your guard. Nitpicking may not only drive you crazy but could be harmful to your caeer as it expose to the treat of being fired for unsubordination. To neutralize that threat, the authors advise that you set boundaries, making clear when it's inappropriate for to intrude on your work. You also may need to remind your boss of your accomplishments if you find an obsessive-compulsive boss is undercutting your work. You may want to divide up your work, so your obsessive-compulsive boss can obsess freely over their parts of the job and leave you free to concentrate on the tasks at hand.

These white-collar psychopaths or sociopaths are "individuals who most often do not act out in a criminal way, yet can be just as manipulative and cunning" as a serial killer. Their personality attributes "typically include superficial charm, unreliability, untruthfulness, and insincerity, [a] lack of guilt, remorse, or shame, [and] a need to engage in thrill-seeking behavior," as well as pathological lying, egocentricity, selfishness, and rejection of authority and discipline, according to the authors. In short, they are corporate con artists. They're the tech administrators who over-order company laptops and hawk them on eBay, or employees who sabotage bosses' and coworkers' careers by appropriating their ideas and denigrating their performance to supervisors. They're the outgoing employees who act friendly to their colleagues only to stab them in the back at every opportunity. Middle management may be the natural habitat of the white-collar psychopath: Psychopaths are known for their extroversion, their charm, and their polished social skills, and complete disregard of people while trying to achieve corporate goals. Such traits are rewarded within many organizations.

If you think you work for one of these individuals, the authors say, don't be fooled by "props" like the ready smile and good eye contact. Instead, watch your back. The authors advise setting firm ground rules and picking your battles very carefully. Better yet, seriously consider switching jobs. Lock your desk, secure your computer password, keep your personal life private, and notify your coworkers and supervisors of any inappropriate behavior on the part of this colleague. As the authors caution, "Anything you say can and will be used against you." Keep notes of any indiscretions and don't blame yourself or feel responsible for the sociopath behavior, the authors say. This is certainly handy advice for anyone who is in danger of being victimized by a white-collar con artist.

Corporate America is a veritable hive of white-collar crazies. Identifying, defining, and diagnosing exact personality disorders your boss suffers from can be a tricky business. Still one sign is universal: the workplace in such cases quickly becomes overflowing with tension. Avoid taking the toxic bosses actions personally and remind yourself that you are not stuck in a hostile work environment. Take actions for self-protection and establish personal boundaries rather than to change the other person.

Remember that all of them are "Mayberry Machiavelli" and are ready to stub you in the back.

Summary

• Psychopathic bosses are incurable
  
• World is far from being perfect. This trivial general observation actually can really help. Consider this crazy jerk more of your maturity test the God exercise on you in his infinite wisdom and withstanding him/her became much more easy. That helps to treat each other more realistically and thus in more psychologically mature way. Related behavior might include minimizing unrealistic expectations, viewing disagreements less personally, holding grudges more briefly, etc.
  
• Psychopathic bosses have significant differences from the normal human beings. What is important they see the world differently and interpret many innocent for normal people patterns as threatening. Absurd reactions/over-reactions should be expected as they are "not normal" in a very profound way.
  
• Any psychopath does not see people as valuable, but only tools to be used in his game. As such they are capable if immense cruelty.
  
• Aggression in office environment is typically indirect. That's why female psychopaths are probably the most dangerous type of corporate psychopaths as they prefer and excel in indirect intimidation. Woman inhumanity to woman in the working place often exceed anything done by men. A female psychopath often treat her female subordinate as if they are despised indentured servants -- hers to humiliate.
  
• The power of psychopathic bosses comes from the way they can isolate you, intimidate you and/or can make you feel bad if you don’t give in to demands. Please note that cliques are female instrument of bulling. Cliques offer security to those who conforms and insecurity to those who don't. Indirect bulling can be achieved via exclusion from a peer group. Female gossip server the same goals.
  
• The best defense is finding a new, better job. You should start working in this direction immediately as this increase your psychological comfort. If job market is good it might be easier then you think.

• Work harassment is a serious problem, severely affecting the lives of those who are exposed to it. In Sweden, a country with 9 million inhabitants, it is estimated that 100-300 people commit suicide yearly as a result of harassment by colleagues. Every 6th to 8th suicide is directly related to work harassment [Leymann, 1986]. Work harassment is thus a form of interpersonal aggression, which is at least as harmful as violence in the traditional sense. [ Sex Differences in Covert Aggression Among Adults ]
• It’s difficult and dangerous to fight back against psychopathic manager. Make sure you get help from people who know about ways of outsmarting them.
• Buying a couple of books and systematically studying the issue might help to fight psychopath. Especially helpful is the ability to detect the tricks; that significantly diminishes the level of stress.
• Try to document the behavior of the psychopath and share the problem with somebody whom you trust outside the office environment. Just periodic discussion of your records improves understanding of the problem and your preparedness to dirty tricks and intimidation
• Although everyone’s psychopathic manager is different on the surface, their tricks are not. All of them are using fear and anxiety to make you feel bad. Learn typical patterns of attack both from experience and literature and soon you will notice that you recognize them. Here having daily log helps immensely as the ability going back and analyze previous similar episodes speed up learning.

Try to set red flags for upper management and HR indirectly, otherwise be ready that your boss will retaliate against you.

• Year questionnaires should be used to inform upper management about the problem.
• Anonymous hotlines and email are helpful, as you can ask somebody to read you message or use free anonymisers to send complains.

Protect your privacy:

• Lock your desk, secure your computer password, keep your personal life private. Learn some elements of computer security. Encrypt sensitive files on your harddrive using compressing program like rar or WinZip.
• Expect you WEB browsing patterns be scrutinized, unless the company has strict policy preventing managers from accessing this information without HR approval. Be especially careful protecting your job searches independently whether you are considering internal transferee or moving to the other company.
• If you need to speak by phone at the cubicle remember that walls have ears. In somebody called you and the call in sensitive, excuse yourself and call back later using cell phone or from a conference room. Never talk to recruiters from your cubicle.

Create a plan to counter the damage to self-esteem:

• It's cool to be frugal. Even if you lose some money leaving the current and finding other job, the mere elimination of stress will pay off in health benefits and part of the loss can be compensated by more frugal life. It's actually cool to be more frugal as youth trends (and gas prices) in USA demonstrate...
• Start working on relevant certifications. Damage to you reputation tha tpsyhopath does by
• Attend night classes in college.
• Intensify your job search, including borderline use of facilities of the current employee. This is a fight and good moment for a counterattack might came later, if you demonstrate sufficient endurance. Never take the decision to change job "on-the spot" no matter how humiliating the experience is. The best revenge is a better position in a different company, not the questionable pleasure of being unemployed.

Old News ;-)

[Apr 29, 2012] Catalyst Corporate Psychopaths - ABC TV Science

Is your boss manipulative? Intimidating? Totally lacking in remorse? Yet superficially charming? Then you could be working with a workplace psychopath. The latest figures suggest one in ten managers are psychopaths, and this week Catalyst goes deep inside their minds - what makes them tick, how do you spot them; and how do you avoid being crushed by them. We’ll also run a handy test – tune in to find out if your boss is an office psychopath.

TRANSCRIPT

Narration: It begins as a phone call - and then a meeting - usually late at night.

A corporation has a problem and they need Dr John Clarke's help. They need a psychopath- buster.

Dr John Clarke: The common misconception with psychopaths is that they're all violent extreme kind of criminals. The majority of them are living and working around us in jobs psychologically destroying the people that they work with.

Narration: There's a growing realisation psychopaths are thriving in today's workplace. According to the textbooks, every large company has them.

Jonica Newby, reporter: This is where I work. It's the ABC building in Sydney. Now the figures are that 0.5% of women are psychopaths, and 2% are men. So that means there are up to 25 corporate psychopaths somewhere up there.

Narration: But who are they? What makes them tick? And how do you avoid being the next victim of the workplace psychopath.

Psychologist John Clarke started out profiling criminal psychopaths, but four years ago, he began to realise there was a much bigger problem.

Dr John Clarke: I was giving a lecture on criminal psychopaths and someone came down after that lecture and said that their boss had the same characteristics as what I'd just described for a criminal one.

Narration: "Annette" knows just what he's talking about. Like most victims we contacted, she would only tell her story anonymously.

She was a confident, career minded public servant when she first met her new boss.

Annette: I got a shock when he took me into his office and shut the door - he just exploded. It was sort of like well what do we want you for.
And then when he let me out again it was all smiles.

Dr John Clarke: There are 20 characteristics to define a psychopath. Really the fundamental factor is an absolute lack of remorse or guilt for their behaviour, pathological lying, manipulative, callous, egotistical, very kind of self centred individual, glib and superficial charm

Narration: The workplace psychopath's textbook strategies feature in a new David Williamson play, Operator.

Psychopath: Francine. They tell me that you're the person who really runs things here, so I thought I'd better say hello as quickly as possible.

Francine: Now you're just trying to flatter me.

Psychopath: Not at all. Three different people have told me that with your capabilities you could step straight out of a support role into top management.

David Williamson: They are so devious. They're so good at saying things you want to hear to your face at the same time they're knifing you in the back.

Psychopath: Could you do me a big favour?

Francine: What?

Psychopath: Write me an email that sort of recounts what happened here today.

Francine: I don't like putting things in writing.

Psychopath: I won't ever show it to anyone without getting your permission first. I know I shouldn't be showing it to you ...

Dr John Clarke: They steal other people's work. They spread rumours about people, character assassination. A range of different strategies they will use to move up through the company.

David Williamson: They are worrying. I mean, if you strike one you may not realise it for quite a while until they do some devious act that stabs you in the back and can quite psychologically crush you.

Narration: Annette's boss was typical - charming his superiors and acolytes, while isolating and undermining his victims.

Annette: I wasn't allowed to have a phone when I was working, you know, my phone calls were monitored just this constant wearing down and harassment and you know, it was just awful.

Narration: By the time she complained, she'd been so discredited behind her back, no one would support her.

Annette: They didn't believe me. They're going, "He's such a funny guy, he's so nice"

In the end I had to go in and, and see him. And I was just crying my eyes out and I was just tears running down my face. And he walked me out through the chairs, through the desks, out through the long way through the office in case anyone had missed the spectacle of me just breaking down. I was devastated. I was just broken.

Narration: But how can someone act in such a seemingly inhuman way?

The truth is, psychopaths are fundamentally different to the rest of us. Research is showing they're deficient in a crucial skill that evolved to ensure we don't abandon our friends and family - empathy.

Dr John Clarke: Empathy really is the ability to feel what another person is feeling. It's very very important in terms of survival of the human species because if nobody really cared or understood what other people were feeling it would just cause breakdown of society.

Narration: Empathy is not just an abstract idea ... it's something you can measure physiologically.

Jonica Newby, reporter: Well, I'm about to be tested for one of the key characteristics of a psychopath.

Dr John Clarke: Now I'm just going to show you some pictures. Sit back, relax, and we'll see what happens.

Narration: As I watch the pictures, probes are detecting whether I release minute traces of sweat - whether I have an emotional response - empathy.

Psychopaths generally don't react.

Jonica Newby, reporter: So how'd I go?

Dr John Clarke: Very well. What we can see as we scroll through is for the non-emotional pictures there is no response. And when we get to here with the pictures of people crying you can see an involuntary physical emotional response.

Jonica Newby, reporter: So I'm not a psychopath.

Dr John Clarke: Definitely not.

Narration: Psychopaths generally don't react.

This lack of emotional response extends deep into the brain.

When most of us see another persons distress, our emotional centre, the limbic system, is aroused. We feel a little of what others are feeling.

But a 2001 US study revealed the psychopath has very little limbic system response to emotional information.

John Clarke: And that's what allows them to manipulate and control other people because they're able to do that on a very rational logical level but at the same time they don't feel the emotion or empathy for the other person.

Narration: No one knows how much of this deficit is genetic, and how much shaped by childhood.

But by the time they are adults, psychopaths aren't simply uncaring. They are physically incapable of feeling other people's pain.

Annette: My hair was falling out, you know, and I uh.. you know, I had diarrhoea, I couldn't sleep, my life got that awful and black it seemed a better option to just be dead and stop it.

Man: Someone I like and respect a lot almost died last night.

Psychopath: Let's get real here. Melissa was reckless, incompetent and stuffed up in a big way. And when you stuff up big time you get depressed.

Man: She nearly died.

Psychopath: She's a loser. Who f...... cares?

Narration: But without a brain scan, how do we spot a psychopath before its too late? One answer seems to be; look up.

John Clarke suspects corporations today aren't just failing to screen for psychopaths, they're unwittingly selecting them.

Dr John Clarke: You see this advertisement here. "An ability to do whatever it takes to meet a deadline". So that would appeal to a psychopath because they are prepared to do whatever it takes whatever the cost. If we look at this one - "The opportunities are endless you just need to know how to win it" - well they know how to win everything pretty much.

David Williamson: They present very confidently. They are full of self-esteem. They have no doubts; no hesitations and so interviewing panels often find them very attractive.

That's what many corporations see as being a good executive.

Narration: But some corporations are now realising they have a problem. That's why they call secretly on criminal profiler, John Clarke.

Dr John Clarke: The companies don't like to admit they have a psychopath and so the first meeting, it's often on a Friday night or late at night after the employees have gone home.

Narration: Issues range from fraud, to broken promises, to losing staff.

Executive: I just can't seem to keep staff and it's all coming from his section.

Dr John Clarke: Which is costing you money.

Executive: Exactly.

Dr John Clarke: The first thing I do is really get an assessment from the people working below, at the same level and above the individual. And so if there are huge discrepancies in opinion that's reason to start delving deeper.

Narration: Dr Clarke then administers a standard psychopath assessment. Remember those questions you answered earlier? They're a modified, cut down version.

Here are the final two:

Is your boss opportunistic, ruthless, hating to lose and playing to win?

Does your boss consider people they've outsmarted as dumb or stupid?

If your boss scored 5 out of 6 or more, you could be working with a workplace psychopath.

Now for the bad news.

Dr John Clarke: It's almost impossible to rehabilitate the psychopath. In fact, there are studies in the United States, which suggest that rehabilitation in fact makes them worse because it teaches them new social skills they can use to manipulate the people around them more effectively.

Narration: Once identified, there are strategies to manage the psychopath or move them on.

But what if you're the victim, and the corporation backs your boss?

Stay too long, and you risk a severe psychological breakdown. That's what happened to Annette.

Annette: I loved my job but in the end I, I fell apart. I was just so, so broken and you know, I just walked out and there was no coming back.

I'm unemployable now, you know. I just, I can't take another knock like that,

Dr John Clarke: When I tell them that one of the options is to leave the company there's shock, and then they go on to how unfair it is but then there's devastation when they do realise that that might be the most appropriate option to take because the situation is not going to change.

Narration: Far from getting their comeuppance, in these days of short term goals and high staff turnover, psychopaths often rise to the top.

In making this story, we spoke to many victims, none who could be identified for fear of defamation or worse - all devastated - all with a similar message.

Annette: I think you should run, you should run. There are some bosses out there that are deadly.

Dr John Clarke: I want people to be aware that they're not going crazy. It's the workplace psychopath that's the problem, not them.

David Williamson: That's not to say that every manager is like that. But it's that one out of ten that has the potential to really wreck a company, wreck the coherence of a company and wreck lives.

Topics: Others

• Reporter: Dr Jonica Newby
• Producer: Louise Heywood
• Researcher: Jonica Newby

Story Contacts

Dr John Clarke: Psychologist / Criminal profiler

David Williamson: Playwright

Dr John Clarke's Website

John Citizen

I could recount acts by a psychopathic boss that are so disgusting, so unethical, that its hard to comprehend. However, I chose to write the following:

For those who, like myself, do not want to quit a good job - I say study your psychopath boss and evolve beyond him / her.

Do not let them defeat you. They are in fact quite predictable, once you learn the fundamentally different way they view you and the world around them. Do not battle with them, instead get to know their modus operandi to the point where nothing surprises you. Strengthen yourself through being informed and prepared. Try to learn from the situation and build your character. After all, they have no right to project their psychopathy on to others. Its his/her personal issue, they have no right to mess with your career or the way you provide for yourself and your family! Fight back, calmly and intelligently.

Yes they are self serving, destructive parasites. However, their presence is an inescapable reality of the corporate world - there is strong argument that corporations themselves are psychopathic entities - if you want to play the corporate game, better get prepared for the corporate psychopath.

Plenty of resources out there, such as Dr. John Clarke and Dr. Robert Hare. Also texts on 'power' (i.e., in this context, manipulating without empathy) like Machiavelli's The Prince can be quite insightful.

Happy Ending 

My husband was at the mercy of a psychopath for 6 months. After almost bringing the Company undone the psychopath was sacked by the Directors. It required reports by all the employees, backed up by visitors to the company from outside. Every incident had been diarized for 6 months. These included swearing, shouting, threatening, harassing (sexual and verbal), lying, discriminating, bullying, taking credit for others good work, demeaning behavior towards staff and customers alike, etc.

Of course there were incidents of charming behavior mixed in, especially with the "right" people. Thankfully, a full report to Directors and HR brought swift action - within 7 days he was GONE!

He had actually received counseling previously so I guess the company did not want any law suits!

Vinny 

Your husband was very lucky. Only 6 months of hell. Sounds like a dumb psychopath, that one, giving away his true colours to too many people. Thats unusual. The one I"m dealing with is much smarter than that. He only shows his true colours to individuals, and he"s conned and cowed the manager so as to make sure any complaints get back to him..

Which makes it payback time against anyone who dares to do it. Everyone is miserable, yet no one, apart from me, has had the guts to complain, which I've done 3 times, to no avail. But it has had the effect, for now, of making him think twice about retaliating, knowing as he does, that I wont take it quietly. I"m waiting for his next move, which I KNOW he will be scheeming up right now. I dont know how this will end, but I am using my instinct, which I think is the only way to fight these types.'All Ive got left to loose, is a job which he has made miserable anyway.

Vinny  

I only wish ABC or any channel could come out with more programmes on this subject. It"s such a widespread and serious problem. It would be a sure fire ratings winner if they advertised it properly in advance as they always do with special interest programmes. And with the amount of people being so badly affected by psychopaths these days, there would surely be enough material to make a 3 or 4 part series out of it. That Catalyst programme was years ago. MORE educational programmes about psychopaths are desperately needed.

Moderator: Thanks for your comment. Dr Jonica Newby recently revisted the subject of psychopaths and her latest story focused on children who are at risk of developing psychopathic traits in adulthood. It's called Psychopath in the Family and you can find it here - http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/3453149.htm

BLONDIE  

I am currently in the clutches of a Corporate Psychopath. The rest of the team I work with also suffer the manipulation. There seems to be no way out. The EEO officer in the company is the person causing the problem. This person has caused me so much grief that I am at my wits end. My problem is that I am very competent in my work a represent a huge threat to this person. I don't know what to do. I would give my eye teeth for a new job.

JKOC 

have had a similar experience, this resulted in me losing my job. I was unaware of what was happening - too naive - until it was too late. Returned from leave - 7 weeks - this was all the time that they needed to cement themselves. I have been completely devastated.

All I can say to you is run - as fast as you can before they destroy your career. Good luck.

Vinny

Would I be correct in saying that the difference between a sociopath and a psychopath is that the psychopath is more ambitious, constantly striving to push their luck further and further, whereas the sociopath is happy to attain a certain level in life, and ruthlessly cling onto that??? Ive known both types over the years, and despite these differences in their aims, they still otherwise possessed all the other normal characteristics of a standard psychopath.

Vinny 

Why is it, in these modern times, our societies are STILL so blissfully ignorant of psycopaths? My supervisor is a copybook psycopath, all my workmates know fully well what he"s like, yet when I mention to them that he is a workplace psycopath, they give me a funny look. Theyve never heard of the term. This ignorance is why workplace psycopaths thrive. People still think psycopaths are just horror movie characters. Is it possible to get the reality of workplace psycopaths into mainstream media? Apart from the odd documentry. These monsters cause far more damage to our workplaces and societies than any other type of villain. The best defence against them, is to EXPOSE THEM, their characteristics, tendencies, aims, games, tell tale signs, and most importantly, the fact that their condition is untreatable and incureable. They have infiltrated into every part of society and I believe they are much more common than any stats suggest, and that they are negatively influencing our culture far more than we realize. How can a collective monster get this big, in our midst, and still hardly anyone has heard of it?

daughter 

One of my parents was a psychopath, I believe. They are both dead now. The one who caused the trouble declared they intended to cause chaos. Is is worse than a boss. It is very difficult to leave a parent. I found the only way to survive was to leave. Now I am dealing with the result of the back stabbing, lies and deception. I am now reading Jon Ronson's 'the psychopath test' to try to understand the situation I was/am in. I am not surprised that others do not believe me. Psychopaths are very charming, convicing, very very clever. I am in the process of being an executor of this parent's will. I am continually confronted with the lies and misinformation left to be dealt with.

Icemaiden 

Mod, bearing in mind that those who have successfully dealt with a psychopath have longer stories than the failures do - would you please stop cutting off the best bits when the stories get 'too long'.

There aren't that many successful techniques. It would be nice if the few there are, were preserved for Posterity!

B  

They are out there. I manage a small team in the public service. A female corporate psychopath was seconded into my workgroup for a period of nine months. She heaped praise on me, offered me gifts (I rejected), and spoke of previous excellent work achievements. My subordinates lapped up the praise, accepted the gifts and listened to every word.

I uncovered a minor fraud, when I challenged her all hell broke loose. There was much cunning, bizarre behavior was directed to me, she made sure there were no witnesses. Incidents included sloshing a bucket of vomit at me, death threats, suicide threats, and totally alienating me to the group I managed.

I was stunned when she denied these actions. A harassment claim was lodged against me painting her as the victim. Outright lies, twisted truths, union involvement. My HR and leadership team went missing. She spread rumors I threatened to kill her via email. I was investigated, but I also finally had proof (no death threat).

I demanded action should be taken, nothing was. I then threatened to quit, still no action. She has since been granted compo on stress leave (which is why I don't think work persued her). As it turns out, this is a pattern of behaviour.

I will resign within the next few weeks on principle, I am absolutely disgusted with my department (11 years of service). She had my team in her clutches, they did not have the courage to stand up and say this behavoiur is wrong - cowards. She backstabbed these people and I stood up for them.

Despite this being extremely unpleasant, I come out much the wiser. They don't play by the same rules. For all those dealing with this, my advice is put yourself first. This may mean quitting.
They're everywhere...

xxx

Both my partner and myself have been bullied and harassed in the workplace by psychopaths.

Survival techniques include keeping a written record on them and any witnesses, try not to let them get you alone (difficult when they call you in an office and shut the door I know).

Try and find someone who is prepared to back you up if meetings are required. Although our situations were different the resultant bullying and harassment symptoms was the same. We both fought off our opponents for years. My Partner has had some success due in part to having "evidence". I literally mean photos, recording etc. (psychos beware people are arming themselves). I however worked for lawyers as a secretary...ever tried arguing with one???

HR were useless as it was the psycopathic partners of the firm who paid them. After 3 miserable years I left, I was very close to snapping and was driving my family and friends mad with my complaints. I abruptly left the firm one day. I'd had enough. Best decision I ever made and should have done it way sooner. These people are difficult to avoid they're everywhere, so in your new job, flush them out immediately. Make sure you let these people know (sometimes a look and body language speaks volumes) that they are NOT your friend, they'll get the message pretty quick.

Also as a backup build up an "emergency" bank account. If do need to leave a job to keep your sanity it helps a lot that you know you have enough money to survive on for a good couple of months before getting another job. Its difficult and risky but if you're sanity, health and family life is at risk of crumbling it's worth it. Surround yourself with supporters it helps pick you up where the psycho's knocked you down. Work to live NOT live to work. There are plenty of good employers out there don't put up with a bad one. As a footnote I've subsequently learned that my "replacement" left after 3 months...(now that's justice!)

Distracted  

I have just left a sociopath after an 11 year relationship. I think i have aged about 10 years over the past 3 years we were living together. I've lost money, was physically and emotionally abused.

He has had at least 8 jobs over the past 11 years and recently got a new well paying job in the area of human services. In all his positions he has had problems with people under him and above him. He has conducted various campaigns and threats against management and his team members in all his positions. Has been pulled up for bullying on countless occasions and sent to counselling etc. He's always fighting with HR, IT, everyone is incompetent etc. He recently forced one woman to resign because he told me she was fat and unattractive. He is now starting another campaign against another woman there.

He works in an area that helps single mothers with there issues and also in an area that employs a lot females, who tend to be very empathetic, ie social workers, educators etc It just amazes me that someone like that can do so well, change jobs constantly but doesn't appear to have to face any consequences. No one seems to question him or look at his past.

He just makes himself so unpleasant to people that in the end, they are glad to see the back of him and wouldn't complain about him because he would retaliate.

I think they should test these people before employing them for this disorder and there should be some kind of register like child abusers. They are dangerous.

Dr Suss 

Dear distracted i completely relate to how you feel regarding your ex sociopath, i was working for and dating one at the exact same time. Mine also switched jobs and caused great disputes with former employers and employee's. It annoys me greatly how they move up in the world by stepping on others and how some employers just don't do background checks anymore. If his current employers had done a back ground check he would not be working for them now and making life miserable for those who have to work under him.

Jerome

It is extremely difficult to overcome the abuse of a manager who exhibit psychopath traits.. I had my dealings with one of these persons, and the methods and strategies they used on the victim are deadly...

Rob

Wow I went through workplace harassment for 5 years in one of Australia's largest communications company's. My manager and supervisor fit this bill to the T. When my harassment started (primarily driven by their bonuses, success and power) I elected to fight this unjust and unwarranted treatment.

When I officially complained to HR and as far as the then CEO, I quickly found out how HR and management can collude to protect themselves and most importantly their reputations. Hence began my 'character assassination'. My union wasn't prepared to assist or defend me, Work Choices was not interested, Comcare didn't even investigate. In the end I felt I had no choice but to leave the company after 19 years of service. As I was going crazy and was always on the defensive and not allowed representation.

It's ironic that it has taken this documentary, Corporate Psychopath, for the first time that I feel somewhat vindicated as to this type of acknowledged behavior in the workplace and the big and powerful corporate world.

Thanks ABC/Catalyst

Silas Kerrchner

I saw everything in your dramatization that exists (and is encouragred) for new Managers in the Canadian Gov't Civil Service.

The Canadian Gov't Civil Service has a new MOTTO "you don't know to need the subject matter to manage"

Unfortunately, after working for many years in XXXX, a new top manager came in from a welfare agency. He had no experience in law enforcement [moderator edited]. He immediatly started to hire his lovers and promote them to middle management; while eliminating the cadre of employees who knew more than him.

Torture Torture Torture
A loss to Canadian Security

John O'Leary

I've been seeing all kinds of numbers on this. Mediaite says 1 in 4 bosses are pyschos! www.BusinessLessonsFromRock.blogspot.com/

Friends in high places assure me the ratio is actually closer to 1 in 2. Bosses with split personality are 2 in 1.

DINESH:

If you add the article below from Dr Burch from Auckland, you will see how much value and merit there is your article. You are essentially right about workplace bullying where extreme individuals with a high repeat rate at some one in ten are really "psychopaths". Well done for bringing this article to my attention too. In the world of law and recruitment and self care, these articles are invaluable.

Dr Burch said his research shows psychopaths created "toxic workplaces" with bullying, manipulation, sexual harassment, lying and fiddling the books.

"We all come across people at work from time to time who are difficult, devious and troublesome," Dr Burch said.

Dr Burch said most people with personalities generally fitting under the 'psychopathic umbrella' do not commit obvious crime and are not imprisoned or hospitalized, but function within normal society - often with apparent success and the respect of their bosses.

However, workplace psychopaths are generally highly destructive and manipulative individuals with "dark sides" who have no remorse for their actions, which can result in a range of serious issues for organizations and the people within them, Dr Burch says.

And they're making you ill, he said.

Victims suffered insomnia, depression, were more prone to heart attacks could even be traumatised to the point of suicide.

"Unrelenting stress from a toxic workplace causes anxiety and clinical depression in 30 percent of female and 20 percent of male targets, according to international research. The risk of cardiovascular disease is 30 percent more likely when workers believe their workplace is unjust...."

Anonymous

I worked for 18 months under two workplace psychopaths in cahoots who not only played mind games and intimidated employees in their professional life, but monitored their phone calls and movements, spread rumours through networking with all around them, and made them feel stalked for years. I still live with the fear of being circled by them. I have learned to look for smiles in the workplace with a real glint in the eye, rather than a vacant glazed stare, and I have remain vigilant that friends stay loyal to me rather than passing on phrases and messages designed to take me back to those times where the abuse was closer. The only place for those without empathy is in IT where they can relate to like minded machines.

Mia

That sounds like a cult more than anything. What field of work is this in? I think a study of different fields would show some correlation with a specific field vs. another. Some psychopaths are drawn to certain paths or callings too. It would reveal a lot if someone did a study on this.

perplexed

I've worked for the state 4 years. 3 months ago I "RIFd" into another department. 15 years of experience in the field. Excited that my experience fit the position perfectly, and eager to contribute to this newly created program. Red flags began 1st day. Fear based management of staff, micromanagement, 2 years ago every counselor was bullied into early retirement or transfer, staff are reprimanded for being too cheerful, certain staff are forbidden to speak to particular staff, manager told me which staff had personal life problems, who had accommodations and who was behind in their work (non of my business and perhaps a nudge to mob targets). At 90 day review he told lie about what I said in meeting and used this as reason he believes I may not be able to deal with "gray areas" so extended probation to 6 months. Friendships among staff are forbidden. I've never dealt with a manager like this and am bewildered! Based on my research, it seems wise to go back onto "RIF" list & get out of there. This is the perfect position for me and love the work so it's a hard decision.

Mia

If you can get ten employees to write to your HR rep or Equal Oppotunity Employer Union or whatever about this manager you can start a real case. I never heard of violating "Freedom of Speech". I guessed that you are a counselor. Are you working with prisoners? Gray areas? hmmm. Maybe the reason is because some of the counselors deal with highly talkable subjects like ..."my clients are murderers" or something that is violating privacy laws. Pretend to be the manager in your mind for a half an hour and meditate on why this manager came up with these rules. If you put yourself in the shoes of this manager you might find that they are just as stressed as you are!

Makkin

Seems to be alot of disgruntled employees now blaming their problems on the scary boogeyman of the office, that it was never their fault the official office psychopath made them fail.

Psychopaths make up roughly 4% of the population not all your bosses can be psychopaths, get over it, maybe you just werent as good at your job as you thought?

Laura

Wow! So what do you do when the psychopath is your ex partner dragging you through the legal system and being a step ahead of you at every turn. Where do we find information to guide us through the legal system. All the behavior of the workplace psychopath is that of the one who lurks at home, same behavior different context. Where to find help, how do we get them diagnosed before a homicide is committed??? Please help!

Moderator: If anyone needs support please call lifeline in Australia
Phone: 13 11 14 

Another spousal

The courts hate liars so tell the truth and listen to everthing they say and where they are going with there 'storys' but make sure you are in court or have witness's when you point out there lie .

kathy

I stumbled across this whilst trying to research what to do about an employer who has been subtly harassing me and undermining me. Everything in this program indicated that my boss is also a pyscopath. She plays games, on one hand nice and then stands over meyelling and pointing her finger at me. Some of her behaviour has now been witnessed by other people in our organisation. I have tried to complain and have been sent to mediation with her. I had a session just today that left me more stressed and confused. without breaching the mediation session too much, all i can say is that she lied and made false accusations about me. What now???

it sucks

Hi I am going through the same at the present time, only thing is i have refused to do the mediation as i know how charming this can be. I put in the response to mediation after they suggested it the following:
1) this persons behaviou is not something that i feel i should be addressing, it would only benefit that person immensely.
2 I do not think that the share holders etc would not condone this type of behaviour.
3 I feel and believe that this kind of behaviour is morally and ethically wrong.
i'm still awaiting a response as yet I have not heard anything.
th manager has alos been moving my things like car keys, turning pc off, isolating me out of meetings.

I put the grievance in on the 17th March, wasn't heard until the 11th april and it's now may???? I have had to take time off to deal with it, not looking forward to going back in.

Mia

I watched a co worker who is very outspoken deal with my boss. He said an onslaught of hateful things that were vented up from months of being a victim.

She calmly addressed him with counterclaims on everything and made us wonder if she even knows herself?

Then she sent him to Anger management the next week and informed the higher ups he has an anger management problem. We laughed at the absurdity of it!

jmac

May I point out bullies do not pick victims they pick targets. There is a difference.

Hanh Stewart

I understand what you going through I am the victim of work place psychopath, as I am right now just engaging legal challenge with such a good company who just employed me and this sociopath ambushed me force me to write my resignation so he could easerly win the court case.

Dr John Clark is right very hard to deal with Sociopath as they are very maniplative,snicky and clever with evil mind . Yes they do destroy my employment opportunity with such good company. Dr John Clark is right again stay away from sociopath to save your self this why I let the lawyer to deal with them so I can move on and go to an other company hopefully not run into another Sociopath

Mia

I think the nice part is to keep you thinking she is still not a threat. I worked with someone like this too. Maybe she feels guilty so she acts nice. I had one change her shirt in front of me once...when we were alone and talk about how she had a stain on it and that was the reason why. She still talked about work as she fixed her shirt and stuff. I laughed because a minute before she was acting all power trippy and then acted like a human being who has problems too. I learned not to trust them anyways. Keep your distance and never talk about your troubles or whatever. It will be used against you, unlike what she does with you. The difference is that you do not use it against her but you could,

jmac

my boss had lied again and again to discredit me with her boss....they appear to have a symbiotic relationship. As a new mature aged graduate the treatment I have been dealt has been disgusting. If it wasn't for the good supportive relationships I have made in the workplace, and support of wonderful friends I think I would have had a breakdown. I identified early that these people are lacking empathy. As a social worker I feel empathy is inherent in my make-up so to be controlled and manipulated has been a shock and very distressing. Their subversive techniques are soul destroying.

Kate

I have just returned from the first session with the psychologist and discovered it was not me as incompetent, and the rest. I work for a CP and am now on one hand feeling a bit better knowing it is not me but horrified that there is almost no hope for me to stay in the job I love. I am having a week off work to overcome the breakdown but cannot see what I will do next. My Doctor says to fight will just kill me an further cement her position. Devastated .

Craig Barry

I Take it that CP is for child protection? I have worked for the last 24yrs in many positions working with young people,I  tell you now, "get out" don't let them burn you out at such a young age!!!
The Department will distroy you!!!

Mia

I dont know if you should quit. Sometimes there are situations that you cannot leave or quit. Try the military for one.;). We get so used to Pyschopaths in positions of authority that we are practically immune to yelling, humiliation, and being called incompetant or slow or whatever.

We deal with jobs that no one explains how to do and all sorts of micromanagements and finally we learn to use our heads, filter out the stupidity and meanness and say "what are the results of this being done" That is all we want at the end of the day. Results.

marc

a few P's joining the conversation here no surprise-important info for them on how to do it better!
Being the daughter of one and sadly not realising untill too late the mother of a few I have an inkling that I may have a co dependence issue.Hospitalisation alerted me to the prevalence of the cost to society of those victims whoavoid ending their lives-not many!Also interesting was the prevalence of certain professions being over represented on the wards suffering from'Burnout'a euphemism for cosequences of a P. the prevalence of Asperger's Syndrome(on the Autistic Spectrum)in my family makes me wonder about the same disconnect to emotions that the P has. Another prog.ABC aired recently "I Psychopath" was absolutely brilliant more exposure is required

Jen

Definately exclude - there is no positive outcome from employing staff at any level with these characteristics - in fact the opposite is sure to be the result - gradual destruction of individuals and any possibility of team work. The planned, cold and calculated destruction of individuals is the purpose of these people.

Jazz

No, their purpose is survival and personal gain. This means that unlike people with ordinary social/ emotional responses they will trample people without conscience to attain their goals. And if you're standing in the way of their objectives, they will set out to destroy you. In this competitive, capitalist society they thrive because they embody the attributes of success. This is an interesting psychological analysis of them: http://www.crisiscounseling.com/Articles/Psychopath.htm

Just say grow

The question is however is cp a fundamental part of leadership or would companies that recognize this personality type and seek to exlude it foster a healthier more productive culture of engagement?

Jen

Definately exclude as they can only add individual and team misery, whilst going undetected for some years. The worst are the professionally trained in some way, such as psychologists, who can use thier profession to enhance their skill at destruction and to hide that from detection.

C

Dear Dr John,
I have been struggling now for 2 yrs with the workplace psychopath. I work in a clinic for youth and adolescents with mental health issues. I thought only caring and concerned people wanted to work for young people!!!!!! My mistake. My concern is for family and patients... but now has moved on to me!!! I am so drained by this experience. The only sustaining factor are the few staff who are aware of this person. Some management are also aware but it is hard to get hard data on them. They are very good at covering their tracks- but the poor kids and their families get their heads done in quite frequently. I am also due for a big payrise. It seems pretty empty though and comes at a big cost of surviving this psychopath. I feel myself losing any empathy I had and am now thoroughly suspicious, paranoid, and unfeeling. I feel like I have developed a 'lizard brain' as soldiers term it and I am turning into the bitter, narcissistic, manipulative creep I despise!!!!! Help!

Mia

Here is what I would do. Stay there and get the big pay raise. Then as you establish yourself in the new position I would look for another job to match the NEW PAY level. New skills acquired make for a better resume and if your skills are in demand then you will find a great job with the new salary and since you worked at this job you need to become more "desensitized" anyway to the patients and families around you. Alot of these adolescents will drain you and then later not be so messed up...but you will still carry their troubles with you not even knowing that ALL TEENS are usually troubled with mental health issues. Later it somehow gets better but you only see their present states and not their futures.

Whistling Woman

I am a veteran, having worked for three women in the past twenty years or so. All had personality problems of some kind.

The first had what I now think was narcissistic personality disorder; the second became disturbed and abusive in the final year before she left very suddenly; the third and most recent is retiring TODAY! She has been lazy, self-serving, self-absorbed, gutless, and undermining. She has launched an investigation into my "misconduct", leaving it up in the air, because she knew she was retiring (but has not even had the courtesy to tell me or the other managers who report to her!). It is probable that she has been driven to this by her own (male) manager, and is either too gutless or uncaring or unprofessional or all three, to refuse to participate in it. I am past caring. It seems they are everywhere - and it's power that enables their true colours to come out. One thing I disagree with Dr Clarke's diagnosis of CP's is the charm - none of them was/is particularly charming, or even interesting as people (which makes it all the more annoying that one has to spend so much time obsessing about them). I think the best thing is just to carry a mental impermeable membrane around oneself, and just write them off one's mental horizon - act as if they are NOT THERE, or when communicating with them is unavoidable, maintain an aura of freezing politeness.

Mia

I worked with one too and I was in the military myself. I noticed that she pointedly did things to exclude me. Like first it started with meetings...saying "this is not concerning your work so you don't have to stop working" but I would overhear her and sometimes she mentioned me like.."what is she working on today?" which made me feel paranoid. Then it went to social exclusion like " we are having a ceremony for blah blah but you need to watch this office while we go". I suspected that she blamed me for mistakes and it went on like this. One day I was driving in my car and suddenly I thought of her and said to myself..."no don't pay her no mind" and wondered "does she think of me?" And thats when I realized not to let her "rent head space". Later I read that they often think about their subjects and I thought no to feeding into her weird head gaming ways.

movingon

I have worked for a female boss for over 2 years and have been subject to micromanagement, subtle and untraceable bullying for the entire time. Her method of insidious grinding victimisation has reduced my confidence and at times my ability. further advancement in the institution is impossible as she has friends and networks with stealth. I am constantly told of her supportive relationship with her boss which leaves me isolated and unable to go to work without feel sick. Is this a P? Either way I want to move on and have applied for several senior admin positions. Is it a war zone in every workplace?

Chris F

Yes, she is a P. Only after getting terminated from my previous job of nine years in May 2010 (now collecting unemployment), did I labeled the problem. It was systemic and so subtle that I didn't even realize that they were trying to abuse me until after I was fired. You described the exact same situation I was once in. The corporation has developed a psychopathic environment overall. Most of my coworkers feel micromanaged, a severe lack of respect from management, cannot talk to anyone in management about how they feel, they dread taking any time off for being sick as psychopathic bosses feel no empathy for the sick or weak, they absolutely dread waking up and going to work and often feel like not going in. Every mistake they make is treated as the same whether it's big or small. After reading about psychopaths in the workplace, I've come to the conclusion that we have at least 4 psychopaths in the office, two of which are female. It's not a war zone in every workplace, but now that you are aware of psychopaths in the workplace, just being able to identify them will allow you not suffer future abuse.

Been there managing one

I managed a potential one of these CPs. John Clarke does educate on them at Sydney Uni Continuing education. I learnt a lot and helped the victims of the CP and in the end we all left the company when national managmnt would not take action even though they knew the problem for 7 years prior to any of us joining. Its just a continual turnover in that area of the company. Do the course if you need to learn about them.

On the edge

Amazing stuff... explains a lot really. I thought these people were borderline personality disorder types but there was too many of them I thought, surely. Yes, CP seems the logical answer now I have watched the episode and read some of the posts. Try working in a uniformed service with these people. It is an absolute nightmare. They herd and gather like shopping trolleys and are just about as unmanageable always power broking and putting some skew on everything. They delight in destabilising the senior officers group and the organisation being dysfunctional because of it.
What do you suppose the collective noun for a group of CP's would be? A 'Toxic' of CP's.

Mia

Lol. I am in the uniformed forces myself and I have seen so much that I think I am desensitized much like a PTSD disorder. I have seen crazy levels of mental abuse and "supposed tactics of execution" to other members in the group. There is only one thing that is good about watching so much mental war...you finally say "hey I have seen that movie too and you buy a bag of popcorn". It doesn't faze you as much, you start to study to gain rank, and you tail race them and leave them collecting dust. Senior Officers are needed in the military and logic and sanity are well represented with this group so don't give up. Leading by example makes us look to you for hope and knowing that there is some people that still make sense in this world.

Anon

Thank you so much ABC. Someone I'm very close to has a Mother who is exactly like this. Although it's been years since he lived at home. I am helping him deal with her cold, malipulating, sexually abusive, controlling ways. He finally told me what life had REALLY been like for him growing up. She should be behind bars. But I'm protecting him. He doesn't want to be publicly humiliated. I thought at some point he might want to confront her about all that she put him through, but after reading this I think perhaps that would be more of a hinderance. And somehow she'd convince him it was all his fault.

Thank you for letting us know that "psychopath" isn't just a bad word. But that it's very real.
And someone said somethign earlyer. Some people have mental illnessess and are kind, morally empathetic human beings.

A psychopath is not the same thing.

stronger now

This article was very helpful to me, especially the description of a CP as someone who can be charming and glib and doesn't really care about their impact on others. I kept trying to understand how someone could lie, manipulate and disparage others even when they were continually caught out - essentially he didnt care less. The CP in my workplace was not my boss - I was his. Over time all of the other staff in the team complained to me about him and when I challenged his poor treatment of others he accused me of bullying - relentlessly, right through the organisation - without anything to substantiate his claims. But he didnt care that it was obvious that he was lying - but throw enough mud and it will stick. The rest of the team were disgusted with his behaviour so then he accused me of turning everyone against him. I experienced the self-doubt, sleepless nights, tears and pain of trying to understand why someone would behave like this. It drove me crazy because there was no reason to treat me like this, it wasnt logical or reasonable. Turns out he had done it over and over again in previous jobs and kept moving on. I cant bear to think what it must be like to have a CP as a boss - its bad enough to have one work for you! My advice - never agree to meet without witnesses, document as much as possible, research the CPs history - what a relief to discover that there is a pattern and that its not just you! - above all dont expect rationality or decency from a CP!

sethpin

I think the CP is generally a narcissist, and that's a mental illness with no cure. I was made redundant recently by the Managing Director of a small company who is a CP... the usual characteristics - lack of empathy, empty promises, lying low after suffering a "narcissistic injury" in the form of a detailed email from me copy to one or two other people.

Fortunately for me I worked alone 700km away and hardly ever saw him, but I feel for HO staff! There is a general lack of knowledge in the workplace about narcissistic personality disorder but when you go to a job interview, you accept the risk that you end up working for a CP (or in your case, employing one). Hopefully the CP can be taught to be ruled by fear of the consequences of mistreating others. Good luck with finding a replacement employee!

mazinoz

I have just managed to get a former employee out of my life, and believe me it wasn't easy. He continued to bully me via technology [put rootkits and self written scripts on all my computers and network in linux, very hard to get rid of]. I still can't come to grips with how evil these people can be. I simply couldn't imagine it! Way out of anything I could comprehend, especially since he did the 'poor me' routine on me, and I went out of my way to help him - taking to doctors, accommodation etc only to have him really use and abuse me. I think this is why I didn't really heave and fight to get him out of my life sooner, though I did do more than you would normally have to do to achieve this. Even when I got him off the premises he refused to hand over his keys. In the end I had to resort to conning him to do this, something I normally wouldn't do but couldn't afford to change the locks. I have since instituted further security measures as well, though I already had deadlocks,window locks etc.

I still have not recovered emotionally from it all, don't hardly know where to start. After I had done all this what horrified me was he ACTUALLY SAID something along the lines of "you're rich, therefore I have the right to take you for everything you've got, it came so easily to you, unlike poor me, therefore I'm entitled. Even though he knew I had chronic pain due to two genetically based health issues and had had to deal with this from my early twenties. Add to this that people like me with hypermobility syndrome and either fibromyalgia or caeliac disease are at least 90% likely to be misdiagnosed by GP's. Also no emotional or practical support from a family with alcoholism issues and mental illness. Life was such a peach for me. (sarcasm)

I think the things to look out for with psychopaths are what I call the three E's. Egotistical, Ego-centrism, Entitled. The entitled thing can be used both ways the 'poor me' or the 'I'm educated therefore I am superior and entitled' sometimes at the same time! I honestly don't think at this stage I will ever get over this, or how. This is the second time I've encountered this in the workplace, coincidentally both male electrical engineers who were subordinate to me. In the other case the backstabbing was relentless and it appeared that the CEO was supporting him till he said something that made me realise that he had been lied to by the psychopath. There were things the psychopath had said that on the surface didn't make sense eg: protests about moving to a work location closer to his home address. I mulled things over and eventually realised why and what he was doing. He told the CEO he was going to 'keep in touch' with people at the old work site, for half a day, whereas in reality it dawned on me that he may have been using this as an excuse to do contract work nearby in the CBD. I checked things out but I was literally shaking with fear when I revealed this to two supportive board members and
 

Moderator: Please keep posts to a reasonable length - under 200 words.

ghostwriter

there seems 2b alot of fingerpointing going on...shame shame shame ...it seems to me that people need to either develop thicker skin or stay out of the corporate sector.. as far as personal life watch the signs they can't change their stripes for long.. never in 1 place for too long if they are real CP.. and not just a sociopath in CP clothing ...lol...& to the person who asked do they know what they are..... yeah they know..

SeenIt

Yep. Ghostwriter and people with this type of attitude are always with us in history. They are low down in the evolutionary chain and will learn through 'what you sow you reap' type of justice. Unfortunately for all of us we need to be patient with these poor souls.

ghostwriter

Seenit.. the moral of the story is if they r a true psychopath they will NOT LEARN because they DON'T CARE.... they aren't happy with themselves for the actions they commit they do it for the reaction to test peoples limits. human nature facinates them as they are not capable of feeling empathy or sympathy & many other "natural" emotions so they feed on u to get a reaction in order to witness these feelings even though the connection to the feelings themselves does not exist..

by giving them a reaction u r playing right into their hands.. they will WEED themselves out in time if u give them NO REACTION... they will get bored with u & move on to other people or places... but if u give them what they want BE PREPARED to be in it for the long hall...my experience is great in this matter.. FYI if not sure your dealing with a TRUE PSYCO ASK THEM...

in my experience they will tell u point blank just to issue & study your reaction..most are VERY PROUD of what they are.. who knows u might even get a 1st real answer.

Been there managing one

Until you come across one you have no idea the damage they cause. They can be long term employees in my case the national management were too frightened to do anything as this one talks legal everytime a problem arises as they have a family of legal eagles giving advice and a sibling that won a fortune from a company that took action. So it ain't so black and white my friend in some cases.

trude

My partner is in the middle of recovering from a CP. He nearly lost his life as he considered suicide at his lowest. Our whole family has been severely affected by the employers lack of care for my partner, even when they knew there was a big problem and just ignored it for 3 yrs. My partner did finally seek workers compensation and after an initial denial of the claim, we are seeing a solicitor who is confident of our case. Interestingly there is no compensation or domestic assistance for me after I have had to give up my job to look after my seriously ill partner and 3 kids.

mazinoz

I believe you and hope you can try to put this behind you. Try to imagine a better life. This may be what gets you through. Definitely get counselling. These people are as toxic as hell. I am going to try to find out as much as possible about a company, its values and its IR record before I work for them. Unfortunately I have seen the proverbial 'bad apple' cause so much dysfunction and stress to other employees.

Survivor

I survived an experience that had all the trademarks of the C.P.

I'm happy to say I managed to get through without being personally defeated. Would I like to go through it again? No, once is enough. I have my scars but I've proven to myself my character was stronger and I see no further learning from going through it again. It was a first for me. I was generally trusting of people in the workplace, but I guess now am a tad more careful from coming out the other end of the C.P. experience.

What I find interesting about the C.P. phenomenon are the quantity of weak minded individuals that often assist the C.P. in their endeavours, conquests and laugh at their sick and sad jokes. All in the hope to be permitted entry into the C.P.'s inner circle.

This is why I said it was a test of character. I felt the whole experience put my character to the test and I survived. Unfortunately, a number of people of whom I knew from previous workplaces flaked under the pressure and assisted the C.P. Some might say they were just trying to survive as best they could. Maybe, but I couldn't live with myself to do it - just not how I was raised. In fact I feel those people are the saddest casualties, not those who are the completely broken by the C.P. or who end up leaving.

I'm thinking of getting some t-shirts printed up with the slogan: "I survived a C.P."

Otherwise what else could be done? A website to name and shame - effectively a black list? Unfortunately no, as it would probably constitute libel. N.B. "Probably" because if it can be proven true I suspect it isn libellous.

Good luck people and remember to hold your own moral strength of character to help survive the ordeal.

sethpin

@ survivor - The people who flaked under pressure from the CP - that's called "narcissistic supply". There's one such sycophant I'm considering removing from my list of verbal referees...

AV

My female boss is a psychopath and hormonally unstable which is always even more of a treat 2 weeks of the month. I had been at the company for 10 years in a regional branch and was transferred to Head Office of which she was the new manager of a new department.

The first DAY i could feel my confidence coming undone. Nothing I did was right. At first I took everything on board, working long hours but she kept changing the goal posts ensuring that people could hear her disapproval of my work. She would put a big display of tearing up work that I had spent hours on saying words like, 'huge disappointment' and my favourite 'some pple do not deserve a job'. By the 4th day I was spending my lunch breaks wiping tears in the toilets.

It was like being constantly slapped in the face. I was shocked! - words, cruel, behind doors locked and humiliation in front of my co-workers. It was more distressing then giving birth! I found her to be unnaturally aggressive and overly charming at the same time with a blank coldness, completely unmoved.

She'd humiliate me and then ask if Id like some lunch and to come outside for a break where she would talk about her family and laugh and joke with other people in the building. I was like .. what the?? Skitzo much??

Luckily she had not factored in my personal relationships at Head Office with HER superiors. (10 years of fun Christmas Parties and Corporate Box shenanigans share a bonding of its own) These things I used to my advantage.

I had a not so secret meeting with her manager of whom she'd shared an adjoining window. He had heard the things being said behind closed doors and had not said anything because he wanted to see how she would play out (being an unknown factor).

He apologised that he had not intervened earlier but he thought I was handling her well. Well, after a few minutes of explosive expletives I warned him to put a stop to her behaviour or I would go higher. He spoke to her. Monday morning she was nice as pie but I KNEW i was in for a fight. Whenever her insidious attempts at work and character assassination wore me down Id make a point of sitting in her managers office sharing chocolate and laughing and smiling at her through the adjoining window.

I have become very good at detailed file notes of conversations and phone calls always cc-ing correspondance and emails openly providing evidence to the team and sometimes BCC'ing contacts in Head Office of my work leaving minimal room for error and if so, showing the criticisms to be hardly worthy of attention. It was exhausting but exhilarating at the same time. I wasnt going to let her beat me and I still havent.

She backed off about 6 months later because she was exposed but I have continued to detail my work. She also realized early on she needed my support in getting the department off the ground due to my inside knowledge of the industry, our clients and my professionalism.

Victim

Thanks for the words of encouragement, Happy Now! Yes I have the Union supporting me and keeping me informed of my rights along with my work colleague who got sack on the spot because of being too emotional on hearing about the retrenchment. I have no problems with references and am confident of getting another job. Those colleagues who are still there, most are new, are vaguely aware of the situation and are still in shock as to the people the P chose to get rid of. All seem to be seeking alternative employment despite their success in being chosen to stay so the organisation is basically stuffed. I would dearly love for the board of management to recruit Dr R. Clark for an assessment but unfortunately he has them eating out of his hands!

Victim (nee nearly Victor)

Well I am nearly a Victor. CP is now trying to manipulate things so I get sacked before my redundancy comes to fruition. Cant give the details as it may become too obvious to the powers that be. Suffice it to say hopefully he has shot himself in the foot in regards to workplace bullying detailed in email. I am taking sick leave as of tomorrow and will try for workcover. Will play it all by ear and see what transpires. Very exhausting I must say but I will stay on top. The union has been kept abrest of events but I am not too sure about this particular ones competency after events that occured a year or so ago. Still it doesnt hurt I guess? I am considering a personal visit to worksafe. Doctor is tomoz. Aaaargh!!

Dr John B Conlon

No, as far as I know (ok so I'm only a retired Anaesthetist). Insight is either extremely rare or unknown in Psychopaths. Funnily enough I had a Psychopath to interview in my Psychiatry finals in 1973 - got the diagnosis right too. Examiners v. impressed.

I digress. It was called "Bullying" at work and my eldest sister had a terrible few years before she retired. When the bullies are confronted they deny everything and feel they have been doing their best for the organisation, leaving a trail of destruction. In My Opinion: think Margaret Thatcher, Rupert Murdoch, Kerry Packer.

Ralph Midnight

They know who and what they are. The smart ones do anyway. They are proud of their ability to cut through the 'pointless' human emotion that clouds judgement and work in a universe that has no mercy.

HappyNow

I want to thank the ABC for re-running this show tonight and wished I had seen it back in 2005 when I was victimised.

I didn't understand the extent of my male 'friend's' perverseness to cruelty until it was too late when I suffered post traumatic stress, depression, anxiety and ruined mutual friendships/ reputation. He also left a trail of financial destruction for others who have engaged in business with him. The scary thing is that although he has recently declared bankruptcy, he is back in Corporate Finance soliciting for investors and an MD of his own company.

If you have to endure a psychopath - remember two words: wasted energy. It's not worth the pyhrric victory - because they are not capable of remorse.

In hindsight and from my lessons learned - to counteract any attacks, build a good sense of self worth, maintain your integrity and never give in to self doubt. Try not to beat yourself up after they've pummeled your self esteem. It would also be good to have an outlet where you can speak out in safety and who does not know the P.

I could ramble on but I think it's been said by everyone else. The only question I have is - do we know of any psychopaths who have successfully reformed and regained a fully functioning conscience?

Kev

Hello fellow victims. Bernie (not my real name) - 24 Feb 2009 You make some excellent points. I would also add get a small tape recorder and a microphone - there are 'spy' shops online that sell these marvels. Transcribe the conversations and keep the recordings organized for the day that you need to play them. There are ones that will record up to 8 hours or more at a time so you needn't fuss with turning it on and off.

If you must stay in your job – start preparing now for your wrongful dismissal suit. And start saving for a lawyer. If you can - get a background check done on them and their resume. P's lie. They lie a lot and they lie badly. Mine had 2 degrees on his resume (turns out he had none) and he didn't even leave a gap large enough to have earned the degrees! That is a firing offense. If HR has had complaints or questions about the P before that may be just what they're looking for - proof. Hire a private investigator to do reference checks on past jobs of his, in addition to criminal and credit checks. If you can show that the company clearly had a monster in their midst they'll want to hush you up. Always be anonymous - never point a gun at your head by letting the P know you're after him. Never assume HR won't rat on you to him. A P will butter up HR and get them on their side' they know the value of a befuddled HR dept.

Ex-wives and girlfriends are outstanding sources of info. You're not the first person they've screwed over. Credit checks are usually very revealing as well.

They will stop at NOTHING to destroy you if they suspect you don't buy their act. Be very careful. Do not think for a second if you let them know subtly that you're onto them that they will back down. Quite the opposite will occur. Same thing if you're passive. Bernies ideas were very good.

Try to never be alone with one. Avoid looking them in the eye; you'll think better and hear better if you don't if you know a true P you'll understand what I mean.

betty

I can't just leave my job to get rid of the psychopath in my life. The psychopath is the father of my son who uses his manipulative ability and charm to convince people in power that it is me who is the bad one. So far, he has done an excellent job of this with judgements praising him and demonishing me; and is now on his second attempt trying to claim custody of my son who was the result of rape by this psychopath when I tried to end a relationship with him. He is cool and charming to other people, lies constantly and tells more lies to cover up those lies and somehow convinces people that I am the one at fault and I am the reason why my son hates him. He has no empathy, no guilt for the way he treats my son or me, and enjoys seeing my son or me upset, and the Family Law supports and encourages him. Since being raped by this person 8 years ago, I and my son have suffered continuously at the hands of this controlling psychopath. Now my son is going to be forced to live with this person and so devastate and destroy a child, not to mention his mother. Why is this happening - because he has convinced people that my son has no reason to hate him, telling stories of being a wonderful father in his affidavits and such like, and so it is said it must be me who is making my son hate him.

Drita

I know how you feel, I was married to someone like that and my only salvation was my strength to keep moving forward and my faith that his day will come. I am still waiting but I am patient.

jc

Can you get them to try that test on him that shows his lack of empathy?

Pete

Dear Betty . I have never replied to anyone like this before but your story was to painful for me to ignore . The problem with me telling you what I know about psychopaths is that it may not help you . My story is that I was married to one for over 17 years . I would have left her a lot earlier in the relationship but I feared for my childrens safety . I eventually moved out when my son had left home and my daughter came with me , she had had enough of her also . I knew that my ex had been stabbing me in back for last few years but I only found out after leaving that it had been going on the whole time i was with her . But getting back to your situation , I too feel that the law is geared for the psychopath and there isn't much you can do , with in the law , other then doing your best and not to be intimadated by them . There are a million things on the net you can look at on this subject but other then this one , catalyst , the only other I find worth while was "Psychopaths:The Mask of Sanity " I think it is called . Your story is awful but you cannot give up . You have your son to think of . Pete

Laura

Pete,
I don't really think theat the law is geared to support the Psychopath, just that the Psychopath is so ruthless and clever that they know how to use it and be a step ahead of us all, unfortuantely.

Chris F

Sorry to hear this, my best friend's sister married a psychopath that she knew for only two months and got pregnant before she realized she had made a huge mistake. I could barely listen to the stories of his abuse, they were so horrific. To make matters worst, he came from a family of psychopaths, his parents and sister worked with him to destroy his wife who was determined to divorce him and save the life of her child. Thankfully, in the end, he was a dead beat dad and she won custody of her son when the judge gave him a choice of either paying the $50,000 in back child support or give up custody of his son forever. He chose the money.

Laura

Dear Betty. Firstly, I never saw the doco, but I have read Dr Johns' book. Your story, is my story. Although I wasn't raped, my Psychopaht didn't want children and I suspect he was feeding me black market morning after pills to miscarry my other 7 pregnancies. I have two children that I kept due to leaving my ex partner on the two separate occiasions, although I was bashed to the floor at 18 wks pregnant. My ex is also dragging me through the legal system, that which I cannot afford. He always threatnened me that if I involved the police or the womens group he would tell everyone I was an alcoholic and he would get the children taken off me. We are still fighting post 2 yrs. I have tried to contact Dr John as I need advise on how to fight a Psychopath through the legal system and would even love to help him write a book for women like us. We just have no hope against these men. It is thier way or no way and we need help. I am beginning a course to work with abused women and would also like advise on which avenue to take. My ex lied throughout the family report, his affidavit and is still lying and getting away with it. He is a criminal and drug addict and has weekend accesss to drive my two innocent children around whilst he is drug affected. Not right, and I want to know how I can have him diagnosed as a Psychopath before he does something to my children. I haven't drank alcohol for over 2 yrs.

jennifer

Is there any chance of Aunty getting John Clarke to expand on the processes used by organisational psychopaths. Most people are blinded by the superficial charm and don't see the victimisation occurring. Clearly this is the psychopaths game and adds to their feelings of superiority. The actual damaging process is much more insidious than the usually portrayed yelling bosses, and can come from any level of staff. From experience the most devastating part is that others believe the lies and manipulative behaviour and the victim is generally in a no win situation.

Sick of Psychopaths

After first watching this story some months ago I have been on a long learning journey . It still hasn't stopped me from being a victim but it has helped me realise that i'm not the one who is mad . What I have learnt is that to stand a chance with a psychopath you must record your conversations with them . It is the only way any one will believe you . There are plenty of discreet & preferably voice activated (so you don't have to fiddle with it ) recording devices out there . Even if you are not sure of the legalities do it any way as it can be presented anonymously . It is the only way to expose these people for the evil bastards they really are .

anne of qld

As a public servant who has been targeted by psychopaths I can tell you that they are very successful. The percentage that is quoted is so true. The first time I was targeted the person was so successful that I was up for Major Misconduct. The union rep thought this person was great! I did what any smart person who wants to stay in the public service I did what the CEO said (he did not like this person). I was sent on a psyche assessment -- I could have been sacked for what this person was saying. After this I have been targeted by psychopaths two more times. The trouble is that once is done once you are a big target. My best advice is to

1. professionally journal,
2. run to EAS,
3. learn your rights and
4. defend yourself to the hilt.
5. make the union your best friend

I also have tried to get on with HR - however I went relieving to another department recently and the psychopath was the HRM!!! This is a first and is very difficult! Anybody tried to disprove a HRM lie! The absolute maliciousness of the lie is difficult.

Judy, Canada

I have one other interesting comment to share. I was never bullied in school or throughout my twenties and thirties. It started once I was successful in my business, compounded with lots of attention and high priced cars. Girls in our schools are ganging up in groups of 4 or 5 and the victims are afraid to report it. I have preached about this example lately as I feel its the root cause of the hardened women I have been exposed to as a business owner. I feel the problem is in the adult women (something is lost in the mothering bond). I personally enjoyed being a manager throughout my career with a long track record of mentoring many into success, however I do not feel women are ready to rule quite yet until they keep their emotions in check. They truly play an ugly game when they go into high gear. W5 had an excellent show on a successful firm that was destroyed by a new female manger who utilized the divide and conquer principle and broke up a strong team as she ruined a once thriving firm. Once it is underway why is it so hard to bring back? It would be wonderful to educate employers and government specialists on the "divide and conquer" principle which basically is how the process works at destruction. There are many wonderful women however the increase in jealous, brutal women who thrive off of breaking another woman amazes me compounded with all the guilt that has been put on men, I personally do not feel many of these women are ready for their new found power. Is it the left overs of going too far with human rights in Canada?

O C

I think female bullies are on the rise. I was brutalied by a female director. I had been a founing member of a successful theatre company for 8 years, with terrific reviews and was well liked by almost all directors I worked with. Then I met M...... who was very charming at first. She was very complimentary of my work for 3.5 weeks and then suddenly she snapped. She would isolate me from the rest of the cast and ridicule me. Hwe comments were such a far cry from the compliments she had paid me for the majority of the rehearsal period. With a week to go until opening I thought I would keep it to my self for the sake of the show. My partner and friends knew I was having a hard time though as I would come home and break down. Then she did the unspeakable-she fired me with only a week to go until opening! The worst part was that she turned the entire company against me. When I sought support there was none to be found. She was this "brilliant and charming director who knew best" and I was the incompetant actor who had to be replaced. It was crazy I had been there for 8 years and in 4 weeks she had charmed the company into taking her side. I sought union and legal advice and there was little i could do in the end. I left a company which I had built from scratch and I was completely abandoned by my fellow actors. Looking back the signs were there. She had to always be the centre of attention, was constantly talking up her accomplishments (in reality they were few) and was canoodling up to a young actor. Psychologists suggested she was a psychopath, as the younger, more attractive and talented star I stood in her way of being queen bee. I will report bullying much sooner next time. She got away with it but in time kharma will get her, perhaps the scathing review of her direction of that production was that very kharma!!

Judy, Canada

Nice to find this. I was targeted and mobbed in Canada. It started in my company as one individual who I had given a Manager title to started a process that escalated into pure hatred after so many had to respect me for so many years. It truly reinforces we as humans have not evolved much since the dark ages. I am deperately trying to recover, mostly from the impact of doubt as the chaos around me unravelled me as I reached out for help and no one believed the scope of my situation. I have survived every hurdle as a business owner however being targeted, mobbed and degraded for eight months was the most brutal experience of every hurdle I previously worked through without missing a beat. The individual involved has a few mentally challenged family members and is an only child - daughter. I witnessed three personalities as I experienced her cruelty. It still amazes me that she charmed her way into doubt. We have huge issues here as I survived attacks on my business by a few women in banks who nsf'd checks with funds in the account and got away with it. Its lingering here, people don't understand it and are complacent about it. It truly sent me to Pluto trying to get attention as I was being brutalized and currently have pulled away from people temporarily in an attempt to recover. Police won't deal with corporate bullies and lawyers want money so the freedom to bully continues. Makes me sad that our evolution still promotes witch hunts just the modern version of todays witch hunts.

MR S

I have been dealing with a psychopath at work now for a month. It's a new job for me, and he obviously sees me as a threat. He's systematically undermined me, turned people against me and done a whole host of underhanded things. I'm actually lucky in that, I'm not the only person he's done it to. So now, there's a little clique of victims that can compare experiences and build alliances against him. He's actually leaving for a management role in a bank and has claimed "I'm going to make the people I manage lifes' hell", which I can believe!!! These people aren't human, there is no boundaries to which they adhere and no lines in which they wont cross to defeat their 'enemy' or perceived threat. The thing I've found is, you can't give them an inch, or anything in which they can use against you; as inevitably, they will. Death to psychopaths! << Irony ;-)

survivor

I think these people are hurting deep inside and bullying other people make them feel better.. They want to see us happy people hurt as much as they do.. The difference is that they will never show their hurt but we do.. And they love it... I left my last job due to a Psychopath.. I have also been blinded by one i thought was a "friend".. She twisted my words put me down to others seperated me from my other friends and finally egged my car when i stopped being her victim .. She felt down when i was happy and elated when i was down and alone.. there is no defence but to walk away and hope they meet their match one day. They pick on the nice or as they see weak.. Dont be an easy target.. My advise is to look strong.. and talk as though you have lots of people in your life... They like to pick on people they think have no support..

Prepared

Dear survivor, I do believe C.P. are very fragile people who live in fear of being bullied or their weaknesses uncovered. I confronted my work place bully who fits the C.P. profile to a T. I was calm and pulled them aside for a quiet talk one on one and I said "I need to tell you that the way you treat me and speak to me makes me feel hurt and upset. To my surprise they broke down crying in front of me like a baby. I felt a bit confused but also felt I regained my power back. However the dramas continue.

Bullied At he job in church

Don't be fooled. In time you will see how ugly and abusive they can get!
They may just have found another victim to turn on. I'm having my first mobbing experience with a few CP's AND IT'S EXTREME...and it's in the church!!!! The one place you'd least expect it. What makes it worse is my mother passed and they knew I was even more vulnerable so they turned up the pressure. With every move they makes they use God's name, and they really believe in what they're doing and that they're right. How sick!

move on

It's not a quick and easy process to change job's when there is a Psychopath getting the better of you. But it's easier to find another church.. Don't put up with it. Love them and leave them and move on to another church i say..

surviver

Thanks Prepared, yes very fragile inside i agree.. And yes the dramas will continue until they understand what they are doing.. because hurt people hurt people! Sometimes i feel like an easy target because of my gentle nature and think i should harden up. But then i think, maybe thats how it started with them!

left the company

Yeah, they're handicapped. And what Bernie said.

Foot soldier

Well done Aunty. Typical of your informative/educative and socially responsible programing.

Agree with Dave (31st December), a follow-up is needed with more detailed facts about these psychopathic people and information about what is being done to 'deal' with these people and support good employees of these typically large corporate organisations. Interesting to note that most of the perpetrators mentioned below in other comments are female!

Interesting given academic studies show that 0.5 of corporate psychopaths are female and 2% are men. The other interesting theme noted from the comments is most people who wrote comments experienced the corporate psychopath in an office environment. I am a nurse, and experienced the corporate psychopath both within health and in the university environment. I survived the battle to fight the war. I lost at first, but eventually won the bigger fight. The perpetrator was the same person in both cases. That person was eventually 'outed', and followed a gruelling process for that person who lost much credibility, income and employment position. Psychologically I was a wreck, and after 4 years, I am making MY WAY as a contract nurse, ensuring I do not belong to any one organisation or work for any one employer. Its an isolating experience but safer this way! I am regaining my confidence slowly and beginning to once again believe in myself - I have to for my children's sake. I look forward to the day when I can trust again, and move to work with others in a permanent position for an organisation. To those seeking help while currently going through it - YOU are the most important person here. YOUR sanity is at stake and subsequently your income, etc. I urge you, move on before you are so badly damaged you are paralysed. There is life outside your curent employment, and many lovely people. There is another way. You have skills, knowledge and experience - think laterally - use them in other ways - and move on. You have the strength.

one of the victims

I am aghast, didn't know there was a psychological term for this until someone mentioned it to me the other day and i 'googled' it. This is my boss to a tee. I knew in some part of me that i couldn't suddenly go from brilliant to pathetic in my job overnight as i have never had so many complaints about the level of my work, but as we naturally do i found myself in a lot of doubt and devastation. What is more concerning is that there seems not much way out for the 'victims' unless they leave their employment and loose their job security, so a balance of the lesser of the two evils in this current time. And as is so often the case, the bosses of these people never know and don't believe it, so one has no where to turn. I pray God's justice be done to these people - karma has a way of working itself out.

Jean

I have a new supervisor psychopath in my section of my workplace, a Indian women. I'm just a temp Mon-Friday and know anytime that I can be asked your contract is over, though I've been with this organisation for 2 years. My personal superviosr psychopath has many complaints about her and many people do not like her attitude and talk about it behind her back.

My Supervisor Psychopath exaggerates situation and makes it bigger than what it really is, is pushy, has unrealistic goals for each of us that is ridicules, lectures, tells lies, is very stressed and unable to relax. told me she doesn't have time for anything let alone dream, when our section had a good giggle at my nightmare which was I was sacked because I couldn't type fast enougth, which I giggle at too! My staff used sacasm directed at her and embrasses her for example saying "we have matching pimples", and when she got busy one day someone asked her "did you have your "Wit Bix this morning" and other staff member offered her a Vallum! From this she giggled herself and run off and I did not see her again all day. However I have noticed 1 change she has stopped yelling at her staff for some strange reason. I wander if she got told of by the co-ordinator or manager about her behaviour.

Karen

You sound like a gossip/bully yourself.

jack of qld

Reply to Jean on the 10th May- this supervisor does not sound like to psychopath to me! They sound as if they need training about how to do their job. All the people in the workplace sound as bad as her. I have experienced pyschopaths at work - .5% of the workforce. A true psychopath will arrange a meeting about you with their supervisor(try to arrange it without a union rep), invite you with no warning, dump all these examples that are false, put doubts on your mental stability and then smile at you after the meeting when you are distressed!They will then run to HR and complain. I have had a psychopath tell me a year afterwards that what they did to me was an exmaple of human nature in action. This involved a work investigatin and a psyche assessment! It was very malcious! By the time you go to HR - the HRM also adds more false lies! The true psychopath uses their "skills" to make your work colleagues gang up on you to make your life miserable. I have encounted a few psychopaths in the workplace and have the mental scars to show. I have learnt to professional journal, keep work journals, run to EAS and have become an expert at writing grievances(public service). The supervisor in your example just needs training. By gossiping about her behind her back you are just as bad! Until you meet a true psychopath you have no idea of how they destroy your life and dreams. This has been done to me a couple of time! Don't confuse training needs with psychopathic behaviour!

Bullied At The Job In Church

Reply to Jean -- if she were a true CP what you described would only have set her off and she would have started all of you on a path of mental and emotional demise....one employee at a time.

The Stoat

I have recently experienced working with a psychopath in the workplace and been, yet another, victim of her behaviour. I came to the position with 20 years of experience in my job and therefore, felt confident that I could successfully meet the challenge of a new work environment. Despite an extremely heavy workload in the first 1/2 year in the job because of a review of the workplace, I felt that I was meeting my obligations with aplomb.

It was not until the second 1/2 of the year that I realised that I had been targeted by my immediate boss. It came to light that I had been successfully undermined for some time when I was called into the HR sector of the workplace and accused of incompetence in all spheres. I was, of course, devastated and broke down in tears.

When I had resumed some semblance of calm, I sought to address these accusations in a letter and at a meeting of all relevant management. I 'won' this battle but should have known that it would not end there...

My boss now saw this as a war, which she must win at all (any) cost. She easily fits the profile of a psychopath, being willing to compromise all standards in a bid to 'win'. I think what really hurt me the most was her undermining of me with both peers and clients. Unfortunately, by the time I realised that my character had been assassinated I was - at best - an object of pity in the workplace: I was humiliated.

I felt powerless and began to suffer sleeplessness and, when asleep, subject to nightmares. I knew that I was spiralling into depression. Fortunately for me, my husband eventually understood my predicament (it's hard to explain as it all seems so paranoid to others)and, being financially stable, agreed that I should resign and take 'time out' to recover.

I, like many others previously recorded, would recommend you do the same if you are in this predicament. What is worse: being temporarily unemployed or permanently unemployable? I have been unemployed for just over a week now (after holidays) and, although I have my moments, the nightmares are easing and I am beginning to feel more like my old self.
This experience has been sobering to say the least and I will always be more guarded in future, but I am hopeful.
Thank you for allowing me to have my say and providing me with invaluable information that made me see that I am not 'losing it' and to the person who put me onto this site.

morrie

I have recently experienced working with a psychopath who was my immediate boss. She quite easily fits the profile - willing to do anything to 'win'. Despite others knowing of this, her behavior is so insidious that she (up until the present) always prevails. Unfortunately, by the time I was aware of her activities, I was so undermined and my character so assassinated that I became - at best - an object of pity. I chose to resign from this position - for I would rather be unemployed in the short term than be unemployable in the long term. I am now getting to sleep at night and the nightmares are abating, the spiral into depression having been stalled. However, this has been a sobering experience and I will always be more guarded in future. I hope that once too many people have resigned from working under this person that the alarm bells will begin to ring for administration, but I'm not holding my breath. I tried to put forward my case but the damage had already been done and hence, my word was discredited before I even opened my mouth. If you have been in this situation I also recommend that you RUN! Thank you to the person who pointed me in the direction of this website.

Moving on

It is scary that this interview was conducted in 2005, yet there are so many recent posts. It just shows how real the issue is.

I can relate to so many of your posts the manipulation & the deceit. Like many of you, my Manager is very charming & has the CEO & other staff buttered up, resulting in my complaints largely falling on deaf ears. I am treated like a nuisance, a disgruntled employee who has had a mere personality clash with their Manager. I sought help from a psychologist & they have helped me see that the problems are not mine. The 2 best bits of advice that I have been given which I want to share with you all are:

1. Remember the person you were before you met the 'psychopath' and base your confidence and self belief on that.
2. Empower yourself by creating choices.(eg. get skilled in another area and open up your job choices)

I was really struggling, and the best thing I did for myself was to seek help from a psychologist & take the pressure off myself to stay and fight. I am now planning an overseas trip & looking at further study and work options so that I can leave my current workplace. I am trying my very best to take a positive out of a negative. It is hard, I still have my moments, but I have belief in myself that I can do it.

I wish you all the best. Believe in yourselves, we will find light at the end of the tunnel.

Jane

This is an excellent discussion. Twice in my career, I've worked with bosses who are psychopaths. The first time, I reported the abusive behavior to HR and, while that eventually led to the boss's leaving months later, he retaliated in the short term and made me so miserable that I left. Never again would I report someone. I'd just get out fast. The second time, I and several others were targeted and laid off as part of a restructuring. That's OK with me; I'm out of there. I loved the job and the colleagues but not the new boss, who's trying to make herself look good. I have since heard from other colleagues who are really suffering as they're now targets of this individual. It's sad.

Graeham Yass

The transcript of this interview has been invaluable for me. I am sure I am working for a psychopath; exhibited by constant lying and stealing ideas to present to the board as his own whilst at the same time berating be in emails that are "blind copied" to the world. when talking to me in public or with customers/suppliers he is charming and eloquent but privatly just tells me to "f....k off" at every opportunity. The business he has run has collapsed and my division is up 300% over two years but I could not believe it when took credit for my work, berated me to the board and colleagues and has explained away his failures. It is so frustrating it has made me ill; I feel powerless. I only have work email and he reads all my correspondence so will post again when I obtain one. Does anyone have any suggestions??

Anna Cotinaut

I used to live with a psychopath , he delighted in telling me the stories of his demise of colleagues so as to take over their positions and secure his own. He was angry and abusive when his manipulation and deciet had no effect. His mother is dying of cancer in another country and he has no feelings to see her before her death. He lived off me financially . thank goodness for this documentary it is an eye opener.

It would be great to also run the psychopath that people live with. Since these people exist in the corporation it is likey they also live with people god forbid.

I have been in a relationship with one such person he was my second marraige and lived off me financially. He was abusive to me and the children he ran hot and cold and we had to walk around on eggshells, the arguments and chaos was certainly a feature. A compulsive liar. He prided himself on removing the property staff from a major institution and he is now the property manager in place. Before he left he informed me he was commencing the demise of a colleague he felt was a threat to him. He had no remorse his mother who is currently dying of cancer and he has no feelings to take time off to be with her. He abondoned his 6 year old child to live and work in another country and for a long time treated her with creulty until she grew up and he was left with a choice of being decent or not seeing her at all.

Emotionally i have been destroyed I have lost my confidence and jobs continually not understanding why i was in a heightened state of anxiety and fear. Thanks to this dooumentary I can start to rebuild myself up to today I felt all the chaos was my responsibility I see now that my responsibility was not doing something sooner.

victim

Being a victim of abuse by my team laeder and now manager for ten years I thought I was alone. I went to her boss and then to HR to find that she had already waeved her web. As a result no job opportunies came my way and even when I applied I was 'unsuccessful'. Bad reviews, being told that I was disliked by all of my peers and fellow employees, I did not crack. Instead one day she slipped and someone saw her, I was saved mentally just knowing that someone knew it was true.

Victim

I am being sued by a psychopath because I complained about him to his employer. He alleges my complaint affected his career (which it didn't)and hurt his feelings. He will stop at nothing to get what he wants. As well as the mental anguish, I could lose my entire life savings. The law does not allow me to use his mental disorder in the defence of a defamation suit, even though his personel file shows a track record of psychopathic behaviour for the last 6 years. If anyone has any advice I would be happy to hear it.

Rosie

What an education and for such an important topic the ABC should keep on top of this. Whilst I have never known one in my 35 yrs of corporate experiences in UK and WA I do feel that my husband worked under a number of them in WA over 20 yrs at the same national corporation. A professional with international experience his work could not be faulted so they targetted and harassed him on little things. He had support from colleagues so was lucky. Despite many reports to Worksafe for Bullying in the Workplace (he was OH&S rep)they did nothing as they wouldn't take on a big corporation. He has now retired from there and has a dream job. He was lucky as he didn't succumb to depression etc.

Davis

It's so wonderful to see 'Jerks at Werx' being seen for what they are, but help for victims is hard to come by. The best advice I have seen is that the smart people leave - not always seen as economically viable nor the best way to deal with ratbags because 'I haven't done anything wrong, I'm a hard worker and I'm fully qualified and capable in the role I am in' tends to guide many vistims because surely the good people around me can see the truth of the matter and right will out'. Right will probably not surface in time to save many victims who are left unable to function anywhere, any more.
The potential, both personal and commercial that is stunted by Psychopatths is immense. Obviously better KPI's are needed to weed them out of work.

Many bullies have similar traits, especially the upwardly mobile bully who targets a superior. It seems incredible, but it happens.

The other incredible phenomenon is the pack of psychopaths that can inhabit workplaces. They can be either mangers or workers. They have cliques that work to control and intimidate en masse. More should be done to research the cultures that allow these cliques to survive and flourish at work.

Peace on Earth to all readers.

Pete

After just watching a rerun of this show i am positive my ex-wife is a psychopath. I left her because of all those reasons that psychopath is a psychopath . Loveless and selfcentred just to name a few . The problem is that she still uses and emotionaly abuses the children . Is there anybody that could offer any sort of advice. Pete

Anonymous

The most important things are: To set limits on her behaviour, which can be viewed as defensible (try a formal agreement in writing). Accept that she will often win. Don't get drawn into attacking her.
Avoid alcohol when seeing her, being with children. Remember that she will attack you and acuse you of doing things she does

Another victim

An ex-colleague of mine forwarded the link of this article to me - this person knew the hell I had gone through under my "Corporate Psychopath" and after reading this article, it is such a relief that my suspicious now have a foundation! It's not me or the 4 other people before who left this role. It's the fact that there is a corporate murderer at the top killing off her staff members...emotionally and mentally. It is just sad that a number of high performing organisations seem to thrive with such "leaders" and the attitude is, if you can't take it, then leave it. Perhaps it's time to shake it up a little more and find a nice little island to ship these psychos off to! After all, we are not fans of letting repeat offenders off likely in this country, perhaps we can apply the same rules here.

And for those who have come out of this awful experience alive, I take my hat off to you.

a survivor

My experience took place in a remote area, and unfortunately we were sent 2 psychopaths who relished each other's support, and went to work on the only female in the workplace. I was totally mystified by their behaviour and most of all had no idea of the backstabbing that was going on that lost me the support of colleagues and management in a place where I had spent a wonderful, positive 20 years. I still don't know what they said but the attitude of the 'firm' towards me was evidence enough.

Being abandoned (on the word of these outsiders) by those who had previously respected and valued my contribution to the team was a shock, however the unfairness of having little option other than to leave when you have been the victim, is the worst, as it takes away your security and could ruin lives.

Personally my life outside the organisation has been wonderful, and opened up many opportunities that have proven to be life altering. I try to be sympathetic to those psychopaths who live in such a negative world, disliked by all they have failed to charm. In a small community it's not easy to maintain this behavior without people realizing what you are like after a while. As long as I harbor resentment, they are still controlling me, and that isn't going to happen.

Your suggestion of sending them to an island is not original. Whoever thought of it before sent them to my island! No more please!

standyrgrd

They will never be shipped off because organizations love CP as they rule buy fear and will do anything to get the job done. I have been working with a CP for 3 years now and reported her for slapping another staff member at work on two different occasions. The response I go from HR is that the slap may have been done jokingly and if so there will be no formal investigation. It's been one month now since I reported this physical abuse and the CP is still in the corporation, in the same job! She shows no remorse because when I report some of her bullying to her superiors she just ups the anti.

Bernie (not my real name)

Yep me too, my boss is a classic. Given psychopathic characteristics and the requirements of organisations, they are a perfect fit. Even if everyone who can do anything about them knows, they are so valuable as predators, eliminators of human problems and super active achievers that they provide a valued service in organisational life. They are a price organisations are willing to pay.

Play the game to win. Why, because it can be fun.

Slow it all down, be polite and supportive, formal and legal, get really into the detail and complexit. They have no idea what you will do next, don't let them know your plans, change your plan without notice, don't settle, ask to think and consult, be committed to the best outcome for all. Just hit the ball back gently over the net, postpone/decrease stimuli wherever possible, reduce face to face dealings, deal through others.

1. With no instant gratification they will give up and go away.
2. Now provide them a face saving out and you win.
3. Work long term and they have no defence.
4. Keep records, wait, wait, wait and then.... I'll let you know what's next ...
   

Marg

Bernie, I tried all of this as I desperately needed to keep my job. They don't give up and go away....they just make it worse. After almost suffering a nervous breakdown, and conytinued thoughts of taking my life....I left. Although the nightmares still continue to haunt me after 4 years, it was the best thing I ever did to just up and leave.

Emancipated

Wow-reading your comments makes me feel like fighting harder than ever! These bullies need to be made accountable for their atrocious actions. I've been working in my current environment for three years, and the psychopath that I have had to deal with has become more devious and manipulative as the years have progressed.

With a 60% turnover in staff, one would think that that would be enough to trigger "alarm bells' about our manager and manage the behaviour of the one common denominator-the bully. Unfortunately, many qualified and valuable staff members have walked away from their jobs. They later described themselves to me as feeling “useless and incompetent�.

My "Team Leader' has based her career on the the work of others, and she ensures that staff members maintain a sense of gratitude towards her-even though the work is not her own.
I decided that I had mentally had enough of the stress involved in working with her, and I took the BIG STEP in submitting a formal grievance. I needed to get to a point within myself that I could handle the fall out associated with this step. I knew that other people had taken her on in the past, and that they had eventually lost their case. They walked away down trodden and shaken by the experience of working with her. HOWEVER, thankfully as a result of their complaints, their voices now count as I have placed a formal grievance against her. Most staff members only stayed for a short period of time within their roles, and therefore had little time to collate concrete evidence to support their complaints.
I am a compliant, hard worker and I take pride in my work. I tried for a long time to keep my head down and stay "out of her radar' but eventually you do become a target. My best advice to you all would be to do what I did a year ago-STOP answering your phone at work/mobile when he/she calls, and AVOID all informal one-on-one meetings.Instead, build evidence with emails and create a solid case. Always have a representative with you when you have to meet with him/her, and when you place your grievance, make sure that you have organised a go-tween email receiver/sender, so that when the bullying behaviour is turned up, then you have another "listening ear'. The last most important thing that you should do is JOIN YOUR UNION.

Also remember, that these bullies only make up a small proportion within a workplace: WE MAKE UP THE MAJORITY so let's stand up to psychopaths and GET RID OF THEM!!!!

After I had placed my grievance with HR I was told that I was the first one to make an "official complaint' against my boss. I was shocked when I heard this as she has been arguing with "everyone' for years. Another staff member mustered up the confidence to place a second grievance against my boss after me.

So the whole process has been going on for months, but it has been the best therapy that I could have ever received, and I feel a great sense of relief. I don't know if I have a job.

Moderator: Please keep posts to a reasonable length - under 200 words. 

Geoff

Most interesting story.. I am the victium of a corporate Psychopath. I found he confided in me in private and then denied it later on...he gave me such a hard time that when my time ended no one in the section would support me.. they considerd his versions of various accussions were correct.
They thought he was a fun guy he convinced his management that he was right. when backed into a corner he was abusive and angry.. he made sure that all staff heard his outburst and moved the situation that I was in the wrong. In private meetings he put down other members of staff.. he would made unconfortable and inappropiate gay comments to me... in the end I was terminated from my employment.. I am now suffering severe depression and am finding it difficult to move on a get a job... I would like to take legal action but the money is a problem

Don

I experienced an almost IDENTICAL situation last year, right down to the sexual harrassment. It was done in such a subtle way with jokes etc that it was hard to detect from an outside perspective. I finally complained and was successful, I've found a new job. Although the guy is such a psychopath that now he is appealing and trying to get his job back. These guys or women, will seriously stop at nothing to win. You just have to be proud and not take their BS, stand up for your rights.

trish

Very interesting reading this article and discussions. I work with one at the moment, thankfully this person is not my boss so they have had limited success in effecting me. However I see fairly regularly the impact on their immediate staff and it is very frustrating, we work in a small office and it is not easy to address the issues.

This person's narcissism is so bad they they believe they are superior to the CEO although is charming to his face. How common is this and the fraudulent behaviour?

Australia Bully Manager

Great article- thank you!  I have been the focus of a jealous, intimidating, undermining & incompetent workplace manager for over a year. It has since come to light that this woman has seen over 8 staff leave due to her psychopathic impact.

I am desperately trying to find a new job. I am also trying to lend a ear to 2 other staff members who have issues in the workplace. The CEO, HR & other all back each other & ignore complaints & OH&S issues. Yes- It is Toxic. I have taken a lot of leave, yet no one even is questioning what is going on with all the staff.

To anyone else in this position- I feel or you... but get out quickly- i regret waiting so long (& thus into a recession job market)due to thinking I was the one going mad!

scared

Can't beleive i'm on this page finding so many people in the same situation as myself. Something needs to be done. I feel like i'm going crazy. Been on my job for 9 years, the last 2 have been a living hell working with a psychopathic co-worker and a passive aggressive supervisor. I have a plan with legal help hopefully it will work. I'm using my sick time and hopefully can get my unemployment.

Andrew

I have a workplace psychopath at the engineering company where i work. She decided that i would be her victim on day one and constantly harasses me. She also makes complaints against me to the boss. The key problem is that he takes her word as gospel.

She tried to get me sacked after 3 months, however i survived after proving myself. This has only intensified her determination. She made a complaint against me again today. We had an argument and after she won it, she then decided to get revenge on me (who takes revenge for winning an argument???) by complaining about me on an unrelated matter.

Luckily my immediate supervisor, as well as the other job team leaders in the business back me and share my concern about this individual.

But i don't know how long i can stand up to this bullying.

Lisa

I am working with one currently. She is constantly harasses me and others. She is lying all the time. She is incompetent with her work but she always tells her superiors that her mistakes made by me. I have worked so hard because she always gives me incorrect information or wrong information which has increased my work load. Although someone can back me up as they have experienced same thing as I have been constantly experienced on a daily basis, I don't know how long it can last.

Dude

I had never experienced a "workplace psychopath" until 3 years ago. After researching the internet to obtain some understanding of these people I became amazed that so many of these low life mongrels exist. I am a long serving Police Officer who works in a small "specialist" area. Our OIC fits all the criteria of an "attention seeking" workplace psychopath. The working environment is absolute hell to say the least. This person exhibits swinging moods, bizarre behaviour, extreme self pity, manipulation and deceit. This persons constant whining is immense and very difficult to take everyday. I have experienced difficulty sleeping at night over a long period of time because of the behaviour. When this person goes on holidays the workplace becomes relaxed and everyone is so happy. Everyone in our office "suffered in silence" for a very long period of time until we all started realising that we all felt the same. Thankfully higher management have now become aware of the behaviour of this person, however I have now leart that it's not an easy issue to deal with. This person is shameless and is fighting "tooth and nail" to keep their position and is stooping to very extreme manipulation and deceit in doing so. I just hope this person moves soon.

Don

Absolutely, a follow up doco would be really good, I just went through hell last year because of one of these idiotic psycos. I luckily walked away with my sanity but now a year later his bosses are still protecting him. I don't understand why bosses would want someone like him to work for them, completely counter productive and damaging to the company and the workers. One of my co-workers is now having to put together a lawsuit.

Alicia

I am currently studying personality in psychology and am about to do a research proposal on workplace psychopaths. I am motivated to do this personally as I have been the victim of workplace psychopaths not once but twice, and have seen many others suffer the same fate as me long after I have left an organization.

This is a real problem, one that is an 'underbelly' of the workplace. Education campaigns or wider community knowledge about this fact of the workplace really needs to be addressed. As too many people that I have spoken to that are going through or have gone through it, feel that the problem is with themselves. It wrecks self esteem and impacts greatly on the quality of life, something really needs to be done about this problem.

Dave

Good Luck and keep the end goal in sight. I think Corporations, starting with HR (the buggest bungling idots that make situation worse) need to change mindset about thinking the bully must be supported and not the victim. Call me crazy, but if someone has the guts to complain it is 99% valid.

Emancipated

HR exists to protect the interests of the corporation-this involves smoothing problems over as economically possible. It takes an enormous amount of courage to stand up to a psychopath, and it needs to be done in a carefully crafted and timely manner. Gather your evidence, join your union, and then strike when you are informed and equipped! Patience first...then fight when the the time is right.

Alison

I left a job because of a 'workplace psychopath'. Fortunately for me I was resilient and got on with my life and career. I thank her for the psychopatic attitude as it was a steep learning curve I will never forget and has been a lesson in how NOT to treat people particularly from a management point of view!

krentz

When you consider that these people literally don't care at the end of the day, consider their psychopathy as a distinct advantage over the general population, whom they view as either moronic, stupid, or wrong, and are incapable of empathising with others, at the end of the day there is nothing to sympathise with.

These people are not having a hard time, they just leave us with all their crap. They are not "cruel" or "nasty", as these are emotive words, and they do not feel (much) emotion. They just do whatever they can to get whatever they want, and damn the rest. As luck would have it, emotions are easy to manipulate, and so that's what happens most of the time.

Luckily I'm very aware of the nature of psychopathy and quite perceptive regarding people so I am unlikely to fall into the same trap many others have done. Unfortunately, this will seem like a declaration of war to most psychopaths, and they love challenge and competition. Protect your own best interests - that's the best advice I can give you. Remember that healing takes time and there is always light at the end of the tunnel, you might just have to travel a long time to find it.

Suzette monohan

hi
i agree with what you said but I am in the same boat as many out there seem to be and i have decided to become a psychopath in theory not practice so that I can undermine the other psycho thats driving me crazy at work.I reckon its better to go outside of the usual norms and head straight to the core issue MADNESS and freak them out and let them run out of the building for a change.........

Kathy

Unless you are a psychopath you cannot compete with them - you will be the one that ends up emotionally destroyed. Also you are lowering yourself to their standard. The only thing to do is avoid them as much as possible. It is better to find a better place to work. Walk away with your sanity, don't waste your precious time and energy playing their stupid mind games.

 

lison

Good advice Dave (posted 31 Dec). I agree. Get rid of them as they don"t care if they get rid of you for their own insecurities and reasons! "The greatest evil is when good people do nothing" a famous quote. I truly believe in that. Don"t be AFRAID. The truth IS the truth. Keep evidence and fight back. I wish all you fellow sufferers the very best outcome, believe in yourselves (you are not going mad) and be kind and gentle to yourselves .Get good support to help you. Unless you remember you have rights as a human being on this planet nothing will change.

Stephanie

I had a manager who was obviously a psychopath from the get-go. He broke up a successful team and fired many competent people. He was new, and when I tried o explain to him how the owners had trained us to do things, he told me, "I don't like people telling me what to do. Obviously they have hired me for a reason. I didn't see your name on the list of applicants for my job; if you don't like the way I do things then you need to apply for my job." So I did! Along with a long cover letter to the owners explaining why I was applying for the position, and imploring them to fire him even if they didn't hire me. They did not hire me, but they did get rid of him. He is now a fast-food manager, hee hee. I also managed to keep another psychopath I had worked at another job for from being hired for my supervisor's job. Knowlege protects, don't be afraid, it's only a lousy job!

Stephanie

Whatever you do, NEVER feel sorry for the psychopath; he will use it against you because in his eyes it makes you weak and he can't relate to the emotion. Pity those who pity, for they are horribly vulnerable to psychopathic control, mainly because normal people don't want to believe the psychopath exists.

Corporate Psychopaths

Once I realised my boss was a corporate psychopath, it was almost a relief and everything began to make sense. Unfortunately it was too late for me and many colleagues in terms of the mental abuse she caused. She appeared so charming to others, yet I can only describe her as being a truly wicked person. There is light at the end of the tunnel. I took her to court. I agree that they cannot be changed. they are fundamentally nasty people. The only solution is recognise the traits early and leave the company quick.

Carol Poland

It is a relief to know someone else is a victim and has taken legal action against this type of abuse.
I am very interested to know details of the court proceedings and the outcome and whether our justice system recognised the actions of a psychopath to be a criminal offence.

I recognise my Ex Husband as having the profile of a Corporate Psycopath and describe him as being a callous, unscrupulous, cruel, evil person.

Throughout 32 years of marriage he treated me as if I was an employee and he had no concept of how to interact as a husband or father.
Divorcing him did not provide me with an escape from the abuse.
I believe he is the perpetrator of extreme emotional and psychological abuse and his actions, which also involve fraud should be recognised as criminal offences.

I look forward to your reply, which will help me to move forward in the right direction.

I am not being frivolous or vindictive. I am wanting to deal with the facts and the abuse in a positive way.

almost victim

My psychopath boss is new to the boss game and was easily spotted as she chose to target everyone subordinate at once. Unfortunately, her bosses love her (more psychopaths?) so she is not going anywhere anytime soon. We are protected by our union so she can't just fire anyone, either. Unions were formed for a reason, afterall. We are mostly women and we confide in each other. Thwarting her is a group effort and supporting each other makes the constant harassment more tolerable. We consulted higher ups in the union, from outside our organization, and we were advised to "keep the devil we know" as getting rid of her would be next to impossible and her replacement might be even smarter and nastier. My advice is talk, talk, talk to each and support each other and under no circustances let the psycopath get you alone! Find a buddy to go into the office with you as a witness. You have that right. And DON'T let them see you sweat...stay calm and be prepared.

Viva la France

Let them know you're not alone too, alone = prime pickings, having family and friends, a life outside takes you away from making them money.

I was accused of using our adopted children as an excuse to leave work overtime and they used to say that "on time" was "early" and other days, "I feel so sorry for you girls, you should leave on time tut tut big mean bosses should let you go", these same people who questioned when you left on time other days. That's how they do your head in if you aren't ahead of the game. So get ahead of the wolves and look at their eyes-they can't tell the truth on the run.

Having to justify, "Why are you going home early?" when I did my days work to the time I was given when first starting there and choosing. "Why do you deserve to have the new piece of equipment?" Asked another new psycho on the way up (when they had one and it broke, they guilted others into giving up theirs for them).

Some "religious" psychos mixed in too, my congregation is praying I get better, "can you work overtime so I can go home on time guilt free?" (because I have none) and gossip gossip gossip and tell others to not complain when the boss does her door slamming swearing act. Play the religious card and you're above question, like religion-he goes to church=he's good. How many killers were altar boys?

"I will always be your fren" a comment made by a girl from overseas online who knows perfectly well how to spell friend-she wanted to be my "fren" because I "did so much for her" (i.e. she wanted to be my nothing, my leach, she was, I was a bit of a larf for her and her friends who didn't think I understod their foreign language). "Dance like no one's watching" i.e. dance around and look crazy while I look sane. So I danced, like I always do. "Oh God has been so bad to you, how can God be so bad to one person?" (said to draw me in), I don't believe in a god, so I, unlike them only have myself accountable for my own actions. Good thing I heard through the grapevine about their online friendship game and fun parties that they deliberately didn't invite myself and a few others to to hurt (but it didn't, I was out to dinner with a real friend)- these parties were just excuses to drink and bad mouth from what one of them told me- drunks get away with anything don't they? Drink makes your tongue loose and you say what you really think- others talked earlier before they asked for my email address and I gave them my old one. People who know how to spell do it, or are trying to lie through semantics, not getting "board" "You're a good sole", ever read that from someone who knows how to spell again and again until then? I just laugh like they're illiterate and blind because they are both. They don't get it.

They try to cling to their own jobs b

Redacted

I to have experienced workplace bullyimg like what is described (for that is what it is) However it is not just Bosses that do this. My missfortune was to upset (as they see it) a member or two of a Fraternal society by standing my ground when the intent was to teach me a lesson or in their slang break my back.

Then the abuse started, roumors spread, jokes made at my expensive, all behind my back. False tails that I bullied people. Machinery I used damaged and it implided I did it. My car tyres let down, tyres puntured. Vehicle keyed and sprayed, but with paint that can be cleaned off (This way the victim can be made to seem a fool by making a mountain out of a mole hill.) After all what damage was done, see the paint comes off with petrol. do you see how this attack works?))

Look up Gang Stalking, Brighting, Mobbing, Gaslighting.

It is a sad fact that there is a subculture of these Psycopaths in society that have got organised, read books and study tactics. They see themselves as normal, to them it is the victim that is defective. But as stated hear they have no true Empathy, they can fain emotion, friendship, affection.

In most cases appear extremely bright, Intelligent, illuminated. They have though drove all emotion out of their souls in their desire to improve their minds and as they see it perfect themselves. But they gather and co-operate like a Pack of Rabid wolves that can think.

They actually see their role as one of fighting for the common under dog. Righting wrongs by bullying people into shape, making them good people.

But intruth they get excited almost erotically on stealling from a mark (The person under attack maybe called a Mark, Marked one, Beyond the Pale, The green Man, Marked with chalk or caled the Project, work in progress).

A person given the task of knocking a peron maybe called a riviter or Hammer smith. (Yes they have their own slang language a tactic taken from the Art of war, It is designed to enable them to talk in a way by insinuation of a idea, so someone over hearing can not understand the hidden message.) It is a method taught by experience of doing or having done to you.

The ultimate high for them is to drive a Victim to self harm through trickery or depression. Being able to kill without even touching the victim is the greatest high or to them the mark of a Grand wizard.

Not all Faternal people are like this Just a organised group within. Wolves hidding amongst the Sheep from the Sheppard.

Sorry to have to write in such away but I need to proctect my children, my family and those who risked their lives to save me. before they drove me off the edge!

Sufferers need to organise, just learn from the fight against slavery! don't re-invent the wheel look to history for how to fight back!

Onthe edge

This pack you mention is so true, the premeditated action plan

jen

Need to add this to get rid of this last unthoughtful comment. CP is not about anyone being paranoid - it is about what is lacking in the CP not the victim.

Dougally

I saw this episode the first time round and instantly realised my manager's manager was one. He fitted all but one of Dr John's characteristics.

My direct manager was weak (read sycophantic) so I was in direct management contact with his manager daily and in effect had to manage the situation myself. I documented the behaviours over time with HR (with some behaviour's demonstrated in the company of others) and then when the show was aired I also provided HR the web links.

Keep in mind HR is there to protect the company not you - and HR did raise the issue with him despite my asking otherwise and made it worse for me – so I suggest you leave the HR contact until you have your next career step in progress. Oh and obviously never ask the P for a reference or to be a referee.

I resigned once I'd had enough, but it was on my own terms.

A couple of years later my P mate got pushed out because of a repeat performance and second report to HR. The gent before me in the same role was the third. So a clear pattern was established. I could only let myself be the first the first to report this, but not be the one to resolve it. Despite it being unfair to me this was not my responsibility to resolve – HR unfortunately felt they could resolve it and perceived it as a personality clash. HR and anyone I spoke to continued to be incredulous about it, except a couple of people who had experienced the P before when they worked for him.

Your own sanity must prevail! You cannot stay and fight on your own! You cannot stay because you enjoy your job however unfair that is! If you stay you get mentally screwed up! Then you are no good for yourself or your family! Leaving protects you from long term mental harm and self-doubt. It took me some time to get my own "Groove" or "Mojo" back after the experience because I did stay too long!

Good jobs do exist elsewhere for good people, so go for those! Put the bad time down to experience. You do grow from these events. I can tell you I don't take the same crap anymore and directly challenge similar behaviours now – even with a few somewhat interesting but not P type characters in my new company. One was made an offer she couldn't refuse the other was counselled.

The game is to win the game of life, not right every wrong done to you. I hope my story helps anyone else move forward...

jen

good on you. this is one of the clearest comments here about roles and relationships when confronted with this situation.

Elsy

Thank you, it is nice to know I can move on... I work with someone who is incapable of empathy, blatantly lies, rewrites history and is very good at covering their incompetence. Any issues are everyone else's fault! 1.5 years ago when members of the team I work with realized we weren't isolated victims we addressed it with our management team. Management are only now addressing it following written complaints- I have an interview next week- and am looking forward to working in a 'normal' work environment - making healthy work relationships. I only hope I can learn to trust others (including myself - I'm not crazy!) - particularly managers again.

Simon

So if there are 312 million people in the USA and half are male and 2 % are psycopaths that makes over 3 million psycopaths. There has to be compulsory screening. They have to be identified on their ID's with a P letter the rest us normals getting a N letter. Then when you take on a job a business partner or marry you can see if you are hooking up with a P.
I worked for a medium sized org once and the CEO was a P but it turned out a criminal P. It was many years later after I had left, that I saw his photo in the newpaper. He had been put away for corruption, a crim, I was so please as he was one of the most evil people I had ever met.

[Apr 29, 2012] I, Psychopath

End the Lie – Independent News

PSYCHOPATH documentary. Directed by John Purdie

“There are many psychopaths in society, that actually, we virtually know nothing about. These are the psychopaths who don’t necessarily commit homicide, commit serious violence, or even come to the attention of the police. They may be successful businessmen. They may be successful politicians. They may be successful academics. They may be successful priests. They exist in all areas of society. There is a growing awareness that psychopathic behavior is around us in all walks of life.”

According to popular wisdom, psychopaths are crazed and bloodthirsty serial killers. The reality is not so simple. While many psychopaths do commit violent crimes, not all psychopaths are criminals and not all criminals are psychopathic. Psychopaths are found in many walks of life and are often successful in competitive professions. However they are also ruthless, manipulative and destructive. Equinox reports on techniques developed by psychologists to work out whether a person is psychopathic and shows how brain scientists are coming close to mapping the malfunctions in the brain that cause a person to be a psychopath. In Britain one person in 200 is likely to be a psychopath. However psychopaths are thought to be responsible for half of all reported crimes and to make up between 15% and 20% of the prison population.

The programme looks at the most recent research into the brains and behavior of psychopaths and assesses the prospects for the treatment or containment of this antisocial group of people who create such a disproportionate amount of destruction. Psychopaths who have been convicted of appalling crimes explain with disturbing clarity what motivated them in their violent and destructive behavior. They speak without shame, guilt, remorse or empathy with their victims. Though they are articulate and, at times, plausible and charming, they lack the range of emotions experienced by the rest of society. They know the difference between right and wrong but they do not feel it. Robert Hare, Professor of Psychology at the University of Vancouver, has devised a system of assessment called the Psychopathy Checklist. In specialized interviews, psychologists assess individuals on a scale of 0 to 40 for a series of character traits, including callousness, superficial charm, lack of empathy and many others (for more detail look at How to recognize a psychopath). Anyone whose score is greater than 26 is diagnosed as psychopathic.

[Apr 29, 2012] HealthPop: Narcissism, pessimism and pain

Narcissists are at a greater risk for high blood pressure and heart problems; Also, men with higher levels of lead are more likely to be pessimistic; And, women consistently report higher levels of pain than men. CBSNews.com's Nick Dietz has the details.

[Jan 30, 2012] With friends like Facebook, who needs sociopaths  by John Naughton

Jan 28, 2012 |   The Guardian

The truth is that companies such as Facebook are basically the corporate world's equivalent of sociopaths, that is to say individuals who are completely lacking in conscience and respect for others. In her book The Sociopath Next Door, Martha Stout of Harvard medical school tries to convey what goes on in the mind of such an individual.

"Imagine," she writes, "not having a conscience, none at all, no feelings of guilt or remorse no matter what you do, no limiting sense of concern of the wellbeing of strangers, friends, or even family members. Imagine no struggles with shame, not a single one in your whole life, no matter what kind of selfish, lazy, harmful, or immoral action you had taken. And pretend that the concept of responsibility is unknown to you, except as a burden others seem to accept without question, like gullible fools."

Welcome to the Facebook mindset.

[Jan 30, 2012] Is Facebook run by sociopaths?

"companies such as Facebook are the corporate world's equivalent of sociopaths."

A commentator on the Guardian suggests that "companies such as Facebook are the corporate world's equivalent of sociopaths." Might this be true?

While I wouldn't wish to wallow in a definition of sociopathy, I did happen to ask a couple of Facebook's advertising clients how they found dealing with the world's most powerful brain child.

"They breathe their own fumes," one executive told me. And he is someone who gives Facebook rather large sums of money.

It is in this, surely, that Facebook has its power. It tells us all that in tomorrow's world, everything will be social. If you're not riding in the social Ferrari, you will be but a mere cipher in the commerce of life. Worse, you will be a mere individual, someone with absolutely no friends in the playground.

And who would want to be an isolated individual or part of an isolated company? It's tempting, then to view Facebook's world picture as expressing the mindset of a sociopath--or even a con man.

The driving force of both is that their world is the only one that matters. Their own personal joy lies in dragging everyone else into their vortex and watching as everyone stares rapt in an excitement they can't quite define. There's a lot of fun in that.

Is there some ultimate meaning and spiritual uplift in the proceedings? Not so much. Rather, it's the power of the game and the protagonist's power in the game that matter.

The gullible--that would be us--play along because the game seems to offer something that we will enjoy: success or approbation, perhaps.

But, in the end, it's rather hard to believe that every move Facebook makes is the move of a benevolent association or a social revolutionary, instead of a move by an advertising company.

Who might suspect, in their private hearts, that privacy is not something that enjoys too much philosophical debate at Facebook HQ? Rather, it's simply something that stands in the way of selling more adverts. It's an inconvenience that gets in the way of economic progress.

Because economic progress is far more important than any individual's right to keep herself to herself. That's not Facebook's fault, some might say. That's just the world we live in. We've all come to believe that economic progress matters more than anything.

Naturally, this might all change a little should one of the Facebook management run into some sort of personal bother that becomes public. But, until then, let's knock down those privacy walls and make some money.

It is wrong, of course, to suggest that Facebook's management might be isolated in their apparent views. Google, too, would surely prefer it if you gave it more and more information so that it can sell more and more--and, cute phrase this, "better"--adverts.

For Naughton, sociopaths are "individuals who are completely lacking in conscience and respect for others."

I have a feeling that the people who run Facebook and Google aren't sociopaths in their private lives--should they have them. It's just that when they create one of those social networks we call companies, a strange group-think takes over. That strange group-think doesn't so much distort reality as try to create a new one. We are now living in the new reality. It's one in which it all has to start with people. People are products, products are money, and money is power.

Once you have the power, you can even try to tell governments what to do and what to think. And that's so much fun.

[Dec 10, 2011] Psychopaths Amongst Us

Be careful. It looks like the term "psychopath" now is  abused...

Thirteenth Monkey

Hare estimates that 1 percent of the population — 300,000 people in Canada — are psychopaths.

He calls them “subclinical” psychopaths. They’re the charming predators who, unable to form real emotional bonds, find and use vulnerable women for sex and money (and inevitably abandon them). They’re the con men like Christophe Rocancourt, and they’re the stockbrokers and promoters who caused Forbes magazine to call the Vancouver Stock Exchange (now part of the Canadian Venture Exchange) the scam capital of the world. (Hare has said that if he couldn’t study psychopaths in prisons, the Vancouver Stock Exchange would have been his second choice.) A significant proportion of persistent wife beaters, and people who have unprotected sex despite carrying the AIDS virus, are psychopaths. Psychopaths can be found in legislatures, hospitals, and used-car lots. They’re your neighbour, your boss, and your blind date. Because they have no conscience, they’re natural predators. If you didn’t have a conscience, you’d be one too.

Psychopaths love chaos and hate rules, so they’re comfortable in the fast-moving modern corporation. Dr. Paul Babiak, an industrial-organizational psychologist based near New York City, is in the process of writing a book with Bob Hare called When Psychopaths Go to Work: Cons, Bullies and the Puppetmaster. The subtitle refers to the three broad classes of psychopaths Babiak has encountered in the workplace.

“The con man works one-on-one,” says Babiak. “They’ll go after a woman, marry her, take her money, then move on and marry someone else. The puppet master would manipulate somebody to get at someone else. This type is more powerful because they’re hidden.” Babiak says psychopaths have three motivations: thrill-seeking, the pathological desire to win, and the inclination to hurt people. “They’ll jump on any opportunity that allows them to do those things,” he says. “If something better comes along, they’ll drop you and move on.”
How can you tell if your boss is a psychopath? It’s not easy, says Babiak. “They have traits similar to ideal leaders. You would expect an ideal leader to be narcissistic, self-centred, dominant, very assertive, maybe to the point of being aggressive. Those things can easily be mistaken for the aggression and bullying that a psychopath would demonstrate. The ability to get people to follow you is a leadership trait, but being charismatic to the point of manipulating people is a psychopathic trait. They can sometimes be confused.”
Once inside a company, psychopaths can be hard to excise. Babiak tells of a salesperson and psychopath — call him John — who was performing badly but not suffering for it. John was managing his boss — flattering him, taking him out for drinks, flying to his side when he was in trouble. In return, his boss covered for him by hiding John’s poor performance. The arrangement lasted until John’s boss was moved. When his replacement called John to task for his abysmal sales numbers, John was a step ahead.

He’d already gone to the company president with a set of facts he used to argue that his new boss, and not he, should be fired. But he made a crucial mistake. “It was actually stolen data,” Babiak says. “The only way [John] could have obtained it would be for him to have gone into a file into which no one was supposed to go. That seemed to be enough, and he was fired rather than the boss. Even so, in the end, he walked out with a company car, a bag of money, and a good reference.”

“A lot of white-collar criminals are psychopaths,” says Bob Hare. “But they flourish because the characteristics that define the disorder are actually valued. When they get caught, what happens? A slap on the wrist, a six-month ban from trading, and don’t give us the $100 million back. I’ve always looked at white-collar crime as being as bad or worse than some of the physically violent crimes that are committed.”
The best way to protect the workplace is not to hire psychopaths in the first place. That means training interviewers so they’re less likely to be manipulated and conned. It means checking resumés for lies and distortions, and it means following up references.

Paul Babiak says he’s “not comfortable” with one researcher’s estimate that one in ten executives is a psychopath, but he has noticed that they are attracted to positions of power. When he describes employees such as John to other executives, they know exactly whom he’s talking about. “I was talking to a group of human-resources executives yesterday,” says Babiak, “and every one of them said, you know, I think I’ve got somebody like that.”

By now, you’re probably thinking the same thing. The number of psychopaths in society is about the same as the number of schizophrenics, but unlike schizophrenics, psychopaths aren’t loners. That means most of us have met or will meet one. Hare gets dozens of letters and e-mail messages every month from people who say they recognize someone they know while reading Without Conscience. They go on to describe a brother, a sister, a husband. ” ‘Please help my seventeen-year-old son. . . .’ ” Hare reads aloud from one such missive. “It’s a heart-rending letter, but what can I do? I’m not a clinician. I have hundreds of these things, and some of them are thirty or forty pages long.”

Hare’s book opened my eyes, too. Reading it, I realized that I might have known a psychopath, Jonathan, at the computer company where I worked in London, England, over twenty years ago. He was charming and confident, and from the moment he arrived he was on excellent terms with the executive inner circle. Jonathan had big plans and promised me that I was a big part of them. One night when I was alone in the office, Jonathan appeared, accompanied by what anyone should have recognized as two prostitutes. “These are two high-ranking staff from the Ministry of Defence,” he said without missing a beat. “We’re going over the details of a contract, which I’m afraid is classified top secret. You’ll have to leave the building.” His voice and eyes were absolutely persuasive and I complied. A few weeks later Jonathan was arrested. He had embezzled tens of thousands of pounds from the small firm, used the company as a mailing address for a marijuana importing business he was running on the side, and robbed the apartment of the company’s owner, who was letting him stay there temporarily.

Like everyone who has been suckered by a psychopath — and Bob Hare includes himself and many of his graduate students (who have been trained to spot them) in that list — I’m ashamed that I fell for Jonathan. But he was brilliant, charismatic, and audacious. He radiated money and power (though in fact he had neither), while his real self — manipulative, lying, parasitic, and irresponsible — was just far enough under his surface to be invisible. Or was it? Maybe I didn’t know how to look, or maybe I didn’t really want to.
I saw his name in the news again recently. “A con man tricked top sports car makers Lotus into lending him a £70,000 model . . . then stole it and drove 6,000 miles across Europe, a court heard,” the story began.
Knowing Jonathan is probably a psychopath makes me feel better. It’s an explanation.

[Dec 10, 2011] Politicians share personality traits with serial killers

Current

Kouri, who's a vice president of the National Assn. of Chiefs of Police, has assembled traits such as superficial charm, an exaggerated sense of self-worth, glibness, lying, lack of remorse and manipulation of others.

These traits, Kouri points out in his analysis, are common to psychopathic serial killers.

But -- and here's the part that may spark some controversy and defensive discussion -- these traits are also common to American politicians. (Maybe you already suspected.)

Yup. Violent homicide aside, our elected officials often show many of the exact same character traits as criminal nut-jobs, who run from police but not for office.

Kouri notes that these criminals are psychologically capable of committing their dirty deeds free of any concern for social, moral or legal consequences and with absolutely no remorse.

"This allows them to do what they want, whenever they want," he wrote. "Ironically, these same traits exist in men and women who are drawn to high-profile and powerful positions in society including political officeholders."

Good grief! And we not only voted for these people, we're paying their salaries and entrusting them to spend our national treasure in wise ways.

We don't know Kouri that well. He may be trying to manipulate all of us with his glib provocative pronouncements. On the other hand ...

He adds:

"While many political leaders will deny the assessment regarding their similarities with serial killers and other career criminals, it is part of a psychopathic profile that may be used in assessing the behaviors of many officials and lawmakers at all levels of government."

-- Andrew Malcolm

We are absolutely not seeking to manipulate Ticket readers by glibly saying with superficial charm that they are certainly among the world's most intelligent people. Nor do we seek to manipulate every one of them to click here for Twitter alerts on each new Ticket item. Or follow

[Jun 04, 2011] Serial killers and politicians share traits - National Law Enforcement Examiner.com

Psychopathy is a personality disorder manifested in people who use a mixture of charm, manipulation, intimidation, and occasionally violence to control others, in order to satisfy their own selfish needs. Although the concept of psychopathy has been known for centuries, the FBI leads the world in the research effort to develop a series of assessment tools, to evaluate the personality traits and behaviors attributable to psychopaths.

Interpersonal traits include glibness, superficial charm, a grandiose sense of self-worth, pathological lying, and the manipulation of others. The affective traits include a lack of remorse and/or guilt, shallow affect, a lack of empathy, and failure to accept responsibility. The lifestyle behaviors include stimulation-seeking behavior, impulsivity, irresponsibility, parasitic orientation, and a lack of realistic life goals.

Research has demonstrated that in those criminals who are psychopathic, scores vary, ranging from a high degree of psychopathy to some measure of psychopathy. However, not all violent offenders are psychopaths and not all psychopaths are violent offenders. If violent offenders are psychopathic, they are able to assault, rape, and murder without concern for legal, moral, or social consequences. This allows them to do what they want, whenever they want. Ironically, these same traits exist in men and women who are drawn to high-profile and powerful positions in society including political officeholders.

... ... ...

Psychopaths are not sensitive to altruistic interview themes, such as sympathy for their victims or remorse/guilt over their crimes. They do possess certain personality traits that can be exploited, particularly their inherent narcissism, selfishness, and vanity.

... ... ...

While many political leaders will deny the assessment regarding their similarities with serial killers and other career criminals, it is part of a psychopathic profile that may be used in assessing the behaviors of many officials and lawmakers at all levels of government.

[Apr 18, 2011] The Awkward Absurdity of Corporate Culture

June 26, 2007

As an Eastern European arriving in the United States initially for college, the corporate culture is even more inexplicable to me than to someone who lived in its presence from birth. A few years ago I had just a vague belief that “corporations are where the real economy and culture of America lies.” Right after college I started a job in a medium-sized corporation, and within weeks I was stunned by the abnormality of its culture.

The company should have been named “the cult of John” since it was a sycophantic cult devoted to its mythical founder. The ultra-energetic recruitment person stressed to me at the interview that “John is a genius” and my manager found endless ways to phrase his devotion to “the big man.” The pecking order was painfully enforced with condescending remarks from superiors to subordinates, and through testosterone-filled meetings among upper management, each eager to outdo his colleagues with obscenities and back-slapping in front of the father of us all, John.

Work, which should have been plentiful, was forgotten under political moves and revolting inefficiency. My manager was “protecting us” from a higher-level manager who promised to “make our life hell.” Why, and how, remains a mystery. An employee from a different department triggered a small-scale war by asking for my help. The manager took each of his team to his office and individually shouted them into promising “never to help anyone without his consent.” I quit after realizing that the corporation is a complex game I was not prepared for.

I am young and I moved on, but the corporate world still lingers with me as an awkward absurdity. Inside windowless cubicles, fear, sycophantism, hypocrisy and selfishness reign free, leaving people both exhausted and humiliated. I find it perplexing that in a nation that prides itself on dignity and liberty, some employees let such abuses go on day by day in a “business as usual” manner. I kept hearing “that’s how managers are, you’ve got to let that insult pass by you” or “you need to pick your battles.” Most upsetting, it seems that almost nobody tries to keep a cool head when judging corporate culture. The problem is not so much something you can understand by looking at facts and figures, but by looking at the monsters the corporation creates out of its employees. And in the college medium, opinions are split between the “lefties,” continuously demonizing corporations to a caricature, and the “econ” students who have no qualms and expect to pick up the corporate culture “on the fly” in internships and jobs.

The resemblance of corporate culture with Soviet society is shocking. Soviet society too was based on fear, hypocrisy, double-talk and many lies. The important communist bureaucrats were masters at speaking with a “wooden tongue” — a style of talking that had no connection with the reality of governing. They were diabolically able to wrap very pragmatic actions in completely irrelevant Marxist-Leninist talk. The major difference from the corporation is that the generations formed in communist times are extremely cynical and bitter, while corporate U.S. keeps pushing credulity, self-blame and “a positive attitude.” Just like communism, the corporate workplace culture refuses to be aware of itself. It wraps a simple and pragmatic set of actions with a complex and irrelevant set of behaviors and justifications, all the while somehow mysteriously passing on the management wisdom over the years.

I have a message to add to my complaints: if you have to work in such a medium, always try to understand what is really happening around you. It is better to be aware of an unpleasant reality than to let your gullibility and insecurities make a victim of you. Be cynical and allow yourself to see through greed, backstabbing, abuse and absurd speeches. Try to connect and communicate with people you can trust. Think scientifically — science made the world evolve; cults always backfired.

wallart:

Daniel, You triggered a few musings:

It occurs to me that your boss might have had psychopathic tendencies. The way he wanted to control your contacts with other employees is a red flag to me.

The management style now in vogue seems to me to more closely resemble totalitarian dictatorship.

With regard to internal economics, however, corporations have always operated in a manner similar to communism, which makes their genuflections to “free enterprise” seem rather rehearsed.

Trude:

Daniel’s advice in his last paragraph is sound for every aspect of society. I’d say be skeptical rather than cynical, but the point is nearly the same — don’t “drink the KoolAid” or lose yourself in slavery to somebody else’s vision of their dream. Keep your own dreams alive. Work is just a place you have sold 40 hours a week to. If your own dream happens to be one that can turn a profit, start your own company and drink your own KoolAid.

[Mar 23, 2011] EXCLUSIVE CIA Psychologist's Notes Reveal True Purpose Behind Bush's Torture Program

Replace detainer with psychopath: "cooperation is the "end goal" of the detainer, who wants the detainee "to see that [the detainer] has 'total' control of you because you are completely dependent on him, and thus you must comply with his wishes. Therefore, it is absolutely inevitable that you must cooperate with him in some way (propaganda, special favors, confession, etc.)."

"From the moment you are detained (if some kind of exploitation is your Detainer's goal) everything your Detainer does will be contrived to bring about these factors: CONTROL, DEPENDENCY, COMPLIANCE AND COOPERATION," Jessen wrote. "Your detainer will work to take away your sense of control. This will be done mostly by removing external control (i.e., sleep, food, communication, personal routines etc. )…Your detainer wants you to feel 'EVERYTHING' is dependent on him, from the smallest detail, (food, sleep, human interaction), to your release or your very life … Your detainer wants you to comply with everything he wishes. He will attempt to make everything from personal comfort to your release unavoidably connected to compliance in your mind."

Jessen wrote that cooperation is the "end goal" of the detainer, who wants the detainee "to see that [the detainer] has 'total' control of you because you are completely dependent on him, and thus you must comply with his wishes. Therefore, it is absolutely inevitable that you must cooperate with him in some way (propaganda, special favors, confession, etc.)."

Jessen described the kinds of pressures that would be exerted on the prisoner to achieve this goal, including "fear of the unknown, loss of control, dehumanization, isolation," and use of sensory deprivation and sensory "flooding." He also included "physical" deprivations in his list of detainer "pressures."

"Unlike everyday experiences, however, as a detainee we could be subjected to stressors/coercive pressures which we cannot completely control," he wrote. "If these stressors are manipulated and increased against us, the cumulative effect can push us out of the optimum range of functioning. This is what the detainer wants, to get us 'off balance.'"

"The Detainer wants us to experience a loss of composure in hopes we can be manipulated into some kind of collaboration..." Jessen wrote. "This is where you are most vulnerable to exploitation. This is where you are most likely to make mistakes, show emotions, act impulsively, become discouraged, etc. You are still close enough to being intact that you would appear convincing and your behavior would appear 'uncoerced.'"

[Mar 22, 2011]  But Freedom Is Slavery - An Exchange With The Guardian’s Economics Editor

Guardian

By contrast, in his devastating book and documentary, The Corporation, Canadian law professor Joel Bakan explained how the business entity termed a ‘corporation’ was legally transformed into a ‘person’ possessing its ‘own identity, separate from the flesh and blood people who were its owners and managers’. Bakan found that corporate behaviour closely matched the clinical definition of a psychopath, including: ‘callous disregard for the feelings of other people, the incapacity to maintain human relationships, reckless disregard for the safety of others, deceitfulness (continual lying to deceive for profit), the incapacity to experience guilt, and the failure to conform to social norms and respect for the law.’ (The Corporation, documentary, YouTube)

Bakan quoted businessman Robert Monks, who noted that a corporation ‘tends to be more profitable to the extent it can make other people pay the bills for its impact on society. There’s a terrible word that economists use for this called “externalities”.’

Monks added:

‘The difficulty with the corporate entity is that it has a dynamic that doesn’t take into account the concerns of flesh-and-blood human people who form the world in which it exists,’ so that ‘in our search for wealth and prosperity, we created a thing that’s going to destroy us.’ (Bakan, The Corporation, Constable, 2004, pp. 70-71)

[Mar 14, 2011] Psychopathy and the Characteristics of a Cult Leader

This is a very important observation: psychopath managers typically operate as cult leaders and books about abusive cults can teach us a lot about how to deal with psychopaths in the office. I highly recommend to read the whole except... --NNB

What follows below are characteristics of a cult leader. These are given so that the reader may understand what to look for in patterns of cult leadership. The text was excerpted from chapter five of Captive Hearts Captive Minds by Madeline Landau Tobias and Janja Lalich pp. 67-79, and is reprinted with permission of the author.

Psychopathy and the Characteristics of a Cult Leader

In general, charismatic personalities are known for their inescapable magnetism, their winning style, the self assurance with which they promote something, a cause, a belief, a product. A charismatic person who offers hope of new beginnings often attracts attention and a following. Over the years we have witnessed the likes of this in Dale Carnegie, Werner Erhard (founder of est, now the Forum), John Hanley (founder of Lifespring), Mahareshi Mahesh Yogi, Shirley MacLaine, John Bradshaw, Marianne Williamson, Ramtha channeler J. Z. Knight, and a rash of Amway "executives," weight loss program promoters and body building gurus.

One dictionary definition of charisma is "a personal magic of leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a public figure (as a political leader or military commander); a special magnetic charm, or appeal." (5) Charisma was studied in depth by the German sociologist Max Weber, who defined it as "an exceptional quality in an individual who, through appearing to possess supernatural, providential or extraordinary powers, succeeds in gathering disciples around him."(6)

Weber's charismatic leader was "a sorcerer with an innovative aura and a personal magnetic gift, [who] promoted a specific doctrine....[and was] concerned with himself rather than involved with others....[He] held an exceptional type of power: it set aside the usage's of normal political life and assumed instead those of demagoguery, dictatorship, or revolution, [which induced] men's whole hearted devotion to the charismatic individual through a blind and fanatical trust and an unrestrained and uncritical faith."(7)

In the case of cults, of course, we know that this induction of whole hearted devotion does not happen spontaneously but is the result of the cult leader's skillful use of thought-reform techniques. Charisma on it's own is not evil and does nor necessarily breed a cult leader. Charisma is, however, a powerful and awesome attribute found in many cult leaders who use it in ways that are both self-serving and destructive to others. The combination of charisma and psychopathy is a Lethal mixture - perhaps it is the very recipe used at the Cookie-cutter Messiah School!

For the cult leader, having charisma is perhaps most useful during the stage of cult formation. It takes a strong-willed and persuasive leader to convince people of a new belief, then gather the newly converted around him as devoted followers. A misinterpretation of the cult leader's personal charisma may also foster his followers' belief in his special or messianic qualities.

So we see that charisma is indeed a desirable trait for someone who wishes to attract a following. However, like beauty, charisma is in the eye of the beholder. Mary, for example, may be completely taken with a particular seminar leader, practically swooning at his every word, while her friend Susie doesn't feel the slightest tingle. Certainly at the time a person is under the sway of charisma the effect is very real. Yet, in reality, charisma does nothing more than create a certain worshipful reaction to an idealized figure in the mind of the one who is smitten.

In the long run, skills of persuasion (which may or may not be charismatic) are more important to the cult leader than charisma - for the power and hold of cults depend on the particular environment shaped by the thought-reform program and control mechanisms, all of which are usually conceptualized and put in place by the leader. Thus it is the psychopathology of the leader, not his charisma, that causes the systematic manipulative abuse and exploitation found in cults.

The Cult Leader as Psychopath

Cultic groups and relationships are formed primarily to meet specific emotional needs of the leader, many of whom suffer from one or another emotional or character disorder. Few, if any, cult leaders subject themselves to the psychological tests or prolonged clinical interviews that allow for an accurate diagnosis. However, researchers and clinicians who have observed these individuals describe them variously as neurotic, psychotic, on a spectrum exhibiting neurotic, sociopathic, and psychotic characteristics, or suffering from a diagnosed personality disorder.

It is not our intent here to make an overarching diagnosis, nor do we intend to imply that all cult leaders or the leaders of any of the groups mentioned here are psychopaths. In reviewing the data, however, we can surmise that there is significant psychological dysfunctioning in some cult leaders and that their behavior demonstrates features rather consistent with the disorder known as psychopathy.

Dr. Robert Hare, one of the world's foremost experts in the field, estimates that there are at least two million psychopaths in North America. He writes, "Psychopaths are social predators who charm, manipulate, and ruthlessly plow their way through life, leaving a broad trail of broken hearts, shattered expectations, and empty wallets. Completely lacking in conscience and in feelings for others, they selfishly take what they want and do as they please, violating social norms and expectations without the slightest sense of guilt or regret."

Psychopathy falls within the section on personality disorders in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which is the standard source book used in making psychiatric evaluations and diagnoses. In the draft version of the manual's 4th edition (to be released Spring 1994), this disorder is listed as "personality disorder not otherwise specified/ Cleckley-type psychopath," named after psychiatrist Hervey Cleckley who carried out the first major studies of psychopaths. The combination of personality and behavioral traits that allows for this diagnosis must be evident in the person's history, not simply apparent during a particular episode. That is, psychopathy is a long-term personality disorder. The term psychopath is often used interchangeably with sociopath, or sociopathic personality. Because it is more commonly recognized, we use the term psychopath here.

Personality disorders, as a diagnosis, relate to certain inflexible and maladaptive behaviors and traits that cause a person to have significantly impaired social or occupational functioning. Signs of this are often first manifested in childhood and adolescence, and are expressed through distorted patterns of perceiving, relating to, and thinking about the environment and oneself. In simple terms this means that something is amiss, awry, not quite right in the person, and this creates problems in how he or she relates to the rest of the world.

The psychopathic personality is sometimes confused with the "antisocial personality," another disorder; however, the psychopath exhibits more extreme behavior than the antisocial personality. The antisocial personality is identified by a mix of antisocial and criminal behaviors--he is the common criminal. The psychopath, on the other hand, is characterized by a mix of criminal and socially deviant behavior.

Psychopathy is not the same as psychosis either. The latter is characterized by an inability to differentiate what is real from what is imagined boundaries between self and others are lost, and critical thinking is greatly impaired. While generally not psychotic, cult leaders may experience psychotic episodes, which may lead to the destruction of themselves or the group. An extreme example of this is the mass murder-suicide that occurred in November 1978 in Jonestown, Guyana, at the People's Temple led by Jim Jones. On his orders, over 900 men, women, and children perished as Jones deteriorated into what was probably a paranoid psychosis. The psychopathic personality has been well described by Hervey Cleckley in his classic work, The "Mask of Sanity", first published in 1941 and updated and reissued in 1982. Cleckley is perhaps best known for his "The Three Faces of Eve", a book and later a popular movie on multiple personality. Cleckley also gave the world a detailed study of the personality and behavior of the psychopath, listing 16 characteristics to be used in evaluating and treating psychopaths. Cleckley's work greatly influenced 20 years of research carried out by Robert Hare at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. In his work developing reliable and valid procedures for assessing psychopathy, Hare made several revisions in Cleckley's list of traits and finally settled on a 20-item Psychopathy Checklist. Later in this chapter we will use an adaptation of both the Cleckley and Hare checklists to examine the profile of a cult leader.

Neuropsychiatrist Richard M. Restak stated, "At the heart of the diagnosis of psychopathy was the recognition that a person could appear normal and yet close observation would reveal the personality to be irrational or even violent". Indeed, initially most psychopaths appear quite normal. They present themselves to us as charming, interesting, even humble. The majority "don't suffer from delusions, hallucinations, or memory impairment, their contract with reality appears solid." Some, on the other hand, may demonstrate marked paranoia and megalomania. In one clinical study of psychopathic inpatients, the authors wrote "We found that our psychopaths were similar to normals (in the reference group) with regard to their capacity to experience external events as real and with regard to their sense of bodily reality. They generally had good memory, concentration, attention, and language function. They had a high barrier against external, aversive stimulation....In some ways they clearly resemble normal people and can thus 'pass' as reasonably normal or sane. Yet we found them to be extremely primitive in other ways, even more primitive than frankly schizophrenic patients. In some ways their thinking was sane and reasonable, but in others it was psychotically inefficient and/or convoluted."

Another researcher described psychopaths in this way These people are impulsive, unable to tolerate frustration and delay, and have problems with trusting. They take a paranoid position or externalize their emotional experience. They have little ability to form a working alliance and a poor capacity for self-observation. Their anger is frightening. Frequently they take flight. Their relations with others are highly problematic. When close to another person they fear engulfment or fusion or loss of self. At the same time, paradoxically, they desire closeness; frustration of their entitled wishes to be nourished, cared for, and assisted often leads to rage. They are capable of a child's primitive fury enacted with an adult's physical capabilities, and action is always in the offing." Ultimately, "the psychopath must have what he wants, no matter what the cost to those in his way."

The Master Manipulator

Let us look for a moment at how some of this manifests in the cult leader. Cult leaders have an outstanding ability to charm and win over followers. They beguile and seduce. They enter a room and garner all the attention. They command the utmost respect and obedience. These are "individuals whose narcissism is so extreme and grandiose that they exist in a land of splendid isolation in which the creation of the grandiose self takes precedence over legal, moral or interpersonal commitments."

Paranoia may be evident in simple or elaborate delusions of persecution. Highly suspicious, they may feel conspired against, spied upon or cheated, or maligned by a person, group, or governmental agency. Any real or suspected unfavorable reaction may be interpreted as a deliberate attack upon them or the group. (Considering the criminal nature of some groups and the and social behavior of others, some of these fears may have more of a basis in reality than delusion!) Harder to evaluate, of course, is whether these leaders' belief in their magical powers, omnipotence, and connection to God (or whatever higher power or belief system they are espousing) is delusional or simply part of the con. Megalomania--the belief that one is able or entitled to rule the world--is equally hard to evaluate without psychological testing of the individual, although numerous cult leaders state quite readily that their goal is to rule the world. In any case, beneath the surface gloss of intelligence, charm, and professed humility seethes an inner world of rage, depression, and fear.

Two writers on the subject used the label 'Trust Bandit' to describe the psychopathic personality. Trust Bandit is indeed an apt description of this thief of our hearts, souls, minds, bodies, and pocketbooks. Since a significant percentage of current and former cult members have been in more than one cultic group or relationship, learning to recognize the personality style of the Trust Bandit can be a useful antidote to further abuse.

[Jan 17, 2011] The Psychopathic Influence

The Hidden Evil

Psychopaths, also called sociopaths, are categorized as those who exhibit superficial charm and intelligence, and are absent of delusions or nervousness. Their traits include:

• Unreliability
• Frequent lying
• Deceitful and manipulative behavior (either goal-oriented or for the delight of the act itself)
• Lack of remorse or shame
• Antisocial behavior
• Poor judgment and failure to learn by experience
• Incapacity for love
• Poverty of general emotions
• Loss of insight
• Unresponsiveness in personal relations
• A frequent need for excitement
• An inflated self-worth
• An ability to rationalize their behavior
• A need for complete power
• A need to dominate others

Psychopathy is basically an emotional disorder. The book, The Psychopath, by James Blair, Karina Blair, and Derek Mitchell, states, "The crucial aspect of psychopathy is ... the emotional impairment." According to Dr. J. Reid Meloy's book, The Psychopathic Mind, although psychopaths don't feel emotion in a normal sense, they do experience boredom, envy, exhilaration, contempt, sadistic pleasure, anger, and hints of depression.

Generally, those who believe it's caused by environmental factors use the term sociopath, and believers of the biological theory use the term psychopath. Psychopathy closely resembles Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD or APD) or Conduct Disorder (CD) as outlined in the DSM-IV. These disorders are detected using the Psychopathy Checklist-Revisited (PCL-R), the DSM-IV, and other diagnostics.

These character types, comprise about 4% of the population and span every level of society. Psychopaths can be found in every race, culture, profession and class. Because the term psychopath has been used to describe APD types and sociopaths, in this chapter I'll use it as a universal label for these three character types.

Later when I'm explaining how psychopaths always mask themselves when seeking positions of power, it will help to remember the following: If a rational person tries to apply their logic while trying to understand the reason for an objective or act of a psychopath, they will fail. This will be explained in more detail later. Likewise, when a rational person hears of the possibility that a massive lie has been told to a population by a trusted leader, and they attempt to use their logic to determine weather or not such a lie is possible, they will usually not believe the truth (that they have fallen for a huge lie).

The reason for this is that although most of us can identify with small lies, we find it difficult to conclude that such a massive lie is possible. When I use the term massive lie, I don't just mean a complete falsehood regarding a major event, but also the scope of its influence (global) and the amount of people that have fallen for it.

In his book, The Mask of Sanity, Dr. Hervey Cleckley, says that even during the most "solemn perjuries" they show "no difficulty at all in looking anyone tranquilly in the eyes." He adds that that they will "lie about any matter, under any circumstances." He explains that it is difficult to express how completely straightforward they appear when telling a blatant lie.

"The great masses of people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one."
-Adolph Hitler

"Lying, deceiving, and manipulation are natural talents for psychopaths," agreed Dr. Robert Hare, in his book, Without Conscience. "When caught in a lie or challenged with the truth, they are seldom perplexed or embarrassed--they simply change their stories or attempt to rework the facts so that they appear to be consistent with the lie."

Psychopaths are always able to justify their actions, no matter how brutal. They have, "an ability to rationalize their behavior so that it appears warranted, reasonable, and justified," says Dr. Cleckley. Dr. Hare added, "Psychopaths show a stunning lack of concern for the devastating effects their actions have on others. Often they are completely forthright about the matter, calmly stating that they have no sense of guilt, [and] are not sorry for the pain and destruction they have caused," which, says Dr. Hare, "is associated with a remarkable ability to rationalize their behavior."Psychopathy is usually untreatable. Most therapists won't work with them because they often end up damaged in the process. Dr. Hare explained, "Such counseling would be wasted on psychopaths." Some of them will even reflect the wishes of the therapist and pretend to be getting better.

In his book, People of The Lie, psychiatrist Dr. Scott Peck had this to say: "Among themselves therapists will not infrequently refer to a patient's psychopathology as being 'overwhelming.' We mean this literally. We literally feel overwhelmed by the labyrinthine mass of lies and twisted motives ... into which we will be drawn if we attempt to work with such people..."

Wikipedia describes that, "traditional therapeutic approaches actually make them, if not worse, then far more adept at manipulating others and concealing their behavior. They are generally considered to be not only incurable but also untreatable." Basically psychopaths are the way they are for life. In most legal jurisdictions they are considered sane. So technically, they're not mentally ill, just different.

Dr. Scott Peck concludes, "I have learned nothing in twenty years that would suggest that evil people can be rapidly influenced by any means other than raw power. They do not respond," he says, "to either gentle kindness or any form of spiritual persuasion with which I am familiar with."

Where Are They?

When people hear the word psychopath, most think of the famous serial killers locked away in prison. However, most don't end up in prison or mental hospitals. Dr. Cleckley wrote, "The true difference between them and the psychopaths who continually go to jails or to psychiatric hospitals is that they keep up a far better and more consistent outward appearance of being normal."

"This outward appearance," says Dr. Cleckley, is essentially a mask, which, "may include business or professional careers that continue in a sense successful, and which are truly successful when measured by financial reward or by the casual observer's opinion of real accomplishment."

"Many psychopaths never go to prison or any other facility," agreed Dr. Hare. "They appear to function reasonably well--as lawyers, doctors, psychiatrists, academics, mercenaries, police officers, cult leaders, military personnel, business people, writers, artists, entertainers, and so fourth--without breaking the law." He continued, "Their intelligence, family background, social skills, and circumstances permit them to construct a facade of normalcy."

"Corrupt and callous politicians, social or career fast climbers, authoritarian leaders, abusing and aggressive persons, etc., are among them" wrote Dr. Renato Sabbatini in his article, The Psychopath's Brain. "A common characteristic," says Dr. Sabbatini, "is that they engage systematically in deception and manipulation of others for personal gain. In fact, many successful and adapted non-violent sociopaths can be found in our society."

Most of these people are not just right in your churches, schools, charitable organizations, and workplaces, but by their very nature, they are likely running them. It is a core trait of the psychopath to place themselves in positions of influence, not for public service, but for power. "The experience of pleasure is not reciprocal for the psychopath," stated Dr. Meloy, "it is available only through sadistic channels of power and control." Achieving power for the sake of having power is the nature of the psychopath. "They love to have power and control over others," agreed Dr. Hare.

The need for absolute power over others and the wish to inflict pain for the enjoyment of watching others suffer, are almost never apparent to the casual observer. The reason for this is that another core trait of the psychopath is disguise. So unfortunately, these individuals usually mask themselves as good-natured people. If they have tremendous wealth, you can bet that they'll create charitable organizations as part of their mask.

They are well aware that their mental makeup is drastically different from the majority. They have a sixth sense for detecting and exploiting any weakness you may have. At a very early age they learn that they can inflict mental and emotional harm on others with ease. They also learn how to detect others like themselves out of a crowd of normal people. Beginning in their childhood, most of them learn to mimic normal emotional reactions in order to blend in with society.

An article on Dr. Hare's website called, Psychopaths Among Us, by Robert Hercz, describes how Dr. Hare was contacted by Nicole Kidman, who wanted his advice on how to play the part of a psychopath for her film, Malice. Dr. Hare uses the anecdote of a psychopath who had just witnessed an accident where a mother watched her child get killed by a car. There's blood all over the place, and the psychopath experiences no emotion, but instead, is trying to avoid getting blood on her shoes. The psychopath notices the mother's emotional reaction to the accident and is fascinated. She goes home, looks in the mirror, and begins to mimic the facial expressions of the mother. "That's the psychopath," revealed Dr. Hare.

Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, states that, "any emotions which the primary psychopath exhibits are the fruits of watching and mimicking other people's emotions." They are adept at, "using their charm and chameleonlike abilities to cut a wide swath through society and leaving a wake of ruined lives behind them," Dr. Hare warns.

"More often than not," says Dr. Cleckley, "the typical psychopath will seem particularly agreeable and make a distinctly positive impression when he is first encountered. Alert and friendly in his attitude, he is easy to talk with and seems to have a good many genuine interests. There is nothing at all odd or queer about him, and in every respect he tends to embody the concept of a well-adjusted, happy person."

"Psychopaths are often witty and articulate," concurred Dr. Hare. "They can be amusing and entertaining conversationalists, ready with quick and clever comeback, and can tell unlikely but convincing stories that cast themselves in a good light. They can be very effective in presenting themselves well and are often very likable and charming."

Remember, most of them don't psychically hurt people, so this is about mental and emotional domination. To accomplish these objectives, they will use their mask of sanity to place themselves in positions within your community. These positions may include school boards, charitable organizations, churches, politics, law enforcement, or any position which they believe will offer them power over others. These are the places where most psychopaths end up, not jail.

[Jan 12, 2011] The Sociopath In The Next Office by Davia Temin

Nov 19, 2010 | Forbes.com

One out of every 25 has no conscience or sense of right or wrong. What to do when you work with one.

Evil in the office. If you think about it, you'll probably realize you've seen it play out at least once in your career.

All of a sudden a well-running, friendly, effective group or company begins to disintegrate for no apparent reason. People start to become demoralized and dysfunctional, efficiency plummets, client service and sales suffer and convoluted mistakes are made, up to and including illegal behavior such as fraud and larceny. Employees begin to develop psychosomatic illnesses, sick time rises and the best talent starts to leave.

What used to be a great work situation turns into a nightmare.

More often than not this dysfunction can be traced to the entry of one new employee, perhaps the boss, his or his assistant, the head of HR or a new shop steward. And when you start to explore, you find that, though the person may look and act apparently normal -- even charming -- all those around him or her are suffering.

Four percent of the global population is made up of sociopaths, Dr. Martha Stout, psychologist and clinical instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, tells us in her book The Sociopath Next Door. That means one out of every 25 human beings has no conscience, no sense of right or wrong, no empathy, no ability to understand emotion--no soul. Worse, while they can mimic emotion, they see other humans as mere pawns or saps, to be used for their benefit or amusement, or both.

Add that to the fact that science now is questioning whether there is any difference at all between sociopaths and psychopaths, and that those with narcissistic personality disorder also have some of the same characteristics (an inability to care about anyone but themselves), it means that "evil" is all around us, even at work.

[Jan 11, 2011] Is Your Boss a Corporate Psychopath

ePsych News

Do these characteristics sound familiar?

• Superficially charming, even warm

• Extreme intimidation of others, especially behind closed doors

• Impulsive behavior

• Manipulative and controlling

• Self-obsessed

• Lack of remorse, and even apparent satisfaction or pleasure, after harming others

Yes? Then you possibly have been, or currently are, working with a corporate psychopath.

Contrary to popular perception, psychopathology is not always about murderousness. It is defined broadly as 'callous behavior without normal feelings of empathy or guilt'. And there's a surprising amount of it about.

According to a recent report on the ABC's Catalyst program, one woman in 200 is classifiable as a psychopath, as is one man out of every 50 - overall, approximately one person in 80. This means that every large organisation has several of them; chances are, you have several psychopaths in your building.

Worse, many companies are unwittingly selecting in favour of psychopathology, especially when recruiting executives. Their charm, fearlessness and "whatever it takes" attitude can win over even experienced interviewers, and with rapid job turnover they can march up the ranks at great speed.

Consequently, the chance of psychopaths holding senior positions in industry and government is disquietingly high. We only have to consider the great wars of history, acts of national aggression in our own lifetimes, and examples of extraordinary corporate self-interest, to see the power of the pathology that we have allowed to slip past the sentries. Criminals in neckties.

[Nov 18, 2010] Stoller A Debtcropper Society

November 18, 2010 | naked capitalism

Edwardo:

“We should recognize that what the creditor class wants is what they’ve always wanted: total dominance of our culture.”

Going on from there what we must recognize is that the proper clinical description, or, rather, diagnosis for those who seek total dominance of others is sociopath. There really is no treatment for such a severe condition, and, therefore, the only effective response entails stern measures.

Psychoanalystus:

Edwardo,

As a shrink with considerable forensic experience, I agree with your statement that there is no treatment for sociopathy. If anything, treatment is highly discouraged, as it only teaches them how to be even better criminals. Sociopaths are not human beings, as they lack a conscience or basic human emotions such as empathy.

As such, the only 2 options we have when dealing with sociopaths:

(1) containment, which means putting them in prison for the rest of their lives with no possibility of release, or

(2) destruction, which can be accomplished via a number of ways, such as public lynching or giving them the death penalty in a speedy, followed by immediate execution.

Psychoanalystus

[Nov 06, 2010] Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed and My Sister Stole My Mother's Boyfriend (9781591025801) by Barbara Oakley

Amazon.com

Borne out of a quest to understand her sister Carolyn's lifelong sinister behavior (which, systems engineer Oakley suggests, may have been compounded by childhood polio), the author sets out on an exploration of evil, or Machiavellian, individuals. Drawing on the advances in brain imaging that have illuminated the relationship of emotions, genetics and the brain (with accompanying imaging scans), Oakley collects detailed case histories of famed evil geniuses such as Slobodan Milosevic and Mao Zedong, interspersed with a memoir of Carolyn's life. Oakley posits that they all had borderline personality disorder or antisocial personality disorder, a claim she supports with evidence from scientists' genetic and neurological research.

All the people she considers, Oakley notes, are charming on the surface but capable of deeply malign behavior (traits similar to those found in some personality disorders), and her analysis attributes these traits to narcissism combined with cognitive and emotional disturbances that lead them to believe they are behaving in a genuinely altruistic way. Disturbing, for sure, but with her own personal story informing her study, Oakley offers an accessible account of a group of psychiatric disorders and those affected by them.

Gadget Hound

This is a terrific book on the brain's organization, where genes fit into the picture of psychopathology, and a personal story to knit it all together. Probably the best I've ever found, and it reflects the state-of-the-art in it's subject matter.

This is a technical book written almost as a novel - just a wonderful read for those who would otherwise never bother with a real medical book. If you're interested in any of the above, then this is the book for you. There are also YouTube videos of the author giving talks at book signings, etc., which are very interesting and can serve as an introduction to the book.

In addition, here are some articles, etc., by Barbara Oakley which should be of considerable interest to anyone purchasing this excellent book:

1. "The Killer in the Lecture Hall," Op-Ed for New York Times, April 19th, 2007, republished in The International Herald Tribune and many other papers worldwide.

2. "The Devil Inside," by Barbara Oakley, The Times Higher Education Supplement, pp 18-19, November 30th, 2007. Invited article.

3. "A world afflicted with blind spots," by Barbara Oakley, op-ed in the Chicago Tribune, December 6, 2007.

4. "On Ayn Rand, Objectivism, and Atlas Shrugged," by Barbara Oakley, Normblog, (one of the most popular blogs in England). Invited article. (Discusses Rand's work using neuroscientific findings.)

cassdog (Gainesville, Fl USA): Illuminating look at some sinister characters in all of our lives, (October 10, 2009)

This author does what a good popular science writer should do. She discusses a large amount of cutting edge science in a manner that an educated reader can understand while providing context to the science through discussions of history, politics and even family relations. The result of this recipe is a thoroughly enjoyable and mesmerizing book that teachers the reader something new.

While I found her discussion of the history of Machiavellian research fascinating and the historical examples of Mao, Milosevic, Hitler and Stalin illuminating, the book hit close to home when she discussed the sub-clinical Machiavellian's that we all have to interact with.

Often these people are very successful and quite friendly but underneath the surface there is a more sinister programming going on. This sinister program has stayed in the gene pool, because at low-levels of the population, these social cheaters could have their way without fear of reciprocation.

In our anonymous urban societies, these personalities can flourish much stronger than in our historical evolution, when maintaining the trust of your social group was literally a matter of life and death.

It is in these sections where I could make sense of some people that I have met in my life and prepare for dealing with them in the future. In a sense this is the journey that the author went through. It appears that she had an overpowering urge to understand the source of her sister's troubled behavior. Along the way, she uncovered some very interesting facts and the readers get to enjoy the results.

Craig Hyatt: A+ for Oakley's Evil Genes, (October 8, 2009)

This review is from: Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed, and My Sister Stole My Mother's Boyfriend (Paperback) I give Evil Genes an A+. First off, forget the whole nature-versus-nurture debate and all the baggage about eugenics and whatnot: that's just not the *point* of this book. Oakley isn't preaching here, she's presenting the reasonable point of view that inheritable faults in brain development can, together with environmental influences, result in personality disorders and other processing problems that may, in turn, lead to inexplicably and gratuitously evil and destructive behavior.

However, I read the book cover to cover, and I never got the impression she was making the case that there's a "schizophrenia gene" or a "rapist gene" or anything like that, and I certainly didn't get the feeling she was arguing that we ought to excuse criminal behavior because "my evil genes made me do it."

What Oakley does is present a well-founded case that genes and combinations of genes can ultimately cause brains to get wired wrong or to develop chemical imbalances that result in faulty processing. Oakley's case seems reasonable to me. If you pick up Gray's Anatomy, you see there are loads of physical variations in the construction of our bodies... an extra bone here... an extra nerve or artery there... and I see no reason why brain construction shouldn't have similar physical and chemical variations resulting in a spectrum of psychological dispositions. Oakley isn't writing a PhD thesis here. What she's doing is mixing a goodish dose of interesting and accessible science with some fascinating inside stuff about public menaces interwoven with Oakley's memories of the trail of destruction left by her own erratic older sister Carolyn. I just couldn't put the book down. Here are a few random sentences on pages I dog eared (some of these are from sources, not Oakley herself):

• Indeed, psychopaths know intellectually what is immoral -- they just don't have a feeling of immorality about it.
• The hypothalamus controls the "four F's": 1. fighting, 2. fleeing, 3. feeding; and 4. mating.
• I've learned one of the most valuable lessons I could ever learn -- that deep-rooted emotional reasoning can often trump logic.
• Densely populated areas, apparently, are the equivalent for psychopaths of ponds and puddles for malarial mosquitoes.
• "Gaslighting" involves the denial of a borderline... that certain events occurred or certain things were said. The borderline may deny another person's perceptions, memory, or very sanity.

If my review didn't convince you, sample the front matter and first chapter. You won't be able to put the book down. I promise.

Sacramento Book Review: Vampires are Real, July 19, 2009

By employing the destructive, exploitative life of her own sibling, Dr. Oakley has personalized a "plot" for her exploration of dangerous mentalities. Mao, Stalin, Slobodan Milosevic, Mugabe, Papa Doc Duvalier, Castro, Hitler--all self-serving, manipulative, and deceitful minds who slew without conscience, disregarded the suffering of and were obsessed with control over others--all, we learn, were Borderline personalities. In perhaps similarly motivated economically murderous careers are Ken Lay, Bernard Madoff, and their ilk.

Perhaps because she is so thorough in covering the associated psychopathologies and neural malfunctions that create or facilitate Borderlines, this delving into a fearful subject was as entertaining to read as top-flight fiction. Most valuable, perhaps, are the insights and diagnostic tools that may empower the reader to recognize Machiavellian personalities in public and corporate life.

Vampire Alert! Personalities that on a tribal level would be shunned or culled, wield immensely dangerous charm and emotionally detached power to harm in an urban, large corporate, or national political milieu. And one of the symptoms of Borderlines is differential reproduction. They are among us, and their numbers are growing!

Sympathetically written, awesomely erudite, with humour and a wide array of the author's personal adventures and achievements to enrich it, this is a book I will reread many times.

Reviewed by David Lloyd Sutton

[Nov 01, 2010] What Psychopath Means

Scientific American

We have all heard these phrases before. “Violent psychopath” (21,700). “Psychopathic serial killer” (14,700). “Psychopathic murderer” (12,500). “Deranged psychopath” (1,050). The number of Google hits following them in parentheses attests to their currency in popular culture. Yet as we will soon discover, each phrase embodies a widespread misconception regarding psychopathic personality, often called psychopathy (pronounced “sigh-COP-athee”) or sociopathy. Indeed, few disorders are as misunderstood as is psychopathic personality. In this column, we will do our best to set the record straight and dispel popular myths about this condition.

Charming but Callous

First described systematically by Medical College of Georgia psychiatrist Hervey M. Cleckley in 1941, psychopathy consists of a specific set of personality traits and behaviors. Superficially charming, psychopaths tend to make a good first impression on others and often strike observers as remarkably normal. Yet they are self-centered, dishonest and undependable, and at times they engage in irresponsible behavior for no apparent reason other than the sheer fun of it. Largely devoid of guilt, empathy and love, they have casual and callous interpersonal and romantic relationships. Psychopaths routinely offer excuses for their reckless and often outrageous actions, placing blame on others instead. They rarely learn from their mistakes or benefit from negative feedback, and they have difficulty inhibiting their impulses.

Not surprisingly, psychopaths are overrepresented in prisons; studies indicate that about 25 percent of inmates meet diagnostic criteria for psychopathy. Nevertheless, research also suggests that a sizable number are represented in everyday life. Some investigators have even speculated that “successful psychopaths”—those who attain prominent positions in society—may be overrepresented in certain occupations, such as politics, business and entertainment. Yet the scientific evidence for this intriguing conjecture is preliminary.

Most psychopaths are male, although the reasons for this sex difference are unknown. Psychopathy seems to be present in both Western and non-Western cultures, including those that have had minimal exposure to media portrayals of the condition. In a 1976 study anthropologist Jane M. Murphy, then at Harvard University, found that an isolated group of Yupik-speaking Inuits near the Bering Strait had a term (kunlangeta) they used to describe “a man who … repeatedly lies and cheats and steals things and … takes sexual advantage of many women—someone who does not pay attention to reprimands and who is always being brought to the elders for punishment.” When Murphy asked an Inuit what the group would typically do with a kunlangeta, he replied, “Somebody would have pushed him off the ice when nobody else was looking.”

The best-established measure of psychopathy, the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), developed by University of British Columbia psychologist Robert D. Hare, requires a standardized interview with subjects and an examination of their file records, such as their criminal and educational histories. Analyses of the PCL-R reveal that it comprises at least three overlapping, but separable, constellations of traits:

• interpersonal deficits (such as grandiosity, arrogance and deceitfulness),
• affective deficits (lack of guilt and empathy, for instance),
• and impulsive and criminal behaviors (including sexual promiscuity and stealing).

Three Myths

Despite substantial research over the past several decades, popular misperceptions surrounding psychopathy persist. Here we will consider three of them.

1. All psychopaths are violent. Research by psychologists such as Randall T. Salekin, now at the University of Alabama, indicates that psychopathy is a risk factor for future physical and sexual violence. Moreover, at least some serial killers—for example, Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy and Dennis Rader, the infamous “BTK” (Bind, Torture, Kill) murderer—have manifested numerous psychopathic traits, including superficial charm and a profound absence of guilt and empathy.

   Nevertheless, most psychopaths are not violent, and most violent people are not psychopaths. In the days following the horrific Virginia Tech shootings of April 16, 2007, many newspaper commentators described the killer, Seung-Hui Cho, as “psychopathic.” Yet Cho exhibited few traits of psychopathy: those who knew him described him as markedly shy, withdrawn and peculiar.

   Regrettably, the current (fourth, revised) edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Text Revision (DSM-IV-TR), published in 2000, only reinforces the confusion between psychopathy and violence. It describes a condition termed antisocial personality disorder (ASPD), which is characterized by a longstanding history of criminal and often physically aggressive behavior, referring to it as synonymous with psychopathy. Yet research demonstrates that measures of psychopathy and ASPD overlap only moderately.

2. All psychopaths are psychotic. In contrast to people with psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia, who often lose contact with reality, psychopaths are almost always rational. They are well aware that their ill-advised or illegal actions are wrong in the eyes of society but shrug off these concerns with startling nonchalance.

   Some notorious serial killers referred to by the media as psychopathic, such as Charles Manson and David Berkowitz, have displayed pronounced features of psychosis rather than psychopathy. For example, Manson claimed to be the reincarnation of Jesus Christ, and Berkowitz believed he was receiving commands from his neighbor Sam Carr’s dog (hence his adopted nickname “Son of Sam”). In contrast, psychopaths are rarely psychotic.

3. Psychopathy is untreatable. In the popular HBO series The Sopranos, the therapist (Dr. Melfi) terminated psychotherapy with Tony Soprano because her friend and fellow psychologist persuaded her that Tony, whom Dr. Melfi concluded was a classic psychopath, was untreatable. Aside from the fact that Tony exhibited several behaviors that are decidedly nonpsychopathic (such as his loyalty to his family and emotional attachment to a group of ducks that had made his swimming pool their home), Dr. Melfi’s pessimism may have been unwarranted. Although psychopaths are often unmotivated to seek treatment, research by psychologist Jennifer Skeem of the University of California, Irvine, and her colleagues suggests that psychopaths may benefit as much as nonpsychopaths from psychological treatment. Even if the core personality traits of psychopaths are exceedingly difficult to change, their criminal behaviors may prove more amenable to treatment.

Psychopathy reminds us that media depictions of mental illness often contain as much fiction as fact. Moreover, widespread misunderstandings of such ailments can produce unfortunate consequences—as Tony Soprano discovered shortly before the television screen went blank.

Selected comments

jkpsych

I applaud your thoughtful consideration of an often misunderstood set of behavioral symptoms. However, there has historically been recognized a clinical differentiation between sociopathy (characterized by superficial charm, narcissism, and a lack of empathy) and the more problematic psychopathy (characterized by the aforementioned symptoms, plus aggressive and predatory behavior). Unfortunately, such a distinction has been ostensibly lost in recent clinical training. This distinction among antisocial presentations is important to acknowledge. Whereas sociopathy may not be recognized in many individuals, psychopathy can be expected to certainly take a larger societal toll.

jasciu

Dr Kaufman brings up a useful distinction in understanding the causes of such behavior. Poor impulse control combined with inadequate self esteem or lower social standing is enough to create sociopathic behavior. Whereas, the sociopath response is more grounded in reality of their social standing and past history the psychopath creates greater perceived threats through imagination - hence the greater violence.

AnnieUK :

I am the mother of a 20 year old psychopath. Living with this kind of behavior has all but destroyed me and the family bonds are very strained. It is not an easy thing to handle, and I suppose admit to, and the family has taken all of 20 years to listen to me. Now they have all finally woken up and are paying attention. Trying to keep everyone talking while trying to keep him alive because of his total lack of remorse or fear, is a full time job.

Ripon :

I understand, but you as a mother have reached the first level of understanding " Recognition of the Psychopath". What ever has happened in the past can now be viewed thru clear eye's.

Generally, the first degree female family members are a big part of the problem, by choosing not to see the problem, making excuse's and arguing with everyone that recognizes the Psychopath for who and what they are, unfeeling manipulators of everyone they come in contact with in their day to day life. If you have openly addressed the problem with your son, with other family members present, that you have started to really address the problem child or bad seed.

Anything less than a direct approach is a waste of time, and still without resolve by you , there is no good answer. The Psychopath must have a victim at all times, other wise they are not happy, with themselves.

When they are unhappy and not manipulating someone, they will begin to ask or question themselves , and possibly but not likely to seek help. The critical point is to warn off victims before they can totally become victimized.

JamesG287

Dr. Kaufman, narcissistic personality features and lack of empathy in particular are what would facilitate aggressive and predatory behavior. In serial domestic abusers, I have found that with the exception of cases where delusional or psychotic symptoms were seen, at least three of the five following characteristics were almost invariably present:

1. self-centeredness,
2. lack of empathy,
3. exaggerated sense of entitlement,
4. jealousy,
5. and an inability to accept responsibility for one's actions.

Those traits facilitate aggression, abuse, exploitation, and deception.

The so-called distinction between sociopathy and psychopathy is ridiculous and based on absolutely nothing of substance. The same could be said of so-called secondary psychopathy because such people are merely products of their environment and do not necessarily suffer from a psychological disorder, whereas psychopaths (real ones) have differences in how their brains process information that could only be hereditary.

Levalle

I believe my husband is a psychopath. He angers very easily, for the simplest reasons. He has been in numerous relationships. He only can stay committed to a person no longer than eight years, and he then becomes bored. He lies about everything, I can't tell when he is truthful or not. I've constantly found condoms or phone numbers of various women. His reply is that these are his friends. It seems he looks for certain women that will further his social or economical status.

I am a school teacher, and for some reason he targeted me. I believe he assumed that I had more financial security. My previous husband was financial secure, which enabled me to do more with my own money. Everything that we own, I have purchased it in my name. I feel that when the relationship has not reached the financial status he desires, he looks for another one to put him in that status. I am very angry for being used and not loved. I feel that he is a great manipulator! Do you have any advice

[Oct 12, 2010] Inside the Mind of a Psychopath

Psychopaths are likable guys when they want to be.

Scientific American

Neuroscientists are discovering that some of the most cold-blooded killers aren't bad. They suffer from a brain abnormality that sets them adrift in an emotionless world

The word “psychopath” conjures up movie images of brutal, inexplicable violence: Jack Nicholson chasing his family with an ax in The Shining or Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter, his face locked into an armored mask to keep him from biting people to death. But real life offers another set of images, that of killers making nice: Ted Bundy as law student and aide to the governor of Washington State, and John Wayne Gacy as the Junior Chamber of Commerce’s “Man of the Year.” Psychopaths are likable guys when they want to be.

Between the two of us, we have interviewed hundreds of prison inmates to assess their mental health. We are trained in spotting psychopaths, but even so, coming face to face with the real article can be electrifying, if also unsettling. One of the most striking peculiarities of psychopaths is that they lack empathy; they are able to shake off as mere tinsel the most universal social obligations. They lie and manipulate yet feel no compunction or regrets — in fact, they don’t feel particularly deeply about anything at all.

[Oct 12, 2010] Cross-check Are war crimes caused by bad apples or bad barrels by John Horgan

Oct 4, 2010

When soldiers commit atrocities, we must ask why. The question is being raised once again by reports that a handful of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan carried out premeditated killings—murders—of Afghan civilians. The soldiers allegedly took photographs of themselves posing with corpses and body parts, including fingers and heads.

The alleged ringleader is Sergeant Calvin Gibbs. In an interrogation video leaked to CNN, Specialist Adam Winfield, a member of Gibbs's platoon, said that Gibbs "likes to kill things. He is pretty much evil incarnate. I mean, I have never met a man who can go from one minute joking around, then mindless killings."

Military officials invariably blame these sorts of atrocities on "bad apples." That was the phrase that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld used to describe American guards accused of abusive behavior at Abu Ghraib prison in 2004.

Some evidence supports the bad-apples theory of atrocities. In a previous post, I cited a report by two psychiatrists that after 60 days of continuous combat, 98 percent of World War II infantrymen suffered from psychiatric illness, with some succumbing to a near-catatonic "vegetative phase." But 2 percent of the soldiers, far from being traumatized by intense, prolonged combat, enjoyed it. The psychiatrists diagnosed these soldiers with "aggressive psychopathic personalities."

Dave Grossman, a former professor of psychology at West Point and Army lieutenant colonel, acknowledged in his 1995 book On Killing (Little, Brown, 1995) that a small number of men—whom he called "the two percent who like it"—can "kill without regret or remorse." According to Grossman, these men may be excellent soldiers when competently trained and supervised, but they are also more likely than other men to use excessive force and commit atrocities.

The description above of someone joking one minute and killing the next sounds like textbook psychopathy. In "Inside the Mind of a Psychopath," in the September/October issue of Scientific American MIND, the neuroscientists Kent Kiehl and Joshua Buckholtz stated that psychopaths "are guilty of the most erratic and irresponsible, sometimes destructive and violent behavior," for which they "feel no compunction or regrets." Psychopaths, who comprise as much as 35 percent of U.S. prisoners, seem incorrigible; they may behave worse after treatments such as group psychotherapy, Kiehl and Buckholtz said, because "insights into others' vulnerabilities become opportunities to hone their manipulation skills."

Today, some psychiatrists prefer the terms "sociopathy" or "antisocial personality disorder" to psychopathy. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, antisocial personality disorder is characterized by extreme aggression, lack of empathy for others, lack of remorse for one's actions—and, not surprisingly, a propensity for violent crime. The manual estimates that 3 percent of all males have the disorder, which is suggestively close to the "two percent who like it." The disorder is much less common among women.

A British study of school-age twins published in 2005 [pdf] suggests that psychopathy has a strong genetic component. Teacher surveys revealed psychopathic tendencies (including antisocial behavior and "callous-unemotional traits") in 234 children—all less than 10 years old—out of a total of 3,687 pairs of twins, or roughly 3 percent. If one identical twin was psychopathic, the other was much more likely to be so; the concordance between fraternal twins was smaller.

In Final Solutions (Cornell, 2005), the political scientist Benjamin Valentino asserted that small percentages of men caused much of the slaughter of the 20th century. "The impetus for mass killing usually originates from a relatively small group of powerful leaders and is often carried out without the active support of broader society," Valentino stated. This pattern was true of mass killings in the Soviet Union, China, Cambodia, the Balkans, Guatemala and elsewhere.

Similarly, the biologist Barbara Oakley argued in Evil Genes (Prometheus, 2007) that Hitler, Stalin, Mao Zedong and other notorious tyrants displayed symptoms of psychopathy. Oakley concluded that they were "born to be bad." But in her 1963 essay on the Nuremberg trials, Hannah Arendt noted that psychiatric evaluations of Nazi mass murderers such as Adolf Eichmann suggested that they were "neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal." Arendt attributed Eichmann's crimes to "circumstances that make it well-nigh impossible for him to know or feel that he is doing wrong." Arendt was rejecting the bad-apple theory and blaming "circumstances" for the Holocaust.

This conclusion was corroborated by famous experiments carried out in the 1960s by the psychologist Stanley Milgram. The son of Jewish immigrants, Milgram devised his experiments in part as a reaction to the Nuremberg trials, which left him wondering about the motivation of Eichmann and other Nazis. In Milgram's experiments—the details of which are still chilling—subjects were told that they were participating in a test of another person's learning ability. The "learners" were actually actors in cahoots with Milgram.

The subject read pairs of words to the learner—who was in an adjoining room and could be heard but not seen by the subject—and then tested his ability to remember the pairings. Each time the learner failed to remember a pairing, the scientist, who was in the same room as the subject, ordered him to give the learner a stronger electric shock. As the shocks increased, the learner reacted with audible distress, crying out in pain, banging on the wall or even claiming that he was about to have a heart attack. After a certain point, the learner would fall silent.

Of course, the learner was pretending to be shocked. If the subject hesitated to deliver stronger shocks, the scientist insisted that the subject continue, adding that he would not be held responsible for anything that happened to the learner. Only if the subject resisted four successive commands from the scientist was the experiment stopped. Otherwise the experiment continued until the subject had administered a "shock" of 450 volts to the learner.

Before the experiment, Milgram asked several dozen psychiatrists to predict the results; the average guess was that only 1 percent of the subjects, those with sadistic tendencies, would deliver the strongest shock. But in Milgram's initial experiment 26 out of 40 subjects, or almost two-thirds, administered what they believed to be the strongest, life-threatening shock. Only one subject refused to continue the experiment before reaching the 300-volt level. Versions of Milgram's experiment have been repeated in the U.S. and elsewhere with similar results.

In 1974 Milgram spelled out the implications of his research: "The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study and the fact most urgently demanding explanation. Ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority."

In 1971 the psychologist Philip Zimbardo, Milgram's former classmate at a New York City high school, carried out the so-called Stanford Prison Experiment, which has become almost as renowned as Milgram's work. Zimbardo created a mock prison in which Stanford students played the roles of either prisoners or guards. The "guards" quickly became so abusive—and the "prisoners" so distressed—that Zimbardo had to discontinue the experiment. Some of the guards' abusive acts—which included forcing prisoners to strip and to engage in simulated homosexual intercourse—were strikingly similar to acts perpetrated more than three decades later by American soldiers against Iraqis held in the Abu Ghraib prison.

This research suggests that human aggression and cruelty stem less from the "disposition" of individuals than from their environment, or "situation," Zimbardo argued in The Lucifer Effect (Random House, 2008). Studies of modern suicide bombers, torturers and war criminals, Zimbardo wrote, have revealed that many are, in Arendt's words, "terrifyingly normal." People behave badly not because they are bad apples but because they are in "bad barrels," situations that encourage brutality. War is the ultimate bad barrel. "In all wars, at all times, in every country, wars transform ordinary, even good men into killers," Zimbardo stated.

In War of the World: History's Age of Hatred (Penguin, 2007), the British historian Niall Ferguson described how combatants in World Wars I and II became consumed with hatred for their opponents. As a result, even Americans and British soldiers, the putative good guys, engaged in escalating atrocities, including bombing civilians, torturing and killing prisoners and mutilating the dead. This emotion-fueled descent into brutality is an inevitable consequence of the bad barrel of war.

If genocide, war crimes and other atrocities were all perpetrated by a few bad apples born with bad genes, we could perhaps identify them through genetic testing and sequester them from the rest of us good, decent, peaceful folk. If only things were that easy.

Photograph of 1968 massacre in My Lai, Vietnam, courtesy of Wiki Commons

Mims 11:59 AM 10/4/10Also relevant: the 2001 documentary Japanese Devils.

http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/04/07/japan.devils/index.html 

The film is basically about how conditioning soldiers to believe that their opponents are sub-human encourages them to commit atrocities against their enemies. Some of the accounts (from former soldiers themselves) are truly gruesome.

In the same vein, but involving U.S. soldiers in Vietnam: Winter Soldier

http://www.wintersoldierfilm.com/

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 2. candide 12:20 PM 10/4/10How about the OBVIOUS: war crimes are caused by .... WAR.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 3. Chrisstephen 02:29 PM 10/4/10Having reported from numerous wars, I think the conclusion is spot on. For some soldiers, killing seems to be a pleasure. The vast majority try to balance following orders with staying alive. In an environment where their job is to kill the enemy and killing is normal, the line between legitimate and illegitimate killing is blurred. The onus is on the supervising commanders to keep all this in check.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 4. WRQ9 03:36 PM 10/4/10I cannot agree with the findings of tests like the Milgram test mentioned because, in my experience, it has been under a perceived threat that people behave this way. Most people will pretend to behave in an acceptable manner no matter how wrong it feels to do so. It is in the presentation of circumstance that bias is introduced. I do not either believe in the 2%-3% figure involving war criminals, as I believe in the prevalence of cover up in these circumstances, and the pragmatism of not being found out in general. The 2%to3% represent to me, a percentage so driven that once they are allowed to commit a murder for example, they are unable to put the genie back in the bottle. The line must be drawn where no possible repercussions are perceived, as when no witness is available or such circumstance to provide a true reflection. Many people are secretly glad to be in a unit with a man like Gibbs because they are allowed to stop pretending and not risk the same level of stigma as the Gibbses. In my informal study of "sociopathy", it seems like about a third of people have a palpable emotional response, a third have a response and suppress it, and fully a third have no response at all. These numbers I don't feel vary as much in males to females as is indicated, but again cultural necessity skews the findings. Although I agree that genetics is a strong predictor of this tendency, other factors can play a significant role in determining the degree of evidence of such leanings. Drug abuse childhood abuses and combinations of other extreme circumstances can inspire differences in scale, either way. I reach these finding by regarding the context and value in circumstance in life to be a constant within the species, and the perception of equality to be assumed. Cheaters oppress, and the willingness to oppress often reflects sociopathic tendencies. In fact, the intended suppression of any faction or individual for any cause save the actual greater good of society, reflects such tendencies. It is the impossibility of proof, given the complexity of human the psyche which leads us time and time again to the same pitfalls. If these people were so alone in culture, they could hardly be considered socially driven in any way. Influence is a form of violence to some, and the relative subtlety doesn't change the paradigm.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 5. JamesDavis 03:42 PM 10/4/10People like Sergeant Calvin Gibbs are needed in wars because it is people like them that brings the war to an end. The more cruel the killings, the faster the war ends or the faster the people give up. You have this in every war because there is a Sergeant Gibbs in every war and Sergeant Gibbs is born with this trait and it comes to light in war. If there is no war, people like Sgt. Gibbs would more than likely become a serial killer or an incredible hunter. In war or not in war, these people have to kill the same way a painter has to paint...they are needed.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 6. TTLG 04:41 PM 10/4/10I am somewhat skeptical of studies like Milgram's which rely on the subjects being fooled by actors. My experience is that most people are much better at detecting this sort of deceit than most actors are are fooling people. For example, just look at how much bad acting there is in Hollywood movies, which have access to the largest pool of actors in the world. If these guys cannot get believable actors, how can psych experimenters? I would not be surprised if a significant amount of people's behavior in these experiments is due to their not entirely believing (either consciously or not) that the situation they are in is real, due to the behavior of the supposed victim or the person giving them orders.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 7. gesimsek 06:20 PM 10/4/10It is an excellent article. Stanford experiment reminds me fraternity entrance tests. Unfortunately, as long as human beings are raised to prove themselves by inflicting damage upon themselves and others, this vicious circle will continue.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 8. imipak 08:20 PM 10/4/10JamesDavis' view that wars end quickly with extreme cruelty is the precise opposite of the view held by Sun Tzu who admonished against excess. It is also contrary to the view of Miyamoto Musashi, who stated that one should never repeat a method, lest it becomes predictable and a weakness.

Since "Art of War" and "Book of Five Rings" are recognized as excellent guides on how to win but no blogger has yet to achieve such repute, I'll side with expert opinion and say Sergeant Gibbs is not the way to win but is actually the way to lose.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 9. tombaxter 09:18 PM 10/4/10I'd like to think I would not have pull the trigger like a handful didn't at My Lai. But even if I didn't shoot, I know I would have never reported it as I didn't report other war crimes I saw. We weren't dealing with people. We were dealing with g**ks and "What is the value of one mere g**k?" It's the same as a Hajji, etc. I hope I will commit suicide before I become a Kapo.

Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this 10. HoboTraveler.com 01:39 AM 10/5/10I have traveled perpetually for 12 years, and visited 88 countries. It is normal for me to live with people who speak a different language than me, this is a more instinctual way of living.

I also observe many tourist and travelers outside the social norms of home.

Yes, for sure 2-3 percent of people feel no guilt.

However, the assumption I feel is wrong, is that we somehow imbue humans with introspection. I do not feel that 50 percent of Humans take the feelings of others into consideration. I believe what we often see as empathy is only a self-serving desire to get reward from the group.

People generally are cows, with an alpha male instructing them what to do, this idea of morality of the individual is truly just fear of social norms being enforced and mass confusion causing mental problems. Overwhelming confusion, incongruence of beliefs to me is mental illness.

People generally do not want to hurt people, but if there is a group desire, or a easy to recognize benefit, with no danger, they will do so without thought.

Andy Graham of HoboTraveler.com in Cote d'Ivoire, West Africa 2010

[Aug 20, 2010] At the top, you can only look down by Cardiff Garcia

Aug 20, 2010 | ft.com

It’s approaching happy hour at Chez FT Alphaville, so we hope you don’t mind if we finish the week on a lighter topic (as we sometimes do).

We draw your attention to a recent article about the psychology of power in the pages of our mortal enemy fierce rival formidable competitor the Wall Street Journal, by science writer Jonah Lehrer.

Lehrer explores a concept called the Paradox of Power, which he summarises thus:

The very traits that helped leaders accumulate control in the first place all but disappear once they rise to power. Instead of being polite, honest and outgoing, they become impulsive, reckless and rude. In some cases, these new habits can help a leader be more decisive and single-minded, or more likely to make choices that will be profitable regardless of their popularity.

One recent study found that overconfident CEOs were more likely to pursue innovation and take their companies in new technological directions. Unchecked, however, these instincts can lead to a big fall.

We know that Wall Street has its share of authoritarian bosses. What Lehrer’s article suggests is that not all of them were quite so accomplished as bastards while still on the way up.

We suppose that’s not really a surprising revelation: power tends to corrupt, etc..

But after discussing the myopia and lack of empathy that overtake people who reach the top of their organisations, Lehrer relates a suggestion from one psychologist for how this problem might be countered.

Given the passage of FinReg, the notion is at least timely:

There is no easy cure for the paradox of power. Mr. Keltner argues that the best treatment is transparency, and that the worst abuses of power can be prevented when people know they’re being monitored. This suggests that the mere existence of a regulatory watchdog or an active board of directors can help discourage people from doing bad things.

However, people in power tend to reliably overestimate their moral virtue, which leads them to stifle oversight. They lobby against regulators, and fill corporate boards with their friends. The end result is sometimes power at its most dangerous.

It’s interesting to think that even if, say, a newly empowered regulatory body turns out to be ineffectual, its presence might nevertheless cause executives to be marginally more virtuous and considerate.

But we would add another point of skepticism to those made by Lehrer. According to the article, people in power only respect their equals, or other people with similar or higher power. Is it likely that an executive who has succumb to the worst effects of the paradox will come to view regulators this way?

Somehow, we doubt it.

Have a nice weekend.

Related links:
The Power Trip – WSJ
No, Steve, it’s not like when Hitler invaded Poland – FT Alphaville
A tragedy of hubris and nemesis – FT
Dick Fuld? Not a bad guy (and other contrarian takes on LEH) – FT Alphaville

[Aug 13, 2010] Identifying Psychopathic Fraudsters These Men Know ' Snakes in Suits' By Dick Carozza

To know about psychopaths is especially important to 401K investors and, especially, to baby boomers. Such types often surface in financial scams that target seniors...

July 2008 | www.fraud-magazine.com

Interview with Dr. Robert D. Hare and Dr. Paul Babiak

Not all psychopaths become fraudsters, but some fraudsters are psychopaths. A fraud examiner's job is to help deter fraud by discretely noticing those employees who might be exhibiting psychopathic tendencies. Psychologists Robert D. Hare, Ph.D., and Paul Babiak, Ph.D., experts in psychopath studies, explain how these aberrant characters can infect organizations and provide ways to deal with them.

Sam strode into the lobby of Bacme Manufacturing. Impeccably dressed in a tailored suit, carrying a burnished leather briefcase, he smiled at the receptionist. "Hello. I'm Sam Smithson, here to see Mr. Tolliver for my second interview." "Yes, Mr. Smithson. Mr. Tolliver is ready to see you." Eyes turned as Sam walked up the stairs.

"Sam! So good to see you!" "It's great to be here again, Mr. Tolliver!" During the national economic downturn, Bacme was suffering and needed a few "white knights." Sam had the requisite resume, leadership qualities, and enthusiastic spirit the company needed to boost morale and the bottom line as a vice president.

Unfortunately, Mr. Tolliver didn't know that Sam was a textbook psychopath. Behind his smile and relaxed manner, he was dishonest, devious, and manipulative. He pretended to be an empathetic listener, but most of the time he had only one person on his mind.

Within a year, Sam had ingratiated himself to staffers who could benefit him: top executives but also the "informal leaders" - middle managers and administrative assistants who got the real work done. Soon he was controlling vast areas of the company and began embezzling funds. By the time the corporation realized it was missing millions of dollars, smiling Sam, "the white knight," was on to the next corporation.

Not all psychopaths become fraudsters, but some fraudsters are psychopaths. A fraud examiner's job is to help deter fraud by discretely noticing those employees who might be exhibiting psychopathic tendencies.

Robert D. Hare, Ph.D. and Paul Babiak, Ph.D., authors of "Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work" (available in the ACFE Bookstore), have been studying psychopaths and their effects for years. Babiak is an industrial and organizational psychologist and president of HRBackOffice, an executive coaching and consulting firm specializing in management development and succession planning (www.HRBackOffice.com). Hare, the creator of the standard tool for diagnosing psychopathy and author of "Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among us," is an emeritus professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia and president of Darkstone Research Group, a forensic research and consulting firm (www.hare.org).

"Psychopaths invest energy in creating and maintaining a facade that facilitates their careers," said Hare. "During the hiring process they convince decision makers of their unique talents and abilities - albeit based upon lies and distortion.

"Executives are always looking for the best and brightest ... but there are not that many from which to choose," Hare said. "As times goes on, the psychopath will continue to manage this positive reputation for as long as it is useful to him or her. ... Executives view themselves as good judges of people, and few want to be told that they were wrong about something as basic as honesty and integrity. This aspect of human nature works in favor of the psychopath."

Hare will be a keynote speaker at the 19th Annual ACFE Fraud Conference & Exhibition in Boston in July. He spoke to Fraud Magazine from his home in Vancouver, B.C., and Babiak from his home in Dutchess County, N.Y.

Do you believe that most fraudsters are psychopaths or do they just exhibit anti-social behavior?

Hare: There are many reasons why people engage in fraudulent behavior, some related to economic necessity, cultural, social, and peer pressures, special circumstances, opportunities, and so forth. Many of these people are small-time criminals just "doing their job," and their victims are relatively few in number. Much more problematic are fraudsters whose activities reflect a virulent mix of personality traits and behaviors including grandiosity; sense of entitlement; a propensity to lie, deceive, cheat, and manipulate; a lack of empathy and remorse; an inability to develop deep emotional and social connections with others; and the view that others are merely resources to be exploited - callously and without regret.

These white-collar psychopaths often are heavily involved in obscenely lucrative scams of every sort. They lead lavish lifestyles while their victims lose their life savings, their dignity, and their health - a financial death penalty as one law enforcement officer put it. The public and the courts have difficulty in appreciating the enormity of the damage done by these social predators, and because their crimes often do not involve direct physical violence, they may receive comparatively light fines and sentences, and early parole. The money obtained from their depredations is seldom recovered, leaving the victims and the public bewildered and convinced that crime certainly does pay when committed by those whose charm, egocentricity, and deception disguise a flabby conscience.

You've designed the "Psychopathy Checklist - Revised" (PCL-R), the standard tool for diagnosing psychopathy. Can you briefly describe its methodology and how it differs from other forms of measurement?

Hare: The PCL-R is a 20-item clinical construct rating scale for the assessment of psychopathy in forensic populations. Qualified professionals use interview and detailed file/collateral information to score each item on 3-point scales (0, 1, 2) according to the extent to which an individual matches explicit criteria for the item. The resulting total scores can vary from 0 to 40 and reflect the extent to which the individual matches the "prototypical psychopath." One derivative of the PCL-R, the Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version (PCL: SV), often is used in community and civil psychiatric research on psychopathy. It has 12 items, with total scores that can vary from 0 to 24. The items in each instrument are grouped into the same four factors or dimensions, each of which contributes to the measurement of psychopathy. For example, the items in the PCL: SV dimensions are: Interpersonal (Superficial, Grandiose, Deceitful); Affective (Lacks remorse, Lacks empathy, Doesn't accept responsibility for own behavior); Lifestyle (Impulsive, Lacks goals, Irresponsibility); Antisocial (Poor behavioral controls, Adolescent antisocial behavior, Adult antisocial behavior). The PCL-R and the PCL: SV are strongly related to one another, both conceptually and empirically and have much the same psychometric, explanatory, and predictive properties. Because of their demonstrated reliability and validity, they are widely used in basic and applied research on psychopathy and for clinical and forensic evaluations.

The personality disorder measured by the PCL-R is similar to antisocial personality disorder (ASPD), described in the American Psychiatric Association's DSM-IV. The difference is that the PCL-R places considerable emphasis on the interpersonal and affective traits associated with psychopathy, whereas ASPD is defined more by antisocial behaviors. As a result, ASPD fails to capture the traditional construct of psychopathy and is much more prevalent in community and forensic populations than is psychopathy.

Self-report personality inventories also are used for the assessment of psychopathic traits and behaviors. The information provided by these instruments reflects the individual's self-understanding and evaluation, what he or she is willing to disclose to others, and impression management. It may be difficult to obtain accurate self-reports of affective experiences associated with psychopathic tendencies. Further, self-report measures of psychopathy are only moderately correlated with the PCL-R and its derivatives. Nonetheless, they provide useful information from the individual's perspective, and contribute to our understanding of the psychopathy construct, particularly in the general population. One derivative of the PCL-R is the B-Scan or Business Integrity Scan, which includes both a self-report version and a supervisor's rating version. We developed the scan out of our experiences with, and research on, the lack of integrity and honesty of corporate psychopaths. Although not a clinical measure of psychopathy, it is designed to tap into the behaviors, attitudes and judgments relevant to ethical business practices.

You've written that many people, after reading or hearing you speak, begin wondering if their bosses and co-workers are psychopaths - or even themselves! I imagine all of us exhibit psychopathic traits at various times, but what are the prevailing characteristics that you believe a person must exhibit to actually be diagnosed as a psychopath? How do you distinguish a psychopath from a difficult person?

Hare: Television constantly describes the symptoms associated with an endless list of diseases, some real, some contrived. The viewer may have one of the symptoms of disease X, say a sore throat, and worry that he or she has the disease. But this symptom is shared by scores of conditions other than disease X, and sometimes a sore throat is simply a sore throat. What people don't take into account is that a given disease or medical condition is defined and diagnosed by a set of symptoms, a syndrome, and that one or two of the defining symptoms may be of little diagnostic value. One symptom does not a disease make, nor does being impulsive, egocentric, irresponsible, and so forth make someone a psychopath; difficult, perhaps, but not psychopathic.

Psychopathy is defined by having a heavy dose of the features that comprise the disorder. How heavy? Like blood pressure, the construct measured by the PCL-R and PCL: SV is dimensional. The threshold for "high blood pressure" or for a label of "hypertensive" is somewhat arbitrary, but typically falls in a range where there is increased risk to the individual's health. The threshold for "psychopathy" also is somewhat arbitrary, but generally is set rather high, at a level where the individual's manipulative, callous, egocentric, predatory, irresponsible, and remorseless behaviors begin to infringe upon the rights and safety of others. For example, researchers often adopt a PCL: SV score of 18 (out of 24) for "probable psychopathy," and a score of 13 for "possible psychopathy." To put this into context, the average PCL: SV score is less than 3 for samples from the general population, and around 13 for samples from forensic populations. Most of those in the general population receive a PCL: SV score of 0 or 1. So, even those who appear to exhibit a few psychopathic features would fall well below thresholds for possible or probable psychopathy. This does not mean that such individuals are saint-like; they could still be very "difficult" for reasons other than psychopathy. Their values, beliefs, or personal style may not be appealing to us, but they may be honest, have integrity, experience emotions at a real level, and contribute to the success of the organization. These "difficult" people also can make sincere efforts to moderate their attitudes and behaviors so as to fit more comfortably into the corporate culture or social norms of their work group. Psychopaths, on the other hand, lack integrity, are dishonest and manipulative, and do not experience deep-seated emotions. They may go through the motions of change in order to achieve their goals, but it will be little more than play-acting. Like Iago in Shakespeare's Othello, psychopaths can be "good" or "bad," depending on what is likely to work best at the time.

What do psychopaths want? What are their motivations?

Hare: They want many of the same basic things that the rest of us want, but, in addition, have an inordinate need for power, prestige, wealth, and so forth. They differ from most of us in terms of how much they "need," their sense of entitlement to whatever they want, and the means with which they are willing to achieve their ends. They also differ dramatically from others in the communal nature of their needs and goals. That is, the sense of altruism, concern for the welfare of family, friends, and society, and the social rules, expectations, and reciprocity that guide most people are irrelevant to psychopaths. They operate according to their own self-serving principle: look out for number 1, no matter what the cost to others, and without guilt or remorse.

Do psychopaths feel emotions and respond to emotions in others?

Hare: The emotional life of psychopaths lacks the range and depth found in most individuals. It often is described as shallow and barren, consisting mostly of "proto-emotions," somewhat primitive responses associated with their own needs and experiences. Their displays of anger, hostility, envy, and response to frustration are likely to be much more intense and genuine than their feelings of empathy, love, shame, and sorrow. While at times they may appear cold and unemotional, they are prone to dramatic, shallow, and short-lived displays of feeling. They are able to mimic emotions rather convincingly, but an astute observer may be left with the impression that they are play-acting and that little is going on below the surface. This, of course, raises an interesting question. If their own emotional life is relatively barren how are they so adept at "reading" and responding to the emotions of other people? The answer seems to be that they have learned that what others describe as a given emotional state is reflected in a distinct pattern of verbal cues and body language. Psychopaths are able to use this information to intuit an emotional state that they don't really understand. In this sense, they are like a color-blind person who "recognizes" color because of the context in which it occurs (the red light is at the top of the traffic signal) and therefore gives the appearance of color perception. However, no amount of training and practice will allow the color-blind person to really understand color or the psychopath to really understand the emotional life of others, except in a vague intellectual, inferential sense. To put it simply, they don't know how you feel, nor do they much care.

You've written that some researchers have said that psychopaths "know the words but not the music." What does that mean?

Hare: It means that psychopaths understand the denotative, dictionary meanings of words but do not fully appreciate their connotative, emotional meaning. Their language is only "word deep," lacking in emotional coloring. Saying "I love you" or "I'm truly sorry" has about as much emotional meaning as saying "have a nice day." This lack of emotional depth in language is part of their more general poverty of affect as described by clinicians and observed in neuroimaging studies.

What are the differences between psychopaths, sociopaths, and those with narcissistic personality or histrionic personality disorders?

Hare: The terms psychopathy and sociopathy refer to related but not identical conditions. Psychopaths have a pattern of personality traits and behaviors not readily understood in terms of social or environmental factors. They are described as without conscience and incapable of empathy, guilt, or loyalty to anyone but themselves. Sociopathy is not a formal psychiatric condition. It refers to a pattern of attitudes, values, and behaviors that is considered antisocial and criminal by society at large, but seen as normal or necessary by the subculture or social environment in which it developed. Sociopaths may have a well-developed conscience and a normal capacity for empathy, guilt, and loyalty, but their sense of right and wrong is based on the norms and expectations of their subculture or group.

Many criminals might be described as sociopaths.

Narcissistic and histrionic personality disorders are described in DSM-IV, and their differences from psychopathy are outlined in "Snakes in Suits."

• Briefly, narcissistic personality disorder involves an excessive need for admiration, a sense of superiority and entitlement, and a lack of empathy. It does not necessarily include the lifestyle and antisocial features of psychopathy, outlined earlier.
• Histrionic personality disorder is defined by excessive and overly dramatic emotionality, attention-seeking, and a strong need for approval. It lacks the lifestyle and antisocial features of psychopathy.

Do we have research that indicates that a person is a psychopath because of genetics, the environment, or both? If it's partially environmental, what could happen to a person so he or she develops into a psychopath?

Hare: All personality traits are the result of genetic-environmental interactions. Recent research in behavioral genetics indicates that callous-unemotional traits and antisocial tendencies, likely precursors to the dimensions of psychopathy described earlier, are highly heritable. There is no evidence that psychopathy can result solely from social or environmental influences. This doesn't mean that some people are destined to become psychopaths, only that the process of socialization is much more difficult for those with early indications of the precursors of the disorder.

Do male and female psychopaths practice their deceptions in different ways? If so, how?

Hare: There are many clinical accounts of female psychopaths but relatively little empirical research. The available evidence suggests that male and female psychopaths share similar interpersonal and affective features, including egocentricity, deceptiveness, shallow emotions, and lack of empathy. All will make maximum use of their physical attributes to deceive and manipulate others, but female psychopaths may be less prone than males to use overt, direct physical aggression to attain their ends. The term femme fatale comes to mind.

What are some ways that companies can screen out psychopaths during the interview and background check processes? This has to be extremely hard because psychopaths exhibit all the right qualities (and fake the rest) when companies are vetting them for jobs.

Babiak: Psychopaths make great first impressions and have extremely effective interviewing skills, so relying on employment interviews alone when making hiring decisions can lead an organization to make the wrong choice. The risk is increased by the use of untrained or inadequately trained interviewers who are unaware of the psychopath's skill at lying and deception, and therefore don't take the necessary extra steps to verify all information collected.

Improving one's chances of detecting psychopathic lying during the employment process requires verification of all details presented (knowledge, experience, expertise), and exploring and challenging discrepancies. Psychopaths talk a good game on a surface level, and will use technical jargon and glib, superficial charm to convince the interviewer of their experience and expertise. As much as possible, resume data should be checked before the interview. Then, by using structured interviewing techniques and multiple interviewers from different functions and levels in the organization, inconsistencies can be explored further and details drilled down.

It is critical that all interviewers get together to share their findings and impressions before an offer is made. During this important meeting, the discrepancies noted and possible deceptions will be uncovered. Relying on a group decision removes the psychopath's advantage in manipulating just one interviewer successfully.

Can you talk briefly about the "three personalities" that are within all of us?

Babiak: Deep down we all have a private experience of ourselves, our personality, which consists of our needs, values, emotions and so forth. This self-perception includes things we know about ourselves that we are comfortable sharing, other characteristics we wish to keep private, and even some parts that are unknown even to us. This is our inner or private personality. When we deal with others, though, we tend to limit the presentation of our personality to those things we like, are socially acceptable, and can positively influence those around us. This is our persona, or public self. We wear this mask in public. The third point of view of the personality is our reputation among those who know or interact with us; that is, our attributed personality.

In a business world, where "perception is reality," this last view of our personality - our reputation - is the most important. It influences how others will treat us and how decisions are made about us, and can ultimately foster or derail our careers. Unfortunately, many people are unaware of or discount this view of themselves. Sometimes it is only upon receipt of hard data, often in the form of "360-degree" feedback given during training programs, that they learn how others really perceive them.

The psychopath operates on the surface level, presenting a mask or persona that is in keeping with the expectations of the organization and its members. Typically, this mask is: "I am the ideal employee and leader."

The psychopath invests considerable effort creating and managing this facade through impression management techniques. Those who have power and authority will be shown only this mask - that is, the facade of an employee who is honest, productive, caring, with leadership potential, and so forth - and will integrate it into their evaluation of the psychopath - in effect, the psychopath's reputation. Those who are of little value to the psychopath will not receive such careful impression management, and may come to see the psychopath for who he or she really is. Unfortunately, however, they are often in positions least likely to influence the thinking of those in power.

In a nutshell, how do psychopaths judge the personalities of others?

Babiak: Psychopaths often come across as good psychologists, but in reality they are just more observant of others and are motivated to take advantage of the traits, characteristics, and personal situations of those around them. Psychopaths use the same three-part personality model to build strong relationships with others. They initially present a charming, charismatic mask, persona, which is often quite likeable. When they want to deepen the relationship (because the target has something they want), they first convince the target that they truly like him or her (that is, like his or her own persona or outward self). Then, they convince the target that they are more similar than different in many ways (including at the deep psychological level). Thirdly, they convince the target that they fully understand and accept the target's own true, private, and inner personality (the one with all of its secrets), and, therefore, because of this acceptance, they can be trusted. Finally, they convince the target that they (the psychopaths) are the ideal friend, partner, coworker, and so forth; this forms the "psychopathic bond." This bond is quite seductive, as few people reach this level of psychological intimacy with others in the work environment. Once this bond is formed, it is very difficult for the target to see the truth about the psychopath as he or she continues to be manipulated.

In business situations, do psychopaths target particular individuals? If so, what kinds of persons?

Babiak: Psychopaths are always on the lookout for individuals of whom they can take advantage. We often correctly assume that they target those with high status and power in the organization, but they also identify those with subtle, informal power in the organization. For example, many secretaries control access to their principals whom a psychopath will want to influence. Middle-level managers control the flow of materials, information, and processes that might prove useful to a psychopath. Individual contributors in professional positions (for example, those in IT, finance, and auditing), despite the lack of authority over staff, have great amounts of influence over information and other resources useful to the corporate psychopath. Any person with perceived utility to the psychopath will be targeted.

I know this is complex, but how are psychopaths able to manipulate people within an organization to be, as you call them, "pawns," and "patrons"?

Babiak: This model evolved out of our observations of how the "psychopathic drama" unfolds. It captures the theatrical nature of the psychopaths' view of organizational life. Psychopaths see themselves as the writers, directors, and producers of the dramas that are their lives - on and off their jobs; other people only exist to fulfill the supporting roles required of them - the pawns, and patrons.

Psychopaths form bonds with many people in the organization; that is, psychopathic bonds, not real ones. The psychopath views as pawns those who have the power, status, or access to desired resources, to be used until their utility is gone, and then dispensed with or even sacrificed. Patrons are those key power holders whom the psychopath relies upon for protection and defense when things get uncomfortable, much like the "mentors" or "godfathers" who exist in many large companies to assist high potentials negotiate their way through the political minefields to the top.

In addition, there is the patsy - a former pawn or patron whose organizational power and influence has been effectively neutralized by the psychopath. Finally, there are the organizational police, those in control positions such as accounting, HR, IT, and security who are in the best position to unseat the psychopath, but who often are not listened to by those in power, and who have already been trapped in the psychopathic bond. The psychopath prefers to avoid the organizational police (they tend to have ethical and professional values which are anathema to the psychopath), but having one in his or her vest pocket can be invaluable.

It makes sense that psychopaths would try to influence recognized top managers, but how do they manipulate and use "informal leaders," those who wield influence but might not be high on the organizational chart?

Babiak: While formal power holders are credited with leading their organizations, it is often a group of informal leaders who gets things done on a day-to-day basis. Unfortunately, in many companies, these informal leaders are the unsung heroes - and feel as such. What better person to convince that they have value and a friend in high places, as the psychopath moves up, than these individuals? They are the perfect targets from the up-and-coming psychopath's point of view.

How can a person avoid becoming ensnared in a one-sided relationship with a psychopath?

Babiak: Knowledge certainly is power in this case. It is important to learn as much as one can about psychopaths - their traits and characteristics, and how they operate. Furthermore, one should learn more about oneself, particularly those things that would make one attractive to a psychopath. These can include power and control of resources (formal and informal), as well as any psychological or emotional weak spots or hot buttons that can be used to unduly influence you. Psychopaths don't operate in a social vacuum, and those with whom they have worked or interacted can be valuable sources of information.

You've written that once psychopaths are within an organization, they revert to their natural three-phase behavior pattern - assessment, manipulation, and abandonment. Can you briefly describe those three steps? Can you also describe the ascension phase?

Babiak: In society, psychopaths exhibit a fairly consistent pattern of behavior. They identify targets (assessment phase), use them (manipulation phase), and dispense with them when their utility is used up (abandonment phase). In organizations, the abandonment phase is difficult to manage, as the psychopath cannot just move on, in the physical sense. This can lead to confrontations with former pawns who now feel like patsies. But the psychopath has already prepared for this, having spread disparaging information about these individuals - that is, "poisoned the water" - among those in positions of power. Those who ultimately confront a corporate psychopath often come to find themselves on the chopping block.

In some cases, psychopaths see opportunities to move up in the power hierarchies by unseating those who have mentored or protected them, their patrons, in the ultimate acts of betrayal. This form of ascension can be particularly rewarding to a psychopath who has played both the patron and other members of the organization.

Are most corporate and organizational psychopaths loners or do they sometimes team up with other psychopaths to pull off fraud schemes?

Babiak: Most of the individuals we have met have been "loners" in the sense of only thinking of themselves; however, they do surround themselves with supporters and followers to facilitate their activities. To the degree that the psychopath can get these naÔve supporters to believe that their actions are consistent with their own personal values, the game remains in play.

Occasionally, two psychopaths may work as a team in the same organization, at least for short periods. Inevitably, there will be a falling out: two stars is one too many. In one case, two corporate psychopaths worked in the same company but were in different divisions and rarely interacted. Historically, there may have been instances of psychopaths working together. One wonders who was "more" psychopathic: Joseph Stalin or his henchman, Lavrentiy Beria, chief of the secret police.

Have the Internet and other technological developments aided psychopaths?

Hare: Immeasurably! The Internet and technology have given psychopaths and other predators access to a virtually unlimited pool of potential victims. They can promote phony stocks, circulate crooked investment schemes, siphon off bank accounts, commit identity theft, and so forth, all with little risk to themselves. They also can promote themselves by constructing fake or greatly embellished Web sites and credentials in order to lure unsuspecting victims. In a very real sense, the Internet and associated technology represent a paradise on earth for fraudsters, with even better things to come.

The business world of the 1980s and 1990s went through startling changes after decades of relative stability in culture and procedures. And now we're in an economic slowdown or possible recession. Have these changes helped or hindered psychopaths in organizations?

Babiak: While economic slowdowns can lead to layoffs and plant closings, there is still the need for seasoned, experienced leaders who have the wherewithal to meet the challenge of recovery and turnaround. These individuals are rare. What a perfect scenario for the psychopath to enter as the "solution," replete with the skills (faked), abilities (faked), and background (faked) necessary to take over and makes things right.

There is also greater access to higher education in general than before, as well as questionable online degrees that can be bought and used by psychopaths to pad their resumes. Losing one's job no longer bears the stigma - or provokes as much concern - as it once did; layoffs and plant closings have left many truly stellar executives with gaps in their employment histories. Economic conditions can be a convenient explanation for short tenures listed on the resume. While a psychopath would be expected to blame the former boss's personality or colleagues' underhandedness for losing his or her job, a really clever one can feign some sadness at having to leave "a great job at a great company" due to economic conditions.

You've written that organizations have become more "psychopath friendly." What do you mean by that?

Babiak: The change of organizational structures from large and bureaucratic to lean, mean, and flat has inadvertently made companies more attractive to psychopaths (fewer rules) and, at the same time, easier to negotiate (faster progression). There is more opportunity for a motivated psychopath to stand out amongst his or her peers, less hoops to jump through, and shorter distances to the top. Changes in work values among employees have also facilitated entry by psychopaths. Many companies, initially puzzled by the demands of "younger" workers for large sign-on bonuses and promotions at least every two years, are beginning to accept this as part of a new work style that needs to be accommodated in some way. A young psychopath would fit in quite nicely in this culture.

You've written that you doubt that psychopathic individuals would be very successful in a highly structured traditional bureaucracy. Why is that?

Babiak: Bureaucracies, by design, are rule-bound structures. They are the result of a stage of organizational development in which companies attempt to systematize their operations in pursuit of consistency, quality, and productivity. An unfortunate outcome also is that they can become quite boring, slow to respond, and intolerant of creativity and innovation.

During the 1980s and 1990s, the speed required of businesses to maintain their positions, and perhaps grow market share, increased. This put a tremendous strain on organizational systems - the bureaucracy - as well as on employees and managers - the culture. The mantra became "do more, better, faster with less" - a difficult task, at best. In response to accelerated market demands, organizations began to jettison parts of their bureaucracy - policies and procedures - in the interest of speed. Entire levels of management were eliminated under the theory that communications would improve from top to bottom. Systems once thought to be helpful were eliminated or "reengineered" away. By eliminating those policies and procedures that could help uncover psychopathic behavior - formal performance appraisals are a good example - and systems that help prevent their hiring - structured employment practices - it became much easier for someone with psychopathic tendencies to slip in and look successful.

Unfortunately, this is where the psychopath has an advantage; these new structures are always in a state of flux and never reach the "ideal" state. We call them "transitional organizations" because the transitioning never ends. This frustrates and confuses those who have grown accustomed to the stability that large organizations used to provide. Being a thrill seeker by nature, the psychopath relishes the chaos. On a practical level, a constantly changing work environment provides the psychopath an endless source of new coworkers to target and many opportunities to move from project to project when boredom sets in.

Can you talk about how psychopathic fraudsters use affinity groups (religious, political, or social entities in which all members share common values or beliefs) to pull off their schemes?

Hare: We refer to these schemes as affinity fraud. They rely on the fact that members of an affinity group typically are very trusting of others who profess to share their values, beliefs, and interests. Those who are most adept at perpetrating affinity fraud are psychopaths who gain entry into the group by developing an acquaintance with a member who then introduces the fraudster as "one of us." The result is a "fox in the henhouse," with predictable results. Religious groups, are particularly vulnerable; belief in the inherent goodness of others and uncritical acceptance of professions of faith are tailor-made for an enterprising psychopath. Sadly, even after being victimized, many members of a group will refuse to face the truth, continuing to believe that the scamster is basically good at heart or that there must be a reason why he or she took advantage of the group. Even sophisticated members of financial and business groups - such as investment clubs - often are no match for the charm and seduction of a good-looking, well-dressed, and apparently well-connected psychopath. A suspicious view of newcomers might help but is no guarantee of immunity to infiltration by someone intent on doing the group harm. Even organizations that by their very nature are extremely cynical and suspicious - such as intelligence agencies and criminal gangs - cannot protect themselves completely from those who misrepresent their credentials, connections, and intentions.

Joseph Wells, the founder and chairman of the ACFE, has concentrated on teaching not just about fraudsters' actions but their psychological motivations and aberrations. How can a group like ours aid its members in spotting possible psychopaths and prevent them from transforming their behaviors into crimes?

Babiak: Increasing the professional standards and training of fraud examiners is a good foundation. Knowledge about the nature of psychopaths and of the strategies and tactics they use is important. Even so, it can be very difficult to spot them without detailed information from a variety of sources about their behavior and manipulations especially if you are the one being targeted. It is also important for examiners to understand themselves and how their own personality traits and vulnerabilities may play into the hands of a psychopath. A confidential "hot line" could be made available to members who have suspicions and need coaching and advice on how to proceed.

Are most psychopaths in organizations exposed or do they remain or go on to greater positions?

Babiak: With one exception, all of the psychopaths that we have studied are still in positions of authority in their companies. In some cases, they have risen within the ranks, and in others, they have solid positions from which they continue to use their organizations for personal gain. The one psychopath we studied who was fired ended up leaving with a sizeable financial package and a company car. He was hired by a competitor at a significantly greater salary. Unfortunately, in their effort to rid themselves of problems and to avoid embarrassment in front of corporate or financial communities, some organizations will cover up their messes and even write favorable letters of recommendation thus facilitating psychopaths' devious journeys up corporate ladders.

Since the publication of "Snakes in Suits," we have received an increased number of calls from executives, entrepreneurs, and principals who now suspect that someone on their staff - or even an equity partner - is a corporate psychopath. We see that awareness of the problem has increased, as has the willingness to take action to remove or otherwise deal with the problem person.

How does a fraud examiner identify possible psychopaths after they're hired? I imagine it's a sensitive issue to put the psychopath label on anybody, but how should a fraud examiner proceed to prevent a possible fraud or should they even try? Is it ever possible to discern the potential for fraud in a suspected psychopath?

Babiak: In business situations, it is rarely useful to label someone a psychopath; organizations can only respond to the overt behaviors of fraudsters and others. Suspecting that a client (or even a coworker) has psychopathic traits can help sensitize an examiner to search out and investigate subtle forms of lying and deceit. If the client is highly psychopathic, the odds are that some form of corporate misbehavior, perhaps fraud, is underway, but hidden from view. If inconsistencies and improprieties begin to surface, it is important that the examiner's focus remain on the facts of each case, as the psychopath will try to distract him or her through flattery, misdirection, questioning the examiner's competence or authority to investigate, and so forth.

What steps lead to the confrontation of a psychopath and how is it carried out? Can a psychopath ever be rehabilitated?

Hare: Like anyone suspected of corporate misbehavior or fraud, confrontation of a suspected psychopath should occur after all the facts have been obtained, verified, digested, and interpreted, and in accordance with corporate policies and due process. In addition, however, it is important to anticipate the potential reactions of the psychopath, which may include "plausible" indignation and denial, diffusion of blame and responsibility, appeals to a "higher" authority, verbal abuse, and threats of litigation. In such cases, it is essential to ensure that the case against the individual is factually and legally sound and to "stand one's ground."

A somewhat different tactic sometimes employed by those accused of misbehavior is to admit it, claim that the behavior was out of character, and solemnly pledge to change. However, when dealing with a suspected psychopath such tactics should be treated with a healthy dose of skepticism. There is little evidence that psychopaths can be, or even believe that they should be, rehabilitated. Their behavior reflects a well-established, stable personality structure. Most people have some insight into the motivations for their own behavior, and will accept that changes need to be made in order to be a good corporate citizen. Unfortunately, psychopaths already are aware of their own motivations, see little wrong with them, and do not believe they need to change. However, if they think that "rehabilitation" can serve their own selfish, pragmatic ends, then they are quite capable of playing the game, portraying themselves as a "saved" or "redeemed" sinner.

Dick Carozza is editor-in-chief of Fraud Magazine.

The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners assumes sole copyright of any article published on www.fraud-magazine.com or www.ACFE.com. ACFE follows a policy of exclusive publication. Permission of the publisher is required before an article can be copied or reproduced. Requests for reprinting an article in any form must be e-mailed to: FraudMagazine@ACFE.com.

[Aug 02, 2010] It’s time to sack job appraisals By Lucy Kellaway

Job appraisal is actually a tremendously powerful weapon in hands of psychopath.

July 11, 2010 | Financial Times

Last week an e-mail went round the office touting for suggestions on ways to improve our performance appraisal system. My suggestion is dead easy and dirt cheap: get rid of the whole thing and replace it with nothing at all.

Normally, if I have any bright ideas about how this newspaper could be managed better, I propose them in private. It is not seemly to wash the Financial Times’ dirty linen in public. Yet when it comes to appraisals, the linen of every other company is covered with much the same filthy stains as ours, and so there seems no shame in suggesting a mass outing to the launderette.

Over the past 30 years, I have been appraised three dozen times – as banker, journalist and non-executive director. I’ve lived through the craze for long, complicated forms. I’ve also survived the informal fashion in which appraisals are called “career chats” and where a bogus air of equality prevails. I’ve done appraisals across a table, on a sofa, even over a meal. I’ve had them à deux and à trois – with a facilitator in tow.

But never have I learnt anything about myself as a result. I have never set any target that I subsequently hit. Instead I always feel as if I am playing a particularly dismal game of charades, with three disadvantages over the traditional parlour game. There is no dressing-up box; there is no correct answer to guess and it isn’t remotely fun. The norm is a harrowing hour’s conversation during which you are forced to swallow an indigestible mix of praise and criticism referring to long-ago events, which leaves you demotivated and confused on the most basic question: am I doing a good job? The resulting form is then put on file, making you feel vaguely paranoid, even though you know from experience how much attention will be subsequently paid to it: none whatsoever.

At least I’ve only had to suffer one side of the process. I have never – thank goodness – had to appraise anyone else, which must be even more tiresome as you have to perform the same operation with each underling in turn, wearily letting people believe they are doing more or less okay, because it’s too tiring to drop the bombshell that they aren’t doing okay at all.

I have a friend in a large company who spends an entire month each year appraising her team. She says the system has been “improved” so that she no longer sorts people into “exceptional performers”, “good performers” and so on. Instead she works through a list of mysterious attributes – such as “leverages mastery” and “innovates holistically” – choosing three strengths and one development need (or weakness, as it was formerly known) for each.

She admits that this system – which applies to almost 100,000 people worldwide – is utterly idiotic. But when I suggest it be scrapped she looks shocked. “Out of the question,” she says. “That would be interpreted as us saying we don’t care about developing people.”

Not by everyone, it seems. Last week Samuel Culbert, a business school professor in California, went on US radio to say that all appraisal systems were total baloney. He thinks even less of them than I do. They were a throwback to the bad old days of management by objective, he said, and only persisted because they allow evil managers to hold employees down and because HR managers are like the KGB when it comes to hoarding information.

His alternative, which he describes in his new book Get Rid of the Performance Review, is that bosses and underlings should have regular, equal conversations during which the boss says things like: “What do you need from me to deliver what we are both on the firing line to produce?”

This is a fantastic idea. The only trouble is that it bears no relation to the world as I know it; managers don’t talk or think like that.

The most sinister thing about the current system is that it allows managers to delude themselves into thinking that they are managing their people.

With this delusion stripped away, some managers might take matters into their own hands. They might even start saying “that’s good” and “that’s not so good” at the only helpful time to say such things: when they have just happened. This sort of thing is called managing, and the beauty of it is that it makes formal appraisals quite unnecessary.

Even for those whose managers did nothing to fill the gap, there would still be a net gain from scrapping appraisals. Time and energy would be saved and the only two things lost would be cynicism and paranoia.

[Jul 24, 2010] Overpaying CEOs by Linda Beale

"Specifically, we claim that higher income inequality between executives and ordinary workers results in executives perceiving themselves as being all-powerful and this perception of power leads them to maltreat rank and file workers."

ataxingmatter

The Wall Street Journal reports today on a study by three academics on CEO pay. They are Streedhari Desai (Harvard), Jennifer George (Rice) and Arthur Brief (Utah), and their study is "When Executives Rake in Millions: Meanness in Organizations" (available on SSRN). Here's the abstract:

The topic of executive compensation has received tremendous attention over the years from both the research community and popular media. In this paper, we examine a heretofore ignored consequence of rising executive compensation. Specifically, we claim that higher income inequality between executives and ordinary workers results in executives perceiving themselves as being all-powerful and this perception of power leads them to maltreat rank and file workers. We present findings from two studies - an archival study and a laboratory experiment – that show that increasing executive compensation results in executives behaving meanly toward those lower down the hierarchy. We discuss the implications of our findings for organizations and offer some solutions to the problem.

Trends in this country are ominous.

• Wages for the middle class have stagnated, especially with the waning power of labor unions to demand an adequate share of corporate revenues (a result of the decades-long effort of neocons and multinational corporations to kill labor unions and make new unionization efforts in previously nonunionized industries very difficult through generous provisions for employer control and significant hurdles for union approval).
• The middle class has therefore depended more on debt than it should, a dependency that has been encouraged by the financialization of the economy and the hunger of the financial institutions and shadow banking system for "product" from which it can reap multiple layers of fees and excess profits. That easy flow of credit led directly to the financial crisis that caused the Great Recession.
• Meanwhile, those at the top have done well and those at the very top--the ultra rich in the top tier of corporate status and in the finance (and shadow finance) industry and its related hangers-on--have done exceedingly well by being able to keep a much larger share of the business profits for themselves.
• That inequality then has created a feedback cycle of disrespect for ordinary workers and greed for more profits and status and power that also led directly to the financial crisis that caused the Great Recession.
• And now we learn the capping blow (which common sense tells us anyway, given what we know about human nature and its frequent inability to handle the struggle between self-interest and altruism in ways that benefit all) those at the top who have been paying themselves exceedingly well (and their buddies when they serve on their boards of directors) are likely to treat their employees exceedingly poorly. Greed at the top goes along with meanness towards those considered "beneath" them.

[Jul 17, 2010] Economist's View In Finance We Distrust

Looks like higher level of inequality produced more sociopaths in upper echelons of power. That is really observable in financial industry. See also "The future of finance" a free ebook with entries by Adair Turner, Peter Boone and Simon Johnson among others: http://www.futureoffinance.org.uk/

sociophile:

According to the bestseller "The Sociopath Next Door" by former Harvard psychologist Martha Stout, 1 in 25 people are sociopaths. What does that mean? It's not anything like an internal struggle of conscience, a battle of good versus evil deep in the soul. It's much more frightening and diabolical than that. Similar to someone who is color blind being unable to see the colors red or green, a sociopath is unable to feel emotions like empathy, compassion or love. A sociopath could crush the skull of a puppy and feel nothing at all other than perhaps a passing sense of curiousity at best or, more villainously, a sense of sporting entertainment. After the first few million, I think it doubtful Bernie Madoff cared anything at all about the money. It was all about screwing the dumb suckers, taking it all from the pathetic little ants and getting away with it. I suspect that finance is an industry where the proportion of sociopaths in the population rises significantly greater than 1 in 25. Regulation may not be enough. The threat of harsh and lengthy prison sentences backed up by vigorous and vigilant prosecution may be in order.

K Ackermann :

I think the sociopath potential is in most people.

The police and the military have to train people to be able to aim a gun at another person and pull the trigger.

Some still never will, but for those that do, most report it gets easier the more they do it. Something gets shut off; it's not something missing or extra, it's just shut off.

Bruce Wilder :

Big bonuses tend to attract and/or train sociopaths.

Mbuna said...

Well, let's get to the heart of the problem. Teaching ethics and having it stick only occurs in a cultural circumstance. Certainly in the past (50 years ago let's say) there was a pretty clear delineation between what was right and ethical and what was not. The basis for such ethics of right and wrong was the Judeo-Christian culture that had a very prevalent voice in society back then.

I am stating as fact that the Judeo-Christian religious culture has lost a tremendous amount of influence in the last 50 years and that trend shows no sign of reversing. In fact I would say that the Renaissance was the real start of the world secularizing trend and it has continued to this day. The only real problem with this is that real culture will not last without some kind of real connection to the Source, the Divine, whatever you may wish to call it.

What we have now is no culture, or call it a secular culture if you will. Look back in history for any other secular cultures existence and you will not find one.

In all cultures to one degree or another, if you didn't follow the rules of the culture you were separated or ostracized, and this kept the core of the culture strong. Our present society lacks this necessary instrument of culture which is why I say we have no culture. Government laws do not suffice and if they did then we would have a police state.

So now lets jump back to ethics on Wall St. My point is that in a real culture you could be hired and everyone would not only understand what was required of them ethically but understand the wisdom of behind it. And that fundamental wisdom is the understanding of what works for the greater good of all. As long as we have this secular, adolescent, me first mentality, no amount of government structure and regulation will actually work because the people who need to make the regulation work will not be culturally dependable. This has already been and is currently being demonstrated, in spades. No one is culturally accountable period, so society just kind of festers into a me first free for all.

We all have to dig a lot deeper to begin to grasp the fundamental issue these times confront us with.

Hawkewinde:

Judeo-Christians don't have a prominent voice in our culture? Give us a break. Or, how about an "indulgence."

"50 years ago there was a pretty clear delineation between what was right and ethical and what was not"

What is this, ancestor worship? 50 years ago, religious zealots beat their wives and lamented the uppity coloreds all six days between services. Only someone who never had to live back in those times would say something so inappropriately glorifying about such a savage era.

And what is currently being demonstrated is that over the last 10 years, the bureaucracy was overrun with foaming-at-the-mouth jesus-school sentinels. Right now is your recommended substitution of competence with "culture" on display.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/28/AR2008072801007.html

How about this for a fundamental issue: The backward view that lawlessness is freedom, and ostentatious displays of religious piety is the same as accountability. That is what contempt for "secular" norms of objectivity brings to civilization

[Jul 15, 2010] Bully or Victim More Similar Than We Might Think Scientific American Podcast

July 10, 2010 | scientific american

We might think that bullies are quite different from the victims of bullying. But those who become either a bully or a victim actually share similar outlooks and have similar difficulties dealing with their environments. There is, however, one significant risk factor for bullying.

Researchers reviewed and analyzed 153 studies and found that both victims and bullies have poor problem-solving skills within social situations. They also found that boys bully more than girls but here’s a significant point: Those who do poorly in school are at a higher risk of becoming a bully. The research was published this week in the journal School Psychology Quarterly.

Typical bullies have negative attitudes toward others, feel badly about themselves, and most likely grew up in a home with conflict. Victims share much of same, negative attitude, conflict in the family.

But the dividing characteristic: bullies dislike school and tend to perform worse academically than those who later become victims.

Most current solutions try to enforce anti-bullying rules or simply remove the bully from bullying situations. The authors note, however, that the most successful intervention is three-pronged. They suggest simultaneously targeting the areas that may be influencing the potential bully or victim in the first place: the parents, the peers and the schools.

—Christie Nicholson

[Jul 08, 2010] Tales of Corporate Oppression

I once got talking to a guy whose job it was to go into a company, sit alongside the Systems Administrator for two weeks, and write a professional audit on his processes and practices.

Naturally the sys admin would be on his best behavior, showing off all the clever things he did to keep the company's computer network ticking over.

At the end of the two weeks, the sys admin would be fired. There was never any audit: this was just the method the company used to replace their IT people without disruption, making sure the new guy was trained up and the old guy didn't cause any damage before he left.

===

At a former employer of mine it was common practice to only grant the pay raises and other benefits associated with a promotion six months after the promotion was given. The official rationale was that management needed to know you were going to work out in the position. Not suprisingly in practice the vast majority of promotions were recinded 4-5 months after they were announced. They always managed to catch people slipping up SOMEHOW over that time.

It was an horrific system but jobs were so scarce in that area that no one quit. (Obviously it wasn't a union shop.) Finally things came to a head when my friend and cubicle mate was promoted to group leader. The poor guy was put on earth to do the kind of Quality Control work the job entailed. He loved his job and worked at least three times faster than everyone else. Better yet he was obsessive about being on time for everything never slacking off during work hours.

In a normal company he would have shot up the corporate ladder. In this case the management freaked when they couldn't trip him up after 5 months. They started increasing his workload by the day. To the point where he was doing five and a half peoples share of analysis. He was my good friend and had a kid and needed the raise so I'd stay late for the first week and would help him finish his work. Then suddenly everyone was banned from assisting one another in their work load.

They finally got what they wanted and he missed a deadline and had his promotion canceled. It was honestly the saddest sight I have ever seen in any workplace. He literally cried the entire day in his cube while still doing his work faster than any of the rest of us.

===

Call centers collect a lot of stats on their employees, "average handling time" being one of them. They're meant to be be measures of efficiency, but when these stats are the only thing team leaders have to justify their existence sometimes that can lead to wackiness.

Take my mate, who was a genuinely nice guy. Far too nice really to be doing the job he was doing.

He thought he was there to help customers get their broadband services connected, his manager thought his job was to get customers off the phone ASAP in order to get good stats for the month.

Naturally this difference in goals lead to the amusing situation where the manager brought in an egg timer, set it to go off after a minute then would literally stand over the employee yelling, "Why are you still talking to this customer?!?" while the employee tried to juggle an irate customer and an irate boss.

After a couple of days of his he was really stressed out. I guess it wasn't helping that he had this whole Pavlovian dog thing happening with egg timers going off (yes, I'm a big meanie for setting one off during lunch) and he came to me for advice.

The only honest answer I could give him was to help 2 out of 3 customers and that should bring his handling time down. Just hang up on or transfer the third one. Although he baulked at this (nice guy), it did work, got his boss off his back and everyone was happier... well, except the customer obviously.

I suppose that's why I got promoted when I made the suggestion to management that they should make "Customer Satisfaction" a measure for team leaders as well?

===

I once, very briefly, worked as a telemarketer. I know, you hate me. I'm sorry.

We were collecting charitable donations for "The Police Benevolence Foundation," which had absolutely nothing to do with the police per se. I still to this day don't know what the money we were collecting for actually went to. They wouldn't outright tell us. They would only respond to the question by answering 'we might use the money to help officers who are wounded in the line of duty.' Then again, they might not.

We were told to never accept no for an answer. In fact, we couldn't accept two no's for an answer. We had to be rejected three times before we could give up. And they actually had to say "No," or "I'm not interested," or in some way offer a firm rejection. "I don't think I can afford it" did NOT count as a rejection.

So one day, I was listening to an old lady tell her tale of woe: her husband had died, her daughter never visited, she didn't know where her cat wandered off to, she couldn't afford her medication, she was laid up in bed for two months and her home care nurse was stealing her valuables... I really didn't want to keep pressing this poor old lady for money. But she had never said "no."

I should say there was also a strict guideline on how long these calls should LAST. The sooner you get one out of the way, the sooner you could start ripping off someone else.

Instead, I listened to her and tried to console her as best I could. After about the first three minutes I never brought up the subject of the Police Benevolence Foundation again. We said goodbye after about 20 minutes and she thanked me for calling.

As I left for the day, the boss calls me over to berate me for the length of the conversation, and--since it was screened--hassle me about letting her go without ever getting one firm, "No."

As I walked out the door, I waved and said, "Bye! Bye! Bye!" I never went back.

===

I am a woman. I worked on Wall Street where the C.E.O. (a man) convened a meeting to explore "Women's Issues on Wall Street." Successful women from the firm were invited along to share their opinions.

One woman, "Diane," said she thought mothers shouldn't take maternity leave, and that women just had to work harder and longer than men to get ahead.

The C.E.O. appointed Diane as "Head of Women's Issues." Diane's boss was forced out and she became co-Head of our department, meaning that I reported to her. At 35, I had been trying to get pregnant for years, and, as everyone in the group knew, was using fertility drugs. Happily, I became pregnant with triplets.

I was a very good producer for the department, but Diane was not happy about my news. She suggested, "as a friend," that I abort one or two of my children so I could "better manage my career."

After giving birth to three beautiful children, and taking my full maternity leave; I found a new job on Wall Street. With three babies, I did not want to fight that fight. Diane continues to move ever-higher on Wall Street.

===

I worked for a Not For Profit organisation where ineptitude is not only tolerated but expected. These are people who would be slaughtered in a private organisation quicker than you could say 'bleeding heart'.

So this isn't really a corporate tale, more of one about human shortcomings and passing the buck. Pretty much transferable over to the private industry world.

I worked in a small team, with two managers. Both managers were completely useless and under-performing for years. As is common for these types, they got away with this by passing the buck and lying to senior management. They blamed their staff for poor performance, we were lazy, lacking motivation, always late...yada yada. We weren't, in fact we were surviving and meeting targets in an sector where all our competitors were having their funding cut and being closed down.

Eventually, these managers had to up their lies - we were difficult (yeh, we were - we told them they were useless), hard to manage and had 'attitudinal problems' (is that even a word??) The General Manager believed them, HR stepped in, and we were all put on Performance Management. The shortsightedness of such an act escaped them, and we 'naughty' staff dutifully attended daily meetings to explain our every act to our hapless manager who didn't actually understand what it was that we were doing.

This went on for six months, the only thing we could do was laugh and wait to be fired. Eventually, the General Manager was fired and his replacement quickly cottoned on to what was happening and sacked our crapola managers. We were all taken off Performance Management, had our 'naughty files' destroyed, and given counselling for our ordeal.

If this isn't incredible enough, it turned out that the old management had been messing up reporting to our government funding body and we had actually performed 15% above what was originally thought.

===

At a medium-sized private textile company, the CEO prided himself on his benevolence to his employees. He even created a non-profit Foundation which provided college scholarships for the children of plant workers. Though each scholarship was only $1000, for the very poor it did provide assistance in helping them achieve their dreams. Each year, the winners were proudly announced in the company newsletter.

After several years, my old computer died and I needed a new one. The IT guy brought in a used computer from Accounting for me to use. I soon found that this computer had been used for running the Foundation. The IT guy hadn't wiped the hard drive and so I was left with lots of information.

As I reviewed the documents (of course I looked), I noticed the CEO's children's names popping up quite frequently--like once a month. They weren't even in college, so it didn't make sense. And the numbers were much larger, too.

A little digging revealed he was paying his kids' private school tuition out of the Foundation, to the tune of $25,000 per year for three kids!

Strangely, this one didn't make the company newsletter.

===

I have many stories about this particular Chairman of a company I used to work for, but this is my favorite.

The Chairman hired two assistants to run his office. The woman was "Kate" and the young man was "Alan," but the Chairman called him "Seven". For days Alan endured the Chairman calling them into the office by yelling down the hall, "Sue! Seven!"

Finally, Alan asked, "Why do you call me Seven?" The Chairman replied that he was the seventh assistant hired that month.

Aha. Alan got it, but kindly asked, "Why don't you just call me by my name?"

The Chairman said, "Because you're not going to be f*!%ing around long enough for me to learn your f*!%ing name!" He then pushed passed Alan, shouting, "Kate! Get rid of Seven and get me Eight!"

===

I was working for a small family-owned company (the kind that are supposed to care about employees, right?) when my father was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. He did chemo and radiation in another state and I cheered him on from a distance.

Some months later the doctors decided the treatments were not working and there was nothing more to be done.

When i heard this sad news, I worked like a dog for a week to get ahead of my deadlines and explained the situation to my boss.

ME: So, can I take a week off to go see him?
BOSS: Well, is he dying right now?
ME: No, not yet, but he's terminal.
BOSS: But he's not dying now.
ME: No, but I'd like to see him while he's still lucid.
BOSS: If he's not dying right now, you can't take time off.

I thought I was misunderstanding something, so I explained again and told the boss that I had worked ahead of my deadlines, etc. He still refused.

I quit and did go see my father. He died two months later.

===

I was once manager of production, responsible for about 45 people. One day, early in the morning, the owner stopped by my office and informed me that we had just lost our major contract. As a result, we soon wouldn't have enough work to keep people employed.

When I enquired which one of us should tell the staff this, he instructed me not to inform anyone. Instead, I was to "find any reason to terminate employees.” For example, if someone was a few minutes late to work, I should immediately terminate them. He said, "If that doesn't work... give them tasks that will make them want to quit."

I argued against this but the owner threatened to fire me. It was tough times in manufacturing and I needed the job.

Over the next four months I had to personally lay off 85% of our employees. Then they fired me.

===

I used to work a grocery store which was governed by a woman I would be accurate in describing as a "bean counter".

One day I called in sick, which I was, and this very lovely woman called me a liar and hung up on me. This infuriated me to the point that I called right back with every intention to resign my post but to frustrate me even more she put me on hold for ten minutes. Now, this may have been a good thing since I realized while I waited that quitting my job would hurt me a lot more than it would her. So I decided to resort to using some civilized verbal abuse (and it was indeed civilized, some words that were in my head did not escape through my mouth) and expressed my discontent with her attitude towards me as an employee. The conversation ended amicably with us coming to a common understanding. Or so I thought.

The next time I came into work I was summoned to her office. Once I got there I received no eye contact from her (her attempt to dominate the situation) and in front of her was my punch clock printout, with every day where I was even just one minute late highlighted. In this group of days being late my average was about three minutes past the hour - and this is in Iceland, where if you're ten minutes late, you're on time (in Mexico I'd have been there before she was). Still she gave me a long lecture on what a bad employee I was - this coming from the only boss I've had who hasn't given me outstanding recommendations - while my department head stood by almost burying his face in his hands. I countered with the argument that I made up for it by never taking a cigarette break, since I don't smoke, and her reply was... that nobody in the company smoked. Which was an insane lie (or delusions of some kind) since more than half of the staff were smokers at that time.

It's safe to say that I lost that battle unfairly but was redeemed when this very lovely woman got fired for being an uptight *enter civilized verbal abuse*.

===

I was part of a large team (100+ people) working on a worldwide rollout of a software product. It was quite a complicated business - the project was scheduled to roll out over a seven year period and we were about halfway through.

Early in the project one of the guys joked that we should have team T-shirts to build morale. Our manager said he didn't like T-shirts as they were too casual for the office. Our guy suggested golf shirts instead.

But no-one could agree and the "team shirt" debate continued, steadily becoming more serious, over the next few years.

One day, out of the blue, the manager arrives with boxes and starts handing out team golf shirts. I was impressed. Not only were they nice-looking, but they were decent quality.

He says everyone should wear their shirts the next day at our monthly all-hands meeting, to show team unity.

At the meeting we're all kidding each other about how cool we look in our team shirts. Then the VP stands up and tells us the project has been cancelled. Effective immediately.

Some of the people there had been hired two (I kid you not - TWO) days before. They looked like they had been sucker punched right there...

It's now three years since I left and the problem the project was meant to resolve has still not been fixed. Business is steadily declining as a result.

My shirt still looks sharp though.

===

During college I worked in a call center providing customer service for satellite TV customers that had purchased an extended warranty.

At first I worked in customer service, and had to explain to customers things like, "No, of course the Protection Plan doesn't cover that. If high winds blow your dish out of alignment, that's covered, but if high winds blow a tree into your dish, which knocks it out of alignment, then that's an act of God, and is not covered." Many customers didn't seem to understand the concept of a "limited warranty" and complained, "But they told me it would be covered... blah blah blah." The fact was we charged $75 for service calls unless the fault was expressly covered by the warranty.

Later, due to a staff shortage, I ended up being cross-trained, and was shown the actual sales script we read to the customers: "From electrical to mechanical failure, you can rest safely knowing that you're covered by the Protection Plan. You will never pay for a service call or replacement part again, because you're already covered!"

I then understood why they separated the two jobs.

===

I was a golden-girl director of a department in a southern conservative corporation until, much to my surprise, a man with no qualifications even near mine was promoted over me to run my department. This was a man I had just a year ago helped "get ahead" and even coached on his salary negotiations. When I asked my boss why he was promoted over me I was told because I had "a bad attitude." When I calmly asked for specific examples none could be provided. One was lamely offered up as a reason but was quickly proved to be incorrect.

Alas, the guy moved up over me and I quietly went about my job of being the one actually running the department when I found out that he had be secretly meeting with one of my employees about splitting the department and giving the younger guy half my employees. The younger guy came and told me about this because he was so upset about it going on behind my back. He and I decided to together to talk to our new boss about it. The new boss then wrote us a threatening and nasty email.

I then met with the HR Director after that to ask for his advice and he questioned my integrity and threatened my employment (mind you, I had a stellar record prior to this). I later found out my new boss and this HR Director were buddies and good friends and had also been talking about this behind my back and my fate was pretty much sealed regardless of what I did. They were both soon promoted to VPs. I soon resigned my position and now I make more money working for myself.

===

A friend of mine who I'll call "David" was bullied by another teacher in his department for many years. Although David was highly qualified and had a great rapport with his students, this other staff member continually made negative comments about him behind his back and ridiculed anything he did.

At first David tried to shrug this off, even when students began telling him that she was calling him an idiot in her class. She also began using David's title ("Head Teacher") at open days and when introducing herself.

After some years, David finally complained to the head of the department, but he was completely dismissive. So David began to keep a diary to show that he was the target of this teacher's negative campaign.

He saw a counsellor, who was shocked at what the diary revealed and encouraged David to take the issue to the school CEO. The CEO listened carefully and began an investigation (things were looking up at last!), but as the issue grew larger than he could reasonably handle, he ended up telling David to simply "take it like a man."

David had a type of mini breakdown, to the point where he says he can not recall a five hour period from that day, although he can remember the uncontrollable sobbing with the counsellor for an hour and a half.

He still works there, as does his tormentor.

[Jun 20, 2010] Ayn Rand- The Boring Bitch is Back | The Big Picture

danm :

1. An individual’s life belongs to himself. 2. Physical force is not a proper way to deal with others. 3. The proper purpose of government is to protect individuals from force or fraud. Are these the principles of “assholes” or immature undergraduates? I think not.
————-
Sociopath could not care less about those assumed “rights” and research has shown that both the political and business worlds are run by a slew of them.

Fog of war

Wikipedia

The fog of war is a term used to describe the level of ambiguity in situational awareness experienced by participants in military operations.^[1] The term seeks to capture the uncertainty regarding own capability, adversary capability, and adversary intent during an engagement, operation, or campaign. The term is ascribed to the Prussian military analyst Carl von Clausewitz, who wrote:

"The great uncertainty of all data in war is a peculiar difficulty, because all action must, to a certain extent, be planned in a mere twilight, which in addition not infrequently—like the effect of a fog or moonshine—gives to things exaggerated dimensions and unnatural appearance."^[2]

The term may also be a reference to the use of black powder in warfare, which often produced clouds of thick "fog", obscuring the battlefield from observers.

[Apr 24, 2010] Jamie Dimon Should Debate Us

April 20, 2010 | The Baseline Scenario

Jack54:

I would have argued that a bank or any corporation cannot be good or evil since thay are not people. The SCOTUS says differently.

I recently found this regarding Evil. I think It describe these people perfectly.

Evil, I think, is the absence of empathy.” Captain G. M. Gilbert, the Army psychologist , Nuremberg trails Submitted by questministries… on February 5, 2009 – 2:26am.

“In my work with the defendants (at the Nuremberg Trails 1945-1949) I was searching for the nature of evil and I now think I have come close to defining it. A lack of empathy. It’s the one characteristic that connects all the defendants, a genuine incapacity to feel with their fellow men.

Evil, I think, is the absence of empathy.”

Quotation: Captain G. M. Gilbert, the Army psychologist assigned to watching the defendants at the Nuremberg trails

On the other hand is a bank or corporation capable of an emotion? Such as Empathy.

EllenD:

Ordinarily in a skilled occupation (medicine, banking?), the community polices itself to avoid runaways from tainting the entire profession.

I don’t think the oligarchs for the most part are lacking in empathy; I think it takes considerable ability to “read” other people and gauge your actions accordingly in order to succeed in business. Even members of urban gangs succeed according to their ability to empathize. Then, however, there is the ability to “compartmentalize,” a word I learned in regard to Bill Clinton, the great compartmentalizer. You empathize in private, and wield your sword, figuratively, when fighting.

The oligarchs, I suspect, do not believe that there is really room in the world for all to flourish (someone posted something along those lines here; is there limitation worked into equations that squeeze profits out of plain paper?), and therefore oligarchical sanity depends on limiting the circle among whom they extend their empathy.

In the Jim Crow South, plenty of Ku Klux Klan types were upstanding, ethical, empathic sorts, but they excluded people of color from the circle of their empathy. Soldiers at war also compartmentalize.

It’s interesting how our elected politicians maneuver, however, deriving campaign funds from the oligarchs, but deriving votes from the non-oligarchs. Each side would be the skunk at the party of the other these days, unless careful etiquette were understood, that etiquette being (in my corner of this country) chiefly to keep out of each other’s space.

A debate would be a carefully controlled encounter, and one would retire to a sort of contrived anonymity once concluded.

Basically, I don’t think the banker echelon believes a broadly-based inclusive community (including them) would really work (not enough basic necessities to go around? no cooperative spirit of sacrifice to get where needed?) (Say what?). Hence the pope-mobile idea.

James Gornick:

Far-fetched Jack54 but, I appreciate your wit and comments, thank you : – )

In keeping on the Scotus theme…

“What lies in our power to do, lies in our power not to do” (Aristotle). Seems to be the mystery the invites the very nature of Evil’s empty compassion and absence of empathy to find a hollowed and empty erect body of common purpose as;

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit” (Aristotle). For we can not achieve Good or Excellence as an erect body and soul without passion for the human condition that breeds life, hence the point of evil and eventual death; this is why,

“It is possible then to fail in many ways…while to succeed is possible only in one way” (Aristotle). As this is the call made to all that hold the position to be able to make change to the human condition.

I think a good way to end this deep thinking session comes with…

“All men are by nature equal, made all the same earth by one Workman; and however we deceive ourselves, as dear unto God is poor peasant as the mighty prince” (Plato).

Simply stated, Goldman Sachs, and all the rest are and never will be GODS Bank nor is the Catholic Church for those wanting to rush in to toss in their two cents.

The Creator defined for all is “I am” or also known as GOD. When man places himself before all the rest, as we discussed the love, compassion, and empathy part, for your fellow neighbor (man / women “human”) you have the full definition of evil exposed.

If you are Christian or even if you are not, these are two good theories to live by. The first, greatest commandment is to love God with all of your heart and soul and the second, to do the same with your neighbor.

From the sounds of the media today, and the continued layers of more covering up. Further folks are going to be losing their homes and jobs. Looks like the neighbor thing is having a little difficulty these days with the banking and financial folks; and for that matter, a lot of other industries just not putting people back to work. To many erect bodies putting profits first and not second, though some real great earnings are coming so far as reported these fist couple of weeks. Look at what came across the wires from Apple and others tonight reinforces even more the reason for this post tonight.

God bless…

Far-fetched, Not anymore…

James Gornick

William

James: A very good post! I think your post is getting at the root of how and why individuals, human beings functioning as bankers who are God’s creations, have been able to do what they have done for a very long time. Especially being the epicenter of the housing bubble and collapse. The bankers have certainly not had empathy for all those affected by their actions. Your quote from Plato bears repeating:

“All men are by nature equal, made all the same earth by one Workman; and however we deceive ourselves, as dear unto God is poor peasant as the mighty prince” (Plato).

Those entrusted with such an important function, such as investment banking, would better serve us and themselves if their actions where God-centered.

[Mar 15, 2010] Links Ides of March 2010

March 15, 2010 | naked capitalism

jbmore61:

There was a study a while back. The gist of it was that the unsuccessful psychopaths were in prison. The successful psychopaths were highly successful businessmen. This was before the GFC. It’s possible that many of the corporate looters are psychopaths who haven’t gotten caught or punished.

[Mar 14, 2010] Indefensible Men

March 13, 2010 | naked capitalism

Alexandra Hamilton:

“The finance community has other elements in common with cults. One is the implicit and explicit reinforcement of bankers’ “specialness,” their elite status.”
———————————————————
That is not unique to finance. You’ll find that in almost any large business, especiallly top management.

The problem may have started in finance, but it is now everywhere.

Alexandra Hamiltons:

“But the firms are white-collar sweatshops with glamorous trappings. You do not know how hard you can work, short of slavery, unless you have been an investment banking analyst or associate. It is not merely the hours, but the extreme and unrelenting time pressure. Priorities are revised every day, numerous times during the day, as markets move.”
——————————————————-
Sounds like permanent ‘hell week’ to me.
http://usmilitary.about.com/od/navytrng/a/sealhellweek.htm
However, Navy Seals only do this 5.5 days in their training, while employees nowadays have to put up with this constantly over several years.
Bringing you to your breaking point is intentional.
Everyone will crack sooner or later and either leave and possible carry away psychological scars from this, like PTSD or such, or (s)he might become brainwashed and accept the value system and start acting like them, namely like a psychopath. Like it or not the business environment is psychopatic in nature.

MacroStrategy:

See definition below. Fits to a T the mold of many (not all) I met and knew in the Wall Street world, especially the “intraspecies predator” part.

Not trying to demonize these people – but this was the role, the character mold, that many of the best and the brightest in this country and elsewhere were drawn to (given the monetary reward, which is what we’re all here for, right?)and groomed for (in elite MBA schools, etc.)

It is truly sick and twisted, and history is unlikely to be kind to this last 30-40 year rule of finanzkapital uber alles and its wrecking ball form of global capitalism.

And Jones, I think you are dead right and have hit on a crucial insight which we best hammer home soon. As the LibertAustrians start waving their snake flags high on the way to victory in the midterm elections, demand that they defend all their John Galt’s on Wall Street.

The predator state, as Jamie Galbraith put it in a recent book, is not the only predatory institution out there. There clearly were other predators working close to the heart of their beloved free market, who for all intents and purposes corrupting and eroding all the rules of the game and social practices that would keep anything resembling a free market intact.

Hy Minsky used to say, it’s like the label on Heinz ketchup says: there are 57 flavors of capitalism. This one leaves a decidedly foul, rancid taste in the mouth…while it rots you from the inside out. Time to head back to the kitchen and try a different recipe altogether.

Psychopathy ( ) is a personality disorder whose hallmark is a lack of empathy. Robert Hare, a researcher in the field describes psychopaths as “intraspecies predators who use charm, manipulation, intimidation, sex and violence to control others and to satisfy their own selfish needs. …

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociopath

scraping_by:

Calling this mindset sociopathology is spot on. It’s a common disease in this country, mostly infecting the jobs involving expensive wardrobes and obscure vocabulary. One of the ways you can see this is a current example and how it relates to law.

The Lehman report reveals an act with Repos that was certainly an attempt to defraud. Yet, the report calls the deception “colorable” rather than unlawful, a fraud that’s only a fraud against, oh, someone somewhere. Not something that would send people to jail, rather something that should be settled by civil lawsuits. Lots of civil lawsuits, requiring lots of hours of legal work by lots of highly-paid lawyers. One notes in passing this was a report by lawyers, but that may not have relevance.

The relevance is that instead of public officials defending the public, we have private individuals settling things among themselves. From honest finance being a public good, it’s now just a civil arrangement. You can’t expect anything, since it’s all negotiable before and after you say yes. Hand over your money and take what they give you. Both as an individual and as the state.

The danger is that the descent from public law to civil law will keep going. Getting to private law, like the Open Carry wackos, is no longer so wacky.

blunt :

Neibuhr, no doubt, is helpful in understanding the mindset behind the crisis and its aftermath.

But perhaps more in tune with the overall conduct before, during and now would be a stroll through Hannah Arendt’s “Eichmann In Jerusalem.”

I was forcefully struck by the ways in which the various unnamed characters in this piece were reminiscent of Arendt’s views of Eichmann and of the culpability of the victims, in some respects, to enabling the horrors.

Surely, nothing could argue more forcefully for “the banality of evil” or the discovery that these people are not any different than the mass of us when we are, like Eichmann, eternal joiners of average intelligence who when we join the “right” group manage to believe we lose all volitional response to any situation.

Arendt was spot on. Such behaviors were not simply confined to Nazi Germany, but are a part of the human repertoire, available to any of us given the opportunity.

I find myself feeling a copmpassion for the fools, knowing that given a certain mindset, I could as well be one of them.

Still, to follow Arendt’s justification for Eichmann’s, that more normal than normal man, execution: since they, the traders and brokers, see no reason that they should share the world with us, then we should see no reason to share the world with them.

Justice and a reminder to us all that we could be them and to reinforce the lesson maybe a few public executions would not come amiss. Certainly there’s need for seizures of whatever gains they’ve acquired through the banality of their regimentation.

Tom Crowl:

Fantastic article and overview of the culture of Wall Street and it’s unfortunate evolution.

Paradoxically, much of this arises as a consequence of biological altruism’s dysfunction in scaled societies… Which is why we need regulations and oversight…

A couple of brief posts on these issues if interested:

The Foundations of Authoritarianism
http://culturalengineer.blogspot.com/2009/05/foundations-of-authoritarianism.html

Compensation and the Social Network
http://culturalengineer.blogspot.com/2009/10/compensation-social-network.html

Ayn Rand & Alan Greenspan: The Altruism Fly in the Objectivist Ointment
http://culturalengineer.blogspot.com/2009/10/ayn-rand-alan-greenspan-altruism-fly-in.html

Alexandra Hamilton :

One of the core tenets of modernism is that social intelligence can be imparted to the masses and that this enhanced social intelligence will result in greater social justice.

This concept is totally modern. Before the advent of modernism such thoughts were unheard of.

————————————————————

Thanks for your great post. This concept is not modern, however. It is thousands of years old. Just to name a few: the New Testament and the Qu’ran, among others. The struggle is still the same, but has different names.

About the Greeks: Some time ago, I think I noticed something. Have you ever tried to analyse the personality types of the greek gods? The are amazingly pathological.

I think, the Greeks were aware of what those rather human “gods” actually described and thus were rather reserved about worshipping them. However, the Romans – which had the same gods under different names – acutally believed in this.They semm to have gone full tilt basing their society and ideals on those personality types.

Why Powerful People -- Many of Whom Take a Moral High Ground -- Don't Practice What They Preach

Dec 30, 2009 | ScienceDaily

2009 may well be remembered for its scandal-ridden headlines, from admissions of extramarital affairs by governors and senators, to corporate executives flying private jets while cutting employee benefits, and most recently, to a mysterious early morning car crash in Florida. The past year has been marked by a series of moral transgressions by powerful figures in political, business and celebrity circles. New research from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University explores why powerful people - many of whom take a moral high ground - don't practice what they preach.

Researchers sought to determine whether power inspires hypocrisy, the tendency to hold high standards for others while performing morally suspect behaviors oneself. The research finds that power makes people stricter in moral judgment of others - while being less strict of their own behavior.

The research was conducted by Joris Lammers and Diederik A. Stapel of Tilburg University in the Netherlands, and by Adam Galinsky of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. The article will appear in a forthcoming issue of Psychological Science.

"This research is especially relevant to the biggest scandals of 2009, as we look back on how private behavior often contradicted the public stance of particular individuals in power," said Galinsky, the Morris and Alice Kaplan Professor of Ethics and Decision in Management at the Kellogg School. "For instance, we saw some politicians use public funds for private benefits while calling for smaller government, or have extramarital affairs while advocating family values. Similarly, we witnessed CEOs of major financial institutions accepting executive bonuses while simultaneously asking for government bailout money on behalf of their companies."

"According to our research, power and influence can cause a severe disconnect between public judgment and private behavior, and as a result, the powerful are stricter in their judgment of others while being more lenient toward their own actions," he continued.

To simulate an experience of power, the researchers assigned roles of high-power and low-power positions to a group of study participants. Some were assigned the role of prime minister and others civil servant. The participants were then presented with moral dilemmas related to breaking traffic rules, declaring taxes, and returning a stolen bike.

Through a series of five experiments, the researchers examined the impact of power on moral hypocrisy. For example, in one experiment the "powerful" participants condemned the cheating of others while cheating more themselves. High-power participants also tended to condemn over-reporting of travel expenses. But, when given a chance to cheat on a dice game to win lottery tickets (played alone in the privacy of a cubicle), the powerful people reported winning a higher amount of lottery tickets than did low-power participants.

Three additional experiments further examined the degree to which powerful people accept their own moral transgressions versus those committed by others. In all cases, those assigned to high-power roles showed significant moral hypocrisy by more strictly judging others for speeding, dodging taxes and keeping a stolen bike, while finding it more acceptable to engage in these behaviors themselves.

Galinsky noted that moral hypocrisy has its greatest impact among people who are legitimately powerful. In contrast, a fifth experiment demonstrated that people who don't feel personally entitled to their power are actually harder on themselves than they are on others, which is a phenomenon the researchers dubbed "hypercrisy." The tendency to be harder on the self than on others also characterized the powerless in multiple studies.

"Ultimately, patterns of hypocrisy and hypercrisy perpetuate social inequality. The powerful impose rules and restraints on others while disregarding these restraints for themselves, whereas the powerless collaborate in reproducing social inequality because they don't feel the same entitlement," Galinsky concluded.

[Dec 19, 2009] Are Americans a Broken People Why We've Stopped Fighting Back Against the Forces of Oppression by Bruce E. Levine

December 11, 2009 | AlterNet

Can people become so broken that truths of how they are being screwed do not "set them free" but instead further demoralize them? Has such a demoralization happened in the United States?

Do some totalitarians actually want us to hear how we have been screwed because they know that humiliating passivity in the face of obvious oppression will demoralize us even further?

What forces have created a demoralized, passive, dis-couraged U.S. population?

Can anything be done to turn this around?

Can people become so broken that truths of how they are being screwed do not "set them free" but instead further demoralize them?

Yes. It is called the "abuse syndrome." How do abusive pimps, spouses, bosses, corporations, and governments stay in control? They shove lies, emotional and physical abuses, and injustices in their victims' faces, and when victims are afraid to exit from these relationships, they get weaker. So the abuser then makes their victims eat even more lies, abuses, and injustices, resulting in victims even weaker as they remain in these relationships.

Does knowing the truth of their abuse set people free when they are deep in these abuse syndromes?

No. For victims of the abuse syndrome, the truth of their passive submission to humiliating oppression is more than embarrassing; it can feel shameful -- and there is nothing more painful than shame. When one already feels beaten down and demoralized, the likely response to the pain of shame is not constructive action, but more attempts to shut down or divert oneself from this pain. It is not likely that the truth of one's humiliating oppression is going to energize one to constructive actions.

Has such a demoralization happened in the U.S.?

In the United States, 47 million people are without health insurance, and many millions more are underinsured or a job layoff away from losing their coverage. But despite the current sellout by their elected officials to the insurance industry, there is no outpouring of millions of U.S. citizens on the streets of Washington, D.C., protesting this betrayal.

Polls show that the majority of Americans oppose U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as well as the taxpayer bailout of the financial industry, yet only a handful of U.S. citizens have protested these circumstances.

Remember the 2000 U.S. presidential election? That's the one in which Al Gore received 500,000 more votes than George W. Bush. That's also the one that the Florida Supreme Court's order for a recount of the disputed Florida vote was overruled by the U.S. Supreme Court in a politicized 5-4 decision, of which dissenting Justice John Paul Stevens remarked: "Although we may never know with complete certainty the identity of the winner of this year's presidential election, the identity of the loser is perfectly clear. It is the nation's confidence in the judge as an impartial guardian of the rule of law." Yet, even this provoked few demonstrators.

When people become broken, they cannot act on truths of injustice. Furthermore, when people have become broken, more truths about how they have been victimized can lead to shame about how they have allowed it. And shame, like fear, is one more way we become even more psychologically broken.

U.S. citizens do not actively protest obvious injustices for the same reasons that people cannot leave their abusive spouses: They feel helpless to effect change. The more we don't act, the weaker we get. And ultimately to deal with the painful humiliation over inaction in the face of an oppressor, we move to shut-down mode and use escape strategies such as depression, substance abuse, and other diversions, which further keep us from acting. This is the vicious cycle of all abuse syndromes.

Do some totalitarians actually want us to hear how we have been screwed because they know that humiliating passivity in the face of obvious oppression will demoralize us even further?

Maybe.

Shortly before the 2000 U.S. presidential election, millions of Americans saw a clip of George W. Bush joking to a wealthy group of people, "What a crowd tonight: the haves and the haves-more. Some people call you the elite; I call you my base." Yet, even with these kind of inflammatory remarks, the tens of millions of U.S. citizens who had come to despise Bush and his arrogance remained passive in the face of the 2000 non-democratic presidential elections.

Perhaps the "political genius" of the Bush-Cheney regime was in their full realization that Americans were so broken that the regime could get away with damn near anything. And the more people did nothing about the boot slamming on their faces, the weaker people became.

What forces have created a demoralized, passive, dis-couraged U.S. population?

The U.S. government-corporate partnership has used its share of guns and terror to break Native Americans, labor union organizers, and other dissidents and activists. But today, most U.S. citizens are broken by financial fears. There is potential legal debt if we speak out against a powerful authority, and all kinds of other debt if we do not comply on the job. Young people are broken by college-loan debts and fear of having no health insurance.

The U.S. population is increasingly broken by the social isolation created by corporate-governmental policies. A 2006 American Sociological Review study ("Social Isolation in America: Changes in Core Discussion Networks over Two Decades") reported that, in 2004, 25 percent of Americans did not have a single confidant. (In 1985, 10 percent of Americans reported not having a single confidant.) Sociologist Robert Putnam, in his 2000 book, Bowling Alone, describes how social connectedness is disappearing in virtually every aspect of U.S. life. For example, there has been a significant decrease in face-to-face contact with neighbors and friends due to suburbanization, commuting, electronic entertainment, time and money pressures and other variables created by governmental-corporate policies. And union activities and other formal or informal ways that people give each other the support necessary to resist oppression have also decreased.

We are also broken by a corporate-government partnership that has rendered most of us out of control when it comes to the basic necessities of life, including our food supply. And we, like many other people in the world, are broken by socializing institutions that alienate us from our basic humanity. A few examples:

• Schools and Universities: Do most schools teach young people to be action-oriented -- or to be passive? Do most schools teach young people that they can affect their surroundings -- or not to bother? Do schools provide examples of democratic institutions -- or examples of authoritarian ones?

  A long list of school critics from Henry David Thoreau to John Dewey, John Holt, Paul Goodman, Jonathan Kozol, Alfie Kohn, Ivan Illich, and John Taylor Gatto have pointed out that a school is nothing less than a miniature society: what young people experience in schools is the chief means of creating our future society. Schools are routinely places where kids -- through fear -- learn to comply to authorities for whom they often have no respect, and to regurgitate material they often find meaningless. These are great ways of breaking someone.

  Today, U.S. colleges and universities have increasingly become places where young people are merely acquiring degree credentials -- badges of compliance for corporate employers -- in exchange for learning to accept bureaucratic domination and enslaving debt.
  

• Mental Health Institutions: Aldous Huxley predicted today's pharmaceutical societyl "[I]t seems to me perfectly in the cards," he said, "that there will be within the next generation or so a pharmacological method of making people love their servitude."

  Today, increasing numbers of people in the U.S. who do not comply with authority are being diagnosed with mental illnesses and medicated with psychiatric drugs that make them less pained about their boredom, resentments, and other negative emotions, thus rendering them more compliant and manageable.

  Oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) is an increasingly popular diagnosis for children and teenagers. The official symptoms of ODD include, "often actively defies or refuses to comply with adult requests or rules," and "often argues with adults." An even more common reaction to oppressive authorities than the overt defiance of ODD is some type of passive defiance -- for example, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Studies show that virtually all children diagnosed with ADHD will pay attention to activities that they actually enjoy or that they have chosen. In other words, when ADHD-labeled kids are having a good time and in control, the "disease" goes away.

  When human beings feel too terrified and broken to actively protest, they may stage a "passive-aggressive revolution" by simply getting depressed, staying drunk, and not doing anything -- this is one reason why the Soviet empire crumbled. However, the diseasing/medicalizing of rebellion and drug "treatments" have weakened the power of even this passive-aggressive revolution.
  

• Television: In his book Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television (1978), Jerry Mander (after reviewing totalitarian critics such as George Orwell, Aldous Huxley, Jacques Ellul, and Ivan Illich) compiled a list of the "Eight Ideal Conditions for the Flowering of Autocracy."

  Mander claimed that television helps create all eight conditions for breaking a population. Television, he explained, (1) occupies people so that they don't know themselves -- and what a human being is; (2) separates people from one another; (3) creates sensory deprivation; (4) occupies the mind and fills the brain with prearranged experience and thought; (5) encourages drug use to dampen dissatisfaction (while TV itself produces a drug-like effect, this was compounded in 1997 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration relaxing the rules of prescription-drug advertising); (6) centralizes knowledge and information; (7) eliminates or "museumize" other cultures to eliminate comparisons; and (8) redefines happiness and the meaning of life.
  

• Commericalism of Damn Near Everything: While spirituality, music, and cinema can be revolutionary forces, the gross commercialization of all of these has deadened their capacity to energize rebellion. So now, damn near everything – not just organized religion -- has become "opiates of the masses."

  The primary societal role of U.S. citizens is no longer that of "citizen" but that of "consumer." While citizens know that buying and selling within community strengthens that community and that this strengthens democracy, consumers care only about the best deal. While citizens understand that dependency on an impersonal creditor is a kind of slavery, consumers get excited with credit cards that offer a temporarily low APR.

  Consumerism breaks people by devaluing human connectedness, socializing self-absorption, obliterating self-reliance, alienating people from normal human emotional reactions, and by selling the idea that purchased products -- not themselves and their community -- are their salvation.

Can anything be done to turn this around?

When people get caught up in humiliating abuse syndromes, more truths about their oppressive humiliations don't set them free. What sets them free is morale.

What gives people morale? Encouragement. Small victories. Models of courageous behaviors. And anything that helps them break out of the vicious cycle of pain, shut down, immobilization, shame over immobilization, more pain, and more shut down.

The last people I would turn to for help in remobilizing a demoralized population are mental health professionals -- at least those who have not rebelled against their professional socialization. Much of the craft of relighting the pilot light requires talents that mental health professionals simply are not selected for nor are they trained in. Specifically, the talents required are a fearlessness around image, spontaneity, and definitely anti-authoritarianism. But these are not the traits that medical schools or graduate schools select for or encourage.

Mental health professionals' focus on symptoms and feelings often create patients who take themselves and their moods far too seriously. In contrast, people talented in the craft of maintaining morale resist this kind of self-absorption. For example, in the question-and-answer session that followed a Noam Chomsky talk (reported in Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky, 2002), a somewhat demoralized man in the audience asked Chomsky if he too ever went through a phase of hopelessness. Chomsky responded, "Yeah, every evening . . ."

If you want to feel hopeless, there are a lot of things you could feel hopeless about. If you want to sort of work out objectively what's the chance that the human species will survive for another century, probably not very high. But I mean, what's the point? . . . First of all, those predictions don't mean anything -- they're more just a reflection of your mood or your personality than anything else. And if you act on that assumption, then you're guaranteeing that'll happen. If you act on the assumption that things can change, well, maybe they will. Okay, the only rational choice, given those alternatives, is to forget pessimism."

A major component of the craft of maintaining morale is not taking the advertised reality too seriously. In the early 1960s, when the overwhelming majority in the U.S. supported military intervention in Vietnam, Chomsky was one of a minority of U.S. citizens actively opposing it. Looking back at this era, Chomsky reflected, "When I got involved in the anti-Vietnam War movement, it seemed to me impossible that we would ever have any effect. . . So looking back, I think my evaluation of the 'hope' was much too pessimistic: it was based on a complete misunderstanding. I was sort of believing what I read."

An elitist assumption is that people don't change because they are either ignorant of their problems or ignorant of solutions. Elitist "helpers" think they have done something useful by informing overweight people that they are obese and that they must reduce their caloric intake and increase exercise. An elitist who has never been broken by his or her circumstances does not know that people who have become demoralized do not need analyses and pontifications. Rather the immobilized need a shot of morale.

See more stories tagged with: consumerism, television, depression, mental illness, american culture

Bruce E. Levine is a clinical psychologist and his latest book is Surviving America’s Depression Epidemic: How to Find Morale, Energy, and Community in a World Gone Crazy (Chelsea Green Publishing, 2007). His Web site is www.brucelevine.net

Comment from bernanke-confirmation-headwinds-increasing

DownSouth:

December 19, 2009 at 3:01 pm

In regards to the Alternet article, isn’t that the very reason why conservatives hate people like Martin Luther King and Marx so much? Are not their philosophies, after all, what gave oppressed peoples not only the intellectual framework to question their oppressors’ rationales, but also the hope necessary to rise up against those oppressors.

Conservatives embrace an assumedly “natural” distinction of rich and poor. The revolutionaries, on the other hand, embrace a notion that men are born or created equal and become unequal by virtue of social and political, that is man-made, institutions.

As Hannah Arendt observed in On Revolution:

Marx’s transformation of the social question into a political force is contained in the term ‘exploitation’, that is, in the notion that poverty is the result of exploitation through a ‘ruling class’ which is in the possession of the means of violence… If Marx helped in liberating the poor, then it was not by telling them that they were the living embodiments of some historical or other necessity, but by persuading them that poverty itself is a political, not a natural phenomenon, the result of violence and violation rather than of scarcity.

Likewise, MLK didn’t buy into the conservative conviction that blacks are created inferior by virtue of the color of their skin, making their inferior status “natural.”

As to engendering hope, MLK led people to believe that God is on the side of justice. The secular Marx, on the other hand, espoused an inexorable historical dialectic process that was equally as unstoppable as MLK’s divinity.

And both MLK as well as the followers of Marx argued that it was incumbent upon the oppressed, and not their oppressors, to bring about change.

For an excellent encapsulation of the socialist doctrine, there is probably no better place to look than chapters 28 and 29 of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle:

And so all over the world two classes were forming, with an unabridged chasm between them—the capitalist class, with its enormous fortunes, and the proletariat, bound into slavery by unseen chains. The latter were a thousand to one in numbers, but they were ignorant and helpless, and they would remain at the mercy of the exploiters until they organized…

Personally, I believe it is nonsensical to argue that today’s American middle class is more beaten down and demoralized than blacks or Hispanics were during Jim Crow, or workers were during the days of Upton Sinclair.

[Aug 26, 2009] How Banks (and Companies) Diversify Their Way Into Incompetence

naked capitalism

I read my first management book at the age of 11, not because it was a management book, but a best seller at the time, And it may have been imprinted by it more than I realized. The Peter Principle says that managers are promoted until they reach their level of incompetence. The classic example is promoting the best salesman to be a sales manager. The joke (all too true) is that you both lose your best salesman and gain a lousy supervisor.

That pattern says that organizations as a whole are not very capable (if they recognize this danger, they should try to manage against it, but the popularity of The Peter Principle did not change corporate practice one jot, at least as far as I can tell). And of course, it explains why there are so many crappy managers and executives.

John Kay of the Financial Times applies this idea to financial firms, arguing that they diversify their way into incompetence:

Financial institutions diversify into their level of incompetence. They extend their scope into activities they understand less...

The principle of diversification into incompetence applies from the largest financial institution to the smallest. AIG was America’s leading insurance company. The company did not just undertake credit insurance, but was the largest trader in the credit default swap market. That is how its financial products group, employing 120 people in London, brought about the collapse of a business that employed 120,000.

Yves here. Citigroup is another example. It isn't so much that Citi made a disastrous acquisition as it dedicated itself to massive reach as a corporate imperative: be as global and be in every conceivable product niche. That is a prescription for being unable to manage yourself, which is the essence of the big bank's problems. Back to Kay:

The boredom factor is important. Much of traditional banking is quite boring. The desire to find new challenges is an admirable human trait. It is, however, very expensive for shareholders to allow their chief executives to indulge it.

Public sector bodies are usually constrained in their activities, so deregulation is often a trigger for expensive experimentation. In Britain, many of the efficiency gains from privatisation were squandered in diversification: I watched senior managers spending 80 per cent of their time on activities that generated 1 per cent of turnover and minus 10 per cent of profit. But it is more fun to go on jollies to Buenos Aires than to fix leaking pipes.

To win an auction when you don’t know what you are bidding for is often to lose. This winner’s curse is often behind bad acquisitions because the successful purchaser is the bidder most willing to pay too much. Hence the contest between Royal Bank of Scotland and Barclays as to which bank would court bankruptcy by buying ABN Amro. Ignorance of products may also be a problem. When you are the newcomer and know little, the business that gravitates to you will be the business no one else wants.

But the driving factor is hubris. Jim Collins’s well-timed study of How the Mighty Fall applies to every business I have mentioned. The financial services industry is particularly vulnerable to hubris because sections of it are not very competitive, and randomness plays a large role in the outcome of speculative transactions. It is therefore particularly easy for those who work in financial institutions to make the mistake of believing that their success is the result of exceptional skill rather than good fortune. What more natural to believe than that extraordinary talent will find pots of gold under other rainbows? Until vanity is vanquished, I anticipate that diversification to the level of incompetence will continue to be a powerful element in business behaviour.

With all due respect, I think Kay has the essence of this wrong. First, deals are engrossing and sexy. They are very intense, the top executives are the focus of Big Decisions, and they have a horde of high priced talent catering to them (well actually, leading them by the nose, but they are usually so adept at it that the client often does not realize he is no longer in control).

But the big driver is that bank CEO pay is correlated with the size of the institution. And it is much easier to get big fast by acquisition than organically. Big deals are a wallet-lining activity, and the advisors understand that very well.

13 comments:

attempter :

I don't doubt Yves is right about the top-down influence, but I think there's also something to the boredom argument.

It's long seemed to me that e.g where it comes to computers and gadgets in general that the engineers seem to want to tinker and gratuitously change things and add superfluous features all way beyond what customers want, and even where it doesn't add to revenue (rent-seeking).

The designers have a fundamentally different, non-market mindset. A customer probably just wants a basic product that functions well, but for the engineer this is his toy, his "creative outlet."

I long suspected this, and recently I've started seeing pieces which agree with me, like in some of the NYT tech columns.

So I don't doubt there may be something similar going on with financial "engineering", although there of course the rent-seeking is a far greater motive.

skippy :

Like in the Military Kill Ratios or Counts get you noticed, promoted because its a sexy statistic (see Vietnam). Not consolidation of ones position in order to blunt the oppositions maneuver (see victory with out death).

skippy..."A solider will fight long and hard for a bit of ribbon" Napoleon Bonaparte.

Ina Pickle :

The problem is not just the organization, but self-selection and the process involved in getting to the top. They choose for risk-taking personalities for whom boredom is a serious issue - and who have a serious bias towards action over inaction, risk-taking over safety, etc.

I once had the CFO of a very large corporation tell me that, if I could tell him that he had a 50/50 chance of keeping the assets he wanted to acquire -- a coin toss -- he would go ahead with the merger.

We have reached a point where our idea of who is executive material involves a macho type who conflates decisiveness with risk-taking, when really they are two different things. Just my opinion.

DownSouth :

This is evidence as to why classical economics and all its begats--Marxism, libertarianism, neo-liberalism, etc---are all failed ideologies. All are predicated on the assumption that man is motivated solely by materialistic objectives, or, as Reinhold Niebuhr put it, "all human desires are determinate and all human ambitions ordinate."

As Niebuhr goes on to explain in The Irony of American History:

The false abstraction of "economic man" remains a permanent defect in all bourgeois-liberal ideology. It seems to know nothing of what Thomas Hobbes termed "the continual competition for honor and dignity" in human affairs. It understands neither the traditional ethnic and cultural loyalties which qualify a consistent economic rationalism; nor the deep and complex motives in the human psyche which express themselves in the desire for "power and glory." All the conflicts in human society involving passions and ambitions, hatreds and loves, envies and ideals not recorded in the market place, are beyond the comprehension of the typical bourgeios ethos.

Or as George Orwell put it:

The energy that actually shapes the world springs from emotions--racial pride, leader-worship, religious belief, love of war--which liberal intellectuals mechanically write off as anachronisms, and which they have usually destroyed so completely in themselves as to have lost all power of action.

Orwell uses H.G. Wells as the poster child of a failed bourgeois-liberal ideologue:

He was, and still is, quite incapable of understanding that nationalism, religious bigotry and feudal loyalty are far more powerful forces than what he himself would describe as sanity. Creatures out of the Dark Ages have come marching into the present, and if they are ghosts they are at any rate ghosts which need a strong magic to lay them. The people who have shown the best understanding of Fascism are either those who have suffered under it or those who have a Fascist streak in themselves. A crude book like "The Iron Heel,' written nearly thirty years ago, is a truer prophecy of the future than either "Brave New World" or "The Shape of Things to Come." If one had to choose among Well's own contemporaries a writer who could stand towards him as a corrective, one might choose Kipling, who was not deaf to the evil voices of power and military "glory."

--George Orwell, "Wells, Hitler and the World State"

Anonymous Jones :

To synthesize the comments of both DownSouth and Siggy, non-financial incentives are crucial to much of the world, just not to those who run it.

Another problem with management beyond the Peter Principle is the self-selection bias. It is exactly those who seek the levels of upper management of the large companies, especially the position of CEO, who are the most likely to exhibit antisocial personality disorder. It is rare that a non-sociopath will have a competitive advantage over a sociopath in rising up the corporate ranks to the top. To wit...

"Profile of the Sociopath

* Grandiose Sense of Self. Feels entitled to certain things as "their right." Extreme narcissism. Can create, and get caught up in, a complex belief about their own powers and abilities. Believe they are all-knowing, entitled to every wish. May state readily that their goal is to be a mogul, rule the world.

* Need for Stimulation Living on the edge. Promiscuity and gambling are common.

* Incapacity for Love Ultimate goal is the creation of a willing victim; incapable of real human attachment to another

* Superficial Charm and conventional appearance Does not perceive that anything is wrong with them; only rarely in difficulty with the law, but seeks out situations where their tyrannical behavior will be tolerated, condoned, or admired

* Manipulative and Conning They never recognize the rights of others and see their self-serving behaviors as permissible. They appear to be charming, yet are covertly hostile and domineering, seeing their victim as merely an instrument to be used. They may dominate and humiliate their victims.

* Seeks Affirmation to Create Lack of Remorse, Shame or Guilt Has an emotional need to justify their crimes and therefore needs their victim's affirmation (respect, gratitude and love); Does not see others around them as people, but only as targets and opportunities. Instead of friends, they have victims and accomplices who end up as victims.

* Irresponsibility/Unreliability Not concerned about wrecking others' lives and dreams. Oblivious or indifferent to the devastation they cause. Does not accept blame themselves, but blames others, even for acts they obviously committed."

DownSouth :

Anonymous Jones,

I had a psychologist friend who believed the same as you, that those with anti-social personality disorder are disproportionately drawn to and well-suited to positions of power. But he insisted upon one caveat, and that is that human behavioral types are distributed along continua and not in discrete categories. Probably nowhere is this better demonstrated than in the findings of Kinsey, Pomeroy and Martin, who developed a seven-point scale (0-6) to indicate degrees of homosexuality-heterosexuality.

We could do the same with type of behavior you describe. A person with the characteristics you enumerate we could define as a 0, and a person, let's say, who is kind, generous, compassionate and caring we could call a 6. I think it goes without saying that a 4, 5 or 6 would be totally inappropriate as a modern corporate executive. But when we get 0's in positions of power, we have a problem.

As to your comment that "non-financial incentives are crucial to much of the world, just not to those who run it," I have to disagree. Being an engineer by training and a reformed "pragmatic jewell," as an art-dealer friend of mine used to call me, I once believed the same as you do.

However, if those who "run the world" do not respond to non-financial incentives, then how do you explain this?:

"Mexican splashes out record $140m for Jackson Pollock's drops of genius
1948 work by American master becomes world's most expensive painting"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/nov/03/usa.topstories3

As the article explains, that's the most expensive painting ever sold, $4 million per square foot for some paint dribbled (and litterally "dribbled" if you're familiar with the work of Jackson Pollock) on a canvas.

I could write quite a bit about this, as it's common knowledge amongst those who study ancient civilizations that powerful men have always coveted exclusive objects that convey a sense of prestige, status and rank upon their owners, and that much human behavior throughout history has been dedicated to acquiring these objects. This behavior can hardly be described as "rational," and has no place within the classical economic paradigm. And yet there it is.

Anonymous Jones :

DownSouth --

I agree with your instinct that most everything is a continuum. I actually believe what people perceive as "bright lines" are usually much more fuzzy upon closer inspection. You can play this game with anything, even acts as repugnant as murder and rape. Start pushing anyone with tough fact sets and their "bright lines" quickly blur.

The reason most humans accept a belief in any certain bright line is for economy of thought. It is just a natural heuristic technique. However, once one accepts that almost everything is a continuum, the world becomes much more interesting. What is the shape of the continuum? Is it a barbell with little in the middle? Or is it a ball with sticks on the sides? Or is it evenly distributed across? Or is it irregularly shaped?

But these questions are useless for most of humanity. People become attached to their heuristic methods and often react in anger when it is suggested that the lines they have drawn could possibly be masking a more complex and subtle world. So we should probably keep this to ourselves before everyone gets their knives out.

FWIW, I didn't actually promote the "synthesis" as my belief. I was just being "clever" (sarcasm intended). I think it would be very difficult for anyone to care about nothing but money. In fact, the "0" sociopath would usually see money as a means, not an end. The end is probably better defined as power, to which money is a very good means. As you note, lifetimes could be spent writing about this.

donna :

I don't believe in the Peter principle. I think companies just promote the managers who suck up best, and then find out they are only good at sucking up.

\

donna :

And I don't think the problem with Citi is diversification --they are simply evil and stupid.

gatopeich :

Well said, donna.

Trapped by the interesting post and superb comments, thinking about reading more of J. London, and at the same time realizing that we are talking the talk while they walk... Away with our money!

moslof :

Belonging to clubs like the Augusta National and landing the corporate jet there a couple hours after a break in the February weather doesn't require much money because the Master's tournament pays the bills tax free and you can meet with all your CEO buddies and strategize with no gossipy women around. These are the non$ perks that any and all bankers will bow down to their bosses for, just to keep the hope alive....

Francois :

"The boredom factor is important. Much of traditional banking is quite boring. The desire to find new challenges is an admirable human trait. It is, however, very expensive for shareholders to allow their chief executives to indulge it."

AMBAC comes to mind as a case example. Here was the corporation who had the most net profit per employee on the PLANET. But the business was a bore; mix that with the side effects of a testosterone-based culture and danger signals should've started to flash all over the place.

[Jul 15, 2009] The Economics of Narcissism By Marion Maneker

Jul 14, 2009 | The Big Money

How grandiosity and lack of empathy created our modern malaise

Narcissism is back in the news, thanks to Sarah Palin. Todd Purdum's Vanity Fair profile, which appeared just days before Palin announced her resignation, described the Alaskan governor this way:

More than once in my travels in Alaska, people brought up, without prompting, the question of Palin's extravagant self-regard. Several told me, independently of one another, that they had consulted the definition of "narcissistic personality disorder" in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders—"a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy"—and thought it fit her perfectly.

The diagnosis clearly resonates, not because it is accurate (who knows?) but because narcissism is the psychological substrate of our troubled times. During the credit boom, an unquenchable need for short-term success, combined with a lack of empathy for those who didn't share in the economic windfalls, was a byproduct of a society trying desperately to survive beyond its means. We both empowered the most ruthlessly self-aggrandizing among us and succumbed to the erosion of any authority that might have contained the overweening. We lost any independent measure of the American dream.

Still, a question remains: Was the army of narcissists unleashed upon our society a product of the boom or the cause of it—or both? For John Gartner, grandiosity was a precondition for success. His 2005 book The Hypomanic Edge praised the reckless abandon of Americans who leapt before they looked. (Slate's Dan Gross made a great case for why those leaders ultimately threaten the institutions they lead.)

In the noughties—given our obsessing over celebrities, insatiable consumption of debt to keep up with others, and the loss of any meaningful values that might sustain us in adversity—the country seemed to be caught up in its own culture of narcissism. As exceptional as this new culture was, it was not new. The culture of narcissism first appeared as a popular concept 30 years ago. And this week marks the apogee of its influence with the anniversary of President Jimmy Carter's infamous "malaise" speech (delivered on July 15, 1979).

That much-reviled address is an unlikely subject for study. But historian Kevin Mattson has done his best to reclaim it in his new book What the Heck Are You Up to, Mr. President? To Mattson, a desperate nation, hobbled by a stagnating economy with chronic energy shortages, a crumbling manufacturing sector, and crippling inflation, was buoyed by Carter's willingness to level with them. Carter tried to snap the country out of its frenzy of selfishness and return it to a civic-minded purpose. The speech boosted the president's poll numbers by 11 points in one evening, and the event seemed to provide a catharsis of sorts, if a short-lived one.

The 1970s were a nadir of American self-confidence. Carter came to give the "malaise" speech at the prodding of Patrick Caddell, who was himself inspired by a reading of historian Christopher Lasch's surprise best-seller of 1979, The Culture of Narcissism. A quiet Midwesterner with a cranky pen, Lasch was the Paul Krugman of 1979 — an esoteric thinker whose political stance was informed by raw anger and disgust. Lasch may have used radical cultural concepts to inform his views, but he himself was deeply and personally conservative. He would later write a book dismissing the notion of progress and locating our best hope as a society in small-town acceptance of limitations.

The Culture of Narcissism was an attack not only on the excesses and disillusionment of the '70s but also on the growth of institutions—the liberal state, corporations, and the therapeutic culture—that broke down the individual's independence and authority. Those institutions may have grown out of a need to protect us from depredations. But the unintended consequence was to replace our freedom and individual authority with insecurity and anxiety.

Thus was born the narcissistic personality of the 1970s. The cultural narcissist—as opposed to the clinical one, like Palin—can overcome the anxiety created by his or her lost economic and social independence, according to Lasch, only "by seeing his ‘grandiose self' reflected in the attentions of others, or by attaching himself to those who radiate celebrity, power, and charisma. For the narcissist, the world is a mirror whereas the rugged individualist saw it as an empty wilderness to be shaped in his own design."

Narcissism thrives only where positive authority—a world of role models who establish genuine, trusted leadership and an economic system where rules are defined and enforced—no longer presides. Lasch's narcissism was a direct result of the hypocrisy of the liberal state and its collapse under the multiple assaults of the Vietnam War, Watergate, the degraded environment, and the emasculating energy crisis.

In our own day, narcissism seems the direct result not of societal failure but of success run amok. (Though we've had our own fruitless, frustrating war with its concomitant betrayals of public trust and an awareness of impending environmental collapse, too.) Beginning in 1994—15 years after the "malaise" speech and 15 years before today—the United States turned itself inside out. The Republican congressional victory of 1994 brought about a libertarian detente between left and right centered around globalization, in the form of NAFTA, and cultural truce, where everyone agreed to disagree on hot-button issues like abortion.

The new order unleashed an explosion of wealth, new technology, and a reinvention of politics both domestically and internationally. The '90s ended up being the 1970s in reverse. Instead of the decline of industry, we had the upending explosion of the Internet. Where the 1970s had eroding pessimism, the 1990s had the optimism that "this time, it is different."

In both cases, the path from past to future was no longer clear, which created confusion and doubt about what rules to follow. Clinton's new liberalism sought deregulation and a return to personal responsibility, but only one side of the equation took hold. Throughout American society in the 1990s, authority was eclipsed by the unparalleled success of young people.

There were other similarities between then and now that contributed to the emergence of the cultural narcissist. Both eras had presidents who were threatened with impeachment. Both eras had a vertiginous rise in housing prices. In the 1970s, homes became a rare anchor for embattled Americans as their most important asset became a refuge from rampant inflation.

For us later, our houses were the devil's candy to satisfy our insatiable needs. Instead of the last and most vital of our assets—the one protected from bankruptcy by homestead laws in many states—we used property as a grub stake in a poker match, hoping to win shallow advantages like better-looking kitchens, elaborate home theaters, and more authentic personal experiences. Each one of these desires fits neatly into the Lasch-ian definition of narcissism: the frantic need to distinguish ourselves without ever mastering our anxieties.

Lacking her own goals, and an independent measure of success, the narcissistic personality keeps chasing a fleeting dream. Perhaps that is why the debt bubble churned endlessly without restraint. We had everything, but it was never enough. Insatiability, of course, is a hallmark symptom.

Another era of adversity might have restored the bulwarks of our society. The excesses of the Internet boom were burned off in the scandals of Enron, Tyco, and the like. The Sept. 11 attacks also seemed to presage a new era of rationality. The Bush administration's response, however, was narcissism through and through. A sober response would have been to track down the malefactors to ensure that justice prevailed. Instead, the neocons in the Bush Pentagon pursued an unlikely target—Iraq—with the misguided idea that they could transform the politics of the Middle East through shock and awe. (Grandiose?) They even imagined they would be greeted as liberators. (Admiration seeking?) And they failed to address the root causes of Sept. 11 attacks: the frustrations felt by the disenfranchised toward the United States. (Not much empathy there, eh?)

So the flood of credit from 2002 on only fueled the narcissism raging at the center of our society. To read the Culture of Narcissism today is to look at ourselves through a distant mirror. We have a better communicator as president, but many of the same maladies confront us—a crippled economy, a recently discredited president whose White House was filled with dirty-tricksters, and a sense that American power no longer has a place in the world. The only good thing is that the feeling of desperation so pervasive during Jimmy Carter's time has not taken hold; but that could be because we just haven't hit bottom yet.

Marion Maneker is the former publisher of HarperCollins's business imprint.

[Jun 6, 2009] Dan Agin Political Corruption, Wall Street Frauds, and Sociopaths

" Labels are just linguistic conveniences that we use to organize reality. We need to keep in mind the continuities in the real world, the gradations, the way traits gradually differ along a spectrum from one person to another, from ordinary to extreme."

Dec 17, 2008 | The Huffington Post

The roots of all of this are deep and troubling. Aside from the general American ethic of "money talks"--net worth more important than personal worth--there's a real psychiatric problem.

Psychologists and psychiatrists have learned a few things about what they call "social cognition"--our awareness of our connections to the people around us. People with normally developed social cognition appear to have attributes that foster social understanding. For example, they have what psychologists call a "theory of mind"--the ability to recognize what some person may be thinking from that person's facial expression or from cues related to what that person is doing or saying. Those with normally developed social cognition also have an attribute called "empathy"--the ability to imagine or feel the emotions of another person.

Unfortunately, either as a consequence of variant genes or very early environment or an interaction of both genes and environment, not everyone is operating with a full deck in the social cognition domain.

For example, 30 to 50 percent of all incarcerated criminals in American prisons have measurable problems in social cognition.

Autistic children have problems in social cognition.

Many psychotics such as schizophrenics have problems in social cognition.

Serial killers have special problems with empathy, although they do have good theory of mind--they excel at reading people and manipulating them. But lacking empathy, they can kill without batting an eye.

Sociopaths in general usually have social cognition problems, especially with empathy. They are people who feel nothing when viewing or imagining the pain and suffering of other people.

Most clinical psychologists and psychiatrists use a rating scheme called the Hare Psychopathy Checklist to diagnose sociopathy (also called psychopathy).

Here are some items on the checklist to detect sociopaths:

Glibness and superficial charm. Grandiose sense of self-worth. Pathological lying. Conning and manipulative behavior. Lack of remorse or guilt. Lack of empathy. Failure to accept responsibility for own actions.

Yes, we could make a list of politicians and Wall Street scam artists described by the above cluster of traits.

Sociopaths? Labels are just linguistic conveniences that we use to organize reality. We need to keep in mind the continuities in the real world, the gradations, the way traits gradually differ along a spectrum from one person to another, from ordinary to extreme.

Not everyone with the traits of a sociopath is a serial killer. Not everyone with the traits of a sociopath is in prison. Not everyone with the traits of a sociopath is autistic or psychotic.

One can have enough empathy to refrain from homicide, but not enough empathy to refrain from fraud or political callousness that causes harm to many thousands of people.

So if you want to understand how someone can run the huge scam that was Enron, or how someone can rip $50 billion out of the pockets of charities and people, many of whom are "friends," or how some people can be callous about a torture called water-boarding (a "no-brainer," he said), or offer nothing but a shrug when reminded they have caused the death of thousands--if you want to understand the dynamics of these behaviors it might help to remember the continuum that runs from ordinary people with empathy to people with no empathy at all.

It seems that's the real America. Or is it? These days it seems we're living in a society that's a candy store for sociopaths and almost-sociopaths and wannabe-sociopaths.

I don't have a fix. Regulation will help on Wall Street, but it's only a band-aid. The general problem is apparently psychiatric.

With so many media people manifesting amazement at the revelations about political corruption and Wall Street scams, one wonders if the media are really amazed or is the surprise just one more example...

With so many media people manifesting amazement at the revelations about political corruption and Wall Street scams, one wonders if the media are really amazed or is the surprise just one more example...

MyTherapy Discussion Forums - Sociopath Comments.

Dear Readers,

I'm a sociopath, lets make that perfectly clear. I don't know if I'm an exception to any rule, but I have a morale guideline that substitutes for the conscience, I was born without. I don't feel, as we all probably have researched my brain reads stimuli much differently, or ignores it all together. As a sociopath, it is hard for me to relate to the value the rest of you put into your relationships, if someone is so horrible and cannot be controlled then just leave, do not pass go, do not let them collect your two hundred dollars, as the case seems to be over and over again.

Advice to Victims.

I've read so many of these stories, and cannot see how every single one of you fall for the ploys of your alleged loved ones. The thing you need to understand is sociopaths seek control, even me. It is very easy to learn just how to present anything to get others to agree or at least behave as you want them too, the best way to discourage a sociopath is to take the control away from them. You can do this directly, assert yourself as the one in control, or get law enforcement involved, most sociopaths, out of self preservation, will not come after you with their own freedom at stake. We understand consequences, and will not volunteer for any of them.

Addendum.

If you've already suffered and left, and are merely looking for some sort of understanding, well then, hear this. People, these days, have a Victim mentality. You, humans, want pity, consolation, like your own personal TV drama. TV is not how the world is suppose to work, but I find that more and more situations end up with dramatic endings. Drama is not supposed to run the world, blame your television set. It is not hard to get over things, simply separate it, because if you let this person control your thoughts, then they won, they have accomplished their goal. Control.

Advice to Sociopaths

The world is stale, boredom is so hard to overcome, because you don't FEEL like our fellow inhabitants of the Earth, we simply exist. We get impulses like animals, but we also use Logic, more precisely than any other being, even humans. Sociopathy is a Blessing or a Curse, depending on whom you ask, and what day it is. I've seen horrid displays of human emotion that makes me glad that I have no emotional spectrum, but I also resent the fact that I'm numb inside, it has almost driven me to extremes, but the code I live my life by, my substitute conscience, always keeps me in line. I made my rules that I live by, and insist that others live by in my presence, and if I can agree on these rules, as important, then I can stop myself from doing the rather basic or violent things that my impulses drive me too.

I know, most of us, can tell a lot about a person merely looking them over, know what they want to hear, and know how to present it to them in a manner to get what we want, I know I can. I'm very good at playing human. I'm handsome, charming, and have a higher IQ than a good ninety percent of people on the planet, and yes, I see myself as 'better than' everyone surrounding me, but that doesn't mean I should use the people beneath me, I would rather help them, like a stray animal, they're very little importance to me, but I'd rather not have them whining within earshot. With your ability to manipulate people, you can lead them in the 'right' direction just as easy as you can lead them in the wrong one.

Humanity is all we have, really, to communicate with, especially since there isn't conventions or parades held in our honor. So, we must simply learn how to be peaceful in our world with others. A human life means very little, we've had time to observe and analyze that people are going to die, so their personal deaths aren't very important, but we are human, at least, genetically, too. We will die, the same way they will, so our lives really aren't more important than others'. Plenty of jobs in society a sociopath would excel at, far past our human counter parts. Lawyers, Law Enforcement, Politicians, and many others, to name a few. I suggest you look strongly in the mirror, and decide on a good life to live, because, we all know how tempting boredom is, to do something new, and satisfy that perpetually talking mind. So, devote yourself to something, even if you cannot feel happy at the fruition of your skill, you can know that you're the best at what you do, and know that rather than manipulating those around you, you were an example among us and helped others rather than hurt them. With a smile and good reputation you can get a lot further in life than with fear. Fear eventually inspires your pets to snap at you, or flee. Love, Respect, and Admiration inspires them to continue on in the path you set for them.

Comments

WhiteWolf Starting Member

JD, as a sociopath, I can tell you... you are not one of us. While I don't doubt you have issues this is not your issue. Stop letting your ex wife dictate to you what you are. As I am sure she has something to do with your believe that you are a sociopath.

Also I wouldn't expect Divineman to return or reply. I've had some experience with the hit and fade tactic he is using. No doubt he probably came back at some point to see what the replies were but didn't feel the need to.. amuse you.

I, on the other hand, am in the mood to amuse myself and you by answering some of the questions you had for him. Perhaps they will enlighten you or otherwise confirm some presumed theories you have had.

Marriage is something I can't really breakdown into less than a chapter. It would take me quite a while to explain and I am not currently in the mood to go into such detail.

BTW, I learned a long time ago that it is best to get a girl to cheat on you and leave you. That way you don't have to put up with the constant acquisitions and harassment they want to subject you to. If a woman leaves you she wont look back. If you leave her she will stalk you till the end of time. Now my ex still hates me bitterly but she doesn't stalk me and that is all that really matters to me. I am not concerned with her erratic emotional instability even if I am the cause.

As for faking emotions... The only time I have found it hard to fake emotions is at a funeral. Everyone is crying and sad and they want you to be sad and cry with them but all I want to do is go get something to eat or go smoke some weed. I believe in the Bible. So I know that certain people, when they die, will go to Heaven. So why feel sad for them? Are they not going to a happier place? I do not understand this about people. You weep and cry for people who are moving on to a better existence than your own. It doesn't make much sense.

Other than funerals faking emotions isn't hard. I like to play the role of Chandler from the TV series Friends. I like to be the funny/witty/sarcastic guy. It's a better role to play because you can always act as if you are being sarcastic.. even when you are not. Other than that I just pretend to be interested in what these cattle say. I mean if you think about it.. normal people are all a bunch of fake liars anyway. Always laughing and smiling about stupid crap no one really cares about but they do so because it is their social norm. How ironic that their social norm is just my plain norm. Who's faking it now? Reflect on that.. so called normal people.

BTW, All you Christians and your waivering faith are going straight to Hell. Why? Because you didn't obey the laws. Why? Because your EMOTIONS got in the way. Little note. If your "temple" is completely corrupted you can kill yourself and still go to Heaven. In fact killing yourself really isn't a rejection of God so much as a rejection of pain. Normal peoples views on God pisses me off the most. How can you say a homosexual is going to Hell or someone who kills himself when all sins are equal sins? Bunch of people living in glasses houses throwing stones at each other. Each of you claiming to be correct. Each of you claiming the other to be wrong. You so called normal people are responsible for the deaths of millions of people around the world due to your arrogant/ignorant judgements. Then you say I am crazy because I don't share your emotional instability. You people of humanity are not a great people. You are an abomination to this planet and your own greatest enemy.

Normal people are slaves to their emotions while sociopaths are ruled by their logic. That's what makes us superior to you. That's what gives us control over you and that's why we think less of you.

WhiteWolf Starting Member

CBoo, moral insanity is part of being a sociopath.

As for evil deeds. What is evil? To determine what evil is really relies on what is socialy acceptable in an area. In Iran people get stoned to death. In America that is simply evil. So evil can be a broad term. We also prey on others which can be seen as evil. I believe it is more instinctive than evil. We see weakness.. we exploit weakness. It's how we survive.

I, for some reason, do not like little dogs. Something about them triggers my instinct to attack. I tortured a lot of little animals as a child. As an adult I try very hard not to torture them but the instinct to punt a little dog is ever present in my mind. I also tortured cats as a child but as I have grown up I have come to really love cats.. but I still hate little dogs. lol Am I evil as well?

CBoo, I will let you in on a little secret that may help you some. Other sociopaths will hate me for admiting this. If you actually got your ex to stalk you... you got the very best of him. You beat him bad if he was that obsessed with aquiring revenge against you. Take comfort in that thought because you won. To us the game is everything because we have nothing else and you beat him at the game.

The following is just me rambling.

I'm working on my sheep and wolves analogy but it is not perfected yet. So much of the new testiment is dedicated to the sociopaths. I think Jesus was trying to explain things to people who will never understand. If you feed the wolf, give the wolf a home to defend and love the wolf.. it is your wolf. That which would prey on you becomes your greatest defender. But you do not love your neighbors as you should thus we prey on you. You're supposed to drown us in love. It is your love that destroys our hate. It is your fear that turns you into our prey. Perhaps your fear provokes our instinct to attack or prey upon you. I believe this is only true for sociopaths who have moral guidlines. The rest are just wolves.

Surviving A Psychopath (Sociopath)

MyTherapy Discussion Forums

Dear Members,

Many of you have written elsewhere about the emotional damage done to you from living with a psychopath (formerly termed "sociopath"). A psychopath is defined as one who lacks empathy, guilt, remorse, and a feeling of responsibility. Thus the psychopath is the exact opposite of the depressed individual (who often suffers from excessive guilt, remorse and feelings of responsibility).

There is an excellent description of a psychopath's behavior at:

http://www.lovefraud.com/01_whatsaSociopath/key_symptoms_sociopath.html

Optional Detailed Information:

The best researched scale to measure the degree to which an individual is a psychopath is R. Hare's Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) which is discussed at:

http://www.answers.com/topic/psychopathy-checklist-revised

Like all rating scales, this scale has some reliability problems:
http://www.campsych.com/pcl_revised.htm

The psychological diagnosis of a "psychopath" differs from the psychiatric diagnosis of "antisocial personality disorder". This distinction is discussed at:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16756576&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum

Dr. Hare discusses this issue in much more detail at:

http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/p960239.html

Given the harm that psychopaths do to others; it is easy to just judge them as "evil" and not consider that this disorder may have an underlying biological cause.

Recent research has shown that psychopaths may have abnormal functioning in the parts of their brains that control emotion. There are excellent reviews of this at:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16712954&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16492259&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum

Our very compassionate member, David, alluded to psychopaths having such a biologically-based disorder in an earlier discussion. If you have ever lived with a psychopath, you will eventually conclude that there must be something desperately wrong in the way their brain functions. How can a normal person not feel guilt, remorse or responsibility?

Research on antisocial personality disorder suggests that about half of this disorder has an environmental causation, and the other half has a genetic causation:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16291212&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum

A very important research finding is that women are much less likely to be psychopaths than men:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16333808&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum

Early research suggested that the treatment of psychopaths actually made them worse. This research argued that psychotherapy just gave the psychopath new ways to justify their behavior (e.g., "I learned that my behavior is all due to my terrible childhood", etc.). More recent research has concluded that we just don't know if treatment helps or harms psychopaths:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=15176755&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum

However, there is a consensus amongst mental health professionals. Namely, if you are in a relationship with a psychopath, leave. There is no way whereby a normal individual can happily live with another individual who does not feel guilt, remore or responsibility. Remember, this advice is valid only if the other individual is truly a psychopath (that is, the individual has the majority of items listed in R. Hare's Psychopathy Checklist-Revised).

Since this topic has received many posts elsewhere; I believe it should be given its own forum here.

Thus I would welcome hearing if your mental health problems were related to dealing with a psychopath.

Phil Long M.D.Administrator

MyTherapy Discussion Forums - Leaving a sociopath - tips - add yours

CBoo Starting Member

I'm on a mission. When I left my ex sociopath husband, I was totally unprepared for what lay ahead of me and I made crucial mistakes in dealing with my situation. I'm painfully aware that there are people out there who are currently living with a sociopath and want to leave, but may be unsure of what to expect or of how to go about it. While all situations are different in some ways, leaving a sociopath, because of their very nature, is almost always complicated. Even more complicated when marriage, kids and financial factors are involved. I don't have all the solutions, but I will give all that I have and hope that others who have freed themselves from a sociopath can add their tips too. I speak only from my own experience and from what I have read from others' experiences.

Some of this advice may also be a applicable to men leaving women sociopaths.

• Prepare yourself mentally. You cannot change the sociopath, not by love, not by therapy, not by time, not by separation, not by anything. Especially not by having a baby with him/her. It's vital that you accept that and that you resolve never to return. When you leave a sociopath it must be for good, or else you are setting yourself up for a sick and protracted game with him/her.
  
• Realize that what attracted you to the sociopath in the first place was a mirage, a false image. The sociopath is good at "sussing people out". He/she can figure out very quickly what it is that you are looking for in a partner and morphs themselves into your soul mate. Every so often that mask slips and you see the real person, but the sociopath knows very well how to put that mask back up at any time that it suits their skewered view of the situation. Do not be conned by that false persona again. And don't by intimidated by their appearance of supreme confidence, that's also a front.
  
• The sociopath is able to moderate their own behaviour. Often, others think that he/she is a wonderful person. They never get close enough to see the other side. This is how the sociopath is able to function in day to day life. They do this for self-preservation, and it often makes us think we look like we're crazy. Remember that you are not crazy, you have emotions, you are normal. Its also common for a sociopath to suggest that you have mental issues by the way. Its just another abuse tactic.
  
• Sociopaths very often try to isolate you from people that would be your greatest allies should you leave. Family, friends and potential friends - sometimes even his own family. Sometimes he will try to fill your "social calender" with his own friends, those he knows he can turn to his side in time to come. Typical tactics would be to bad-mouth you to them, or them to you or both ways. Also typical would be to fill your time in such a way that you lose touch with friends or to move you away from familiar territory. I have read so many times, and it was also the case in my situation, where a simple phone call to mom or dad or an old friend was such a relief to both parties and that bonds were never really broken. Its very good to have support when you leave a sociopath.
  
• Often it is difficult to leave a sociopath because you have no income of your own, or he has been financially abusive and there are kids to consider, or you are scared he will be violent. In fact, I believe many women stay in bad marriages for these reasons. The best advice I can give here, and there is NO shame in this, is to visit your local women's shelter. You do not (unless you choose to or need to) have to sleep at the shelter. The wonderful people at these places have a wealth of advice to give - financial, legal, medical, housing, councelling etc. At many shelters they will even help you to find employment. I would advise paying them a visit even before you leave the sociopath, whether he has been physically abusive or not. Their support is also valuable if you do not have support from family or friends.
  
• Limit any contact that you have with the sociopath. If you have no kids, cut all contact. If you have kids, limit it to only communication necessary for the kid/s sake. Insist on communicating only via e-mail, registered letters, or via/with a third party. A sociopath will mess with your head so badly if you allow him to talk with you direct. That I can guarantee you.
  
• If you are going to divorce him or you have kids, start gathering all evidence immediately. Prepare yourself for a massive battle. I have yet to read of an amicable divorce/custody agreement from a sociopath. If your finances are strained, apply now for legal aid, some countries have a waiting list for "free" lawyers. If you can afford a really good lawyer, don't spare the expense. If you can't then make sure you're on his case constantly from day one. Just by the way, a sociopath always tells his lawyer what to do and not the other way around. So take advice from your lawyer, get the options available and instruct him/her. Do not be lax with the legal system, make it work. And don't spare the awful, disgusting details about the sociopath and his/her behaviour. Paint a picture of the very devil himself because that is what he will try to do with your image.
  
• Expect the sociopath to dart off to the family advocate or whoever deals with child welfare in your country. The sociopath will present himself well, so try to get in first. Don't just presume that these people will see him for who he really is. Tell them everything. Offer evidence of abuse if you have it.
  
• Always work with the legal/child welfare system. You do not want to turn these people against you by suddenly running off with the kids or by breaching court orders.
  
• Once you have left the sociopath there is a chance that he/she will stalk and/or harass you and smear your reputation around your work, neighbourhood, friends etc. Try to gather evidence of this and pursue a restraining order. All sociopaths are capable of anything and should never be underestimated. Check your car regularly - tyres, battery, water tank, breaks etc, and make sure where you are living is very secure. Notify neighbours and local police of any interferences near your home.
  
• I may add more as I think of it. I hope this helps someone out there. I don't mean to scare anyone by the way, its just reality, sorry.

  Take care of yourself, you deserve a good life.

  Cboo

FLMgirl

Other possible tips:

• Teach your children how to make a collect call, and how to dial 911.
  
• Ask a neighbor to call the police if violence begins.
  
• Be sure to have all abuse (sexual and physical) documented.
  
• Hide away some money.
  
• Establish a code word for danger with friends, and family.
  
• Do not tell the him/her that you are leaving face to face. Leave when he is not there, get somewhere safe, then call him, or have someone else call and tell him/her that you have left. In many cases, you aren't just leaving, you are escaping.
  
• Check the laws where you are, as stalking is now a criminal offense in many states, and countries.
  
• Hide an extra set of house and car keys.
  
• When preparing to leave, try to have available:

  --Social Security numbers (yours, his, childrens)
  --Birth certificates (your and the childrens)
  --Drivers license
  --Bank account numbers
  --Insurance policies, and numbers
  --Marriage license
  --Valuable jewelry

Everyday is a winding road...

[Apr 22, 2009] Economist's View A Crisis of Ethic Proportions

Patricia Shannon says...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30267075//

Adult psychopaths commonly have a long history of significant behavior problems in youth and juvenile delinquency (although most delinquents will not become psychopaths). Studies show that a significant portion of children who show psychopathic traits — often referred to among researchers as “callous-unemotional (CU) traits,” which include not being concerned about others’ feelings and not feeling bad or guilty

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30267075/page/2/

Frick says some of the best evidence for helping kids with CU traits comes from an Australian study of boys ages 4 to 8 with conduct problems. Those with CU traits did not respond to the common discipline strategy of time-outs but they did show a response to a parenting strategy in which they were rewarded — praised — for good, “prosocial” behavior. Frick says the study, published in 2005 in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, makes sense considering that people with psychopathic tendencies tend to be reward-driven and largely insensitive to punishment.

[Nov 21, 2008] U.S. suicide rate is up

"I would not be surprised if a big factor was the despair that sets in by age 50 plus or minus when you realize your life has been wasted doing meaningless tasks for bosses who are essentially criminals.
The American way of prosperity leaves something out."

Los Angeles Times

After falling for more than a decade, the U.S. suicide rate has climbed steadily since 1999, driven by an alarming increase among middle-age adults, researchers said Monday.

A new six-year analysis in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that the U.S. suicide rate rose to 11 per 100,000 people in 2005, from 10.5 per 100,000 in 1999, an increase of just under 5%.

The report found that virtually all of the increase was attributable to a nearly 16% jump in suicides among people ages 40 to 64, a group not commonly seen as high-risk. The rate for that age group rose to 15.6 per 100,000 in 2005, from 13.5 per 100,000 in 1999.

Susan P. Baker, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health and an author of the study, said she was baffled by the findings. Sociological studies have found that middle age is generally a time of relative security and emotional well-being, she said.

"We really don't know what is causing this," said Dr. Paula Clayton, research director of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, who was not involved in the study. "All we have is speculation."

One possibility, she said, is that the increase in suicides might be tied to a concurrent increase in abuse of prescription pain pills, such as OxyContin. Studies have shown that people who abuse drugs are at greater risk for suicide, she noted.

Another possible explanation, she said, was the drop in hormone replacement therapy after it was linked to health risks in 2002. Women who gave up the drugs or decided not to take them might have been more susceptible to depression and potentially suicide, she said.

Dr. Ian Cook, an associate professor of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences at UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study, said stresses of modern life, particularly worries in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, might have a role.

Untreated depression is the leading cause of suicide, he said.

"The bottom line is while we can't infer a lot of things about what is causing the trend, I think it cries out for better depression screening and treatment," he said.

Suicide rates declined 18% from 1986 to 1999, helped in part by a focus on prevention among teenagers and the elderly.

In the current study, researchers found little or no change in the suicide rates for three other age groups: 10 to 19, 20 to 29, and over 65.

Suicides for whites ages 40 to 64 rose 17% from 1999 to 2005, researchers said. For middle-age white men, the rate rose 16% to 26.9 per 100,000 in 2005, from 23.1 per 100,000 in 1999. For white women in that age group, the rate rose 19% to 8.2 per 100,000 from 6.9 per 100,000.

The suicide rate among middle-age African Americans rose 7% from 1999 to 2005, but it was not enough to drive up the overall suicide rate among blacks.

For black men ages 40 to 64, the rate rose 5% to 10.4 per 100,000 from 9.9 per 100,000, and for black women in that age group, the rate rose 14% to 2.5 per 100,000 from 2.2 per 100,000.

Baker said she had no idea why the increases among whites were higher.

Gellene is a Times staff writer.

Comments from Angry Bear Late Working-Age Suicides Rising

coberly,

The authors find an increase in the rate of suicide in a longitudinal analysis of the 40-64 cohort. This would already hold for an inherent acceleration in suicide as people move from an younger cohort to the one being discussed.

Greg

coberly: (despair over wasted life)

Isn't that what the stereotypical midlife crisis is mostly about? What you mentioned is just a particular aspect of the general phenomenon. And it usually doesn't start as late as 50. But I can imagine the despair escalates.

As for Greg's point, he has already followed up but what he says is essentially it's a boomer phenomenon -- whatever characteristics boomers have are strongest in the age group where the peak of the boomers is. That's how I read his claim.
cm

Really interesting, thanks for posting this. I'd also look to the increasing use of SSRI antidepressants, which have suicide as a side-effect. I understand some new allergy medicines also have depression and suicide as a side effect-Singulair?
Laurie

Yep, boomers. They died in their 20s and now in their 50s. There should be cheering all around.

But on a serious note, I wonder what the job loss is among this group. The stats on men/women increases work against this factor but it may play some role. Also, what about divorce. Are a greater number left alone in their 50s after children are grown with children moving elsewhere for jobs? A loneliness factor, perhaps?

Perhaps its just not anything in particular.
Anna Lee

[Nov 21, 2008] Rake (character) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A rake is defined as a man habituated to immoral conduct. Rakes are frequently stock characters in novels. Often a rake is a man who wastes his (usually inherited) fortune on wine, women and song, incurring lavish debts in the process. The rake is also frequently a cad: a man who seduces a young woman and impregnates her before leaving, often to her social or financial ruin. To call the character a rake calls attention to his promiscuity and wild spending of money; to call the character a cad implies a callous seducer who coldly breaks his victim's heart. These men are also known as heels. A bounder is an 'ill-bred, unscrupulous man', the social inferior of the cad.^[1][2][3][4] During the English Restoration period (1660–1688), the word was used in a glamorous sense: the Restoration rake is a carefree, witty, sexually irresistible aristocrat typified by Charles II's courtiers, the Earl of Rochester and the Earl of Dorset, who combined riotous living with intellectual pursuits and patronage of the arts. The Restoration rake is celebrated in the Restoration comedy of the 1660s and 1670s.^[5] After the reign of Charles II, and especially after the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the cultural perception of the rake took a dive into squalor. The rake became the butt of moralistic tales in which his typical fate was debtor's prison, venereal disease, or, in the case of William Hogarth's A Rake's Progress, insanity in Bedlam.^[6]

The rake is often portrayed as a heavy drinker or gambler. An earlier form of the word was rake-hell, a form reshaped by folk etymology to mean someone who stokes the fires of Hell, making them hotter. The actual etymology of the word is from the Old Norse reikall, meaning "vagrant" or "wanderer"; this was borrowed into Middle English as rakel (possibly via Dutch rekel, meaning "scoundrel").

Rakes are also very arrogant.^{[citation needed]}

Well known fictional rakes and cads include:

• Dorimant, the hero of The Man of Mode by George Etherege, based upon the historical Earl of Rochester mentioned below and above
• Compeyson, the man who jilted Miss Havisham in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
• Alec d'Urberville, Tess's seducer in Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
• Rodolphe Boulanger, Madame Bovary's principal lover
• Harry Paget Flashman, chief character of a series of novels by George MacDonald Fraser
• Don Juan
• Mollie Flannigan
• Dorian Gray
• Tom Rakewell, the protagonist of William Hogarth's series of paintings, A Rake's Progress
• The Prodigal Son, one of Jesus' parables
• The Vicomte de Valmont, the consummate seducer of the novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses
• Rupert of Hentzau
• Angel (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) in his persona as Liam of Galway, before he was made into a vampire
• Caledon Hockley, Rose DeWitt Bukater's fiance in Titanic
• George Wickham, of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice
• Pechorin, the anti-hero of A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov
• Harry Horner, from The Country Wife by William Wycherly
• Dmitri Karamazov sensualist elder brother of Doestyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov
• Lovelace, suitor to Clarissa in Samuel Richardson's novel. Lovelace (a pun on Loveless) is as much interested in power as seduction.
• Michael Moorcock's character Colonel Pyat presents one of the least appealing forms of the rake archetype, despite being historically a little too late for the classic definiton of a rake.

Historical figures who have informed the stock character include:

• Cagliostro
• Lord Byron
• John Mytton
• Giacomo Casanova
• Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset
• John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester
• Sir Charles Sedley
• John Wilkes
• Charles Mohun, 4th Baron Mohun
• Colonel Francis Charteris
• Hellfire Club
• Marquis de Sade
• Francis Dashwood
• Beauchamp Bagenal

The stock character of the rake can be contrasted with some others. The town drunk is frequently intoxicated, and impoverished by heavy drinking, but here the focus is on the character's alcoholic state rather than on sexual excess; the town drunk is typically older than the rake.

[Nov 19, 2008] Bullying devastates lives -- until victims find ways to heal By Janet Kornblum

USATODAY.com

Kathy Shedd had red hair. Meg Rafferty was shy. And Jodee Blanco was just different. Those were their crimes.

The punishments for Blanco, Shedd, Rafferty, and others like them? Being kicked, punched and spit upon. They were yelled at, taunted and shunned. They spent hard time in isolation, crying themselves to sleep at night, sometimes wanting to die.

They weren't in prison. They were in school. And their tormenters were not adults, but other children. And yet, now as adults, the memories of childhood bullying still haunt their daily lives.

"I was relentlessly tormented from fifth grade until the end of high school simply for being different," says Blanco, a former public relations executive from Chicago. Blanco wrote about her experiences in Please Stop Laughing at Us. .. : One Survivor's Extraordinary Quest to Prevent School Bullying, which was published in the spring. "I was ambushed. I would find my belongings floating in the toilet. I was spat at and kicked and worst — ignored."

Blanco, a school consultant who talks to students and teachers about ways to prevent bullying — often cyberbullying — still bears the emotional pain of bullying, including raw flashbacks to childhood torment. But she's getting help and now also wants other adults who have been bullied to seek help as well.

Though cyberbullying has taken center stage among many in the psychological community, "adult survivors of peer abuse," as she calls her demographic, often suffer in silence, she says.

Rafferty, of Eden Prairie, Minn., 52, knew she was different and "that there was something wrong with me," she says. But like many adult survivors, "I tried to hide it."

Not everyone who is bullied has lifelong trauma. But there's no question that "unrelenting, daily hostilities that maybe escalate to threats or actual aggression can be on par with torture and child abuse," or that "repeated and severe bullying can cause psychological trauma," says Daniel Nelson, medical director of the Child Psychiatry Unit at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center.

"There's no question that bullying in certain instances can be absolutely devastating."

The abuse that Kathy Shedd of Lafayette, Ind., endured more than two decades ago still affects her, even at age 42.

Shedd's crime? Being born with red hair — and having a name that unfortunately made rhyming taunts simple.

"Being bullied set me up as a mark," she says. "I don't fight back." It's so bad that she likes to have her husband with her when she goes out in public — although lately things have been improving for her, ever since she began focusing on the issue.

"I've always wanted to know: Why? Why do they bully?"

That's a simple question with many answers. Experts have different theories on why certain children get picked on, but most agree that being different — in even the smallest way — can lead to bullying.

As a teenager, Jenny Morsch, 28, of Hinckley, Ill., became the target of anonymous letters that called her fat and threatened her. She has her suspicions about the teens in town who might have written the letters. But even police couldn't identify the perpetrators, leaving Jenny ostracized, sentenced to sit alone at lunch with kids staring at her. The letters made her frightened, depressed and suicidal."

She did get help in college. But a decade after it happened, it still affects her.

"I feel like everything sucks and I can't do anything right. I feel like I have to be perfect."

Blanco is also still affected today, even though she spends her life counseling other victims. Recently she began therapy to help her put the pain behind her.

And she strongly believes that others who have survived years of abuse also need to find ways of healing.

"I want people who are victims, who are survivors like me, to know that if you're affected by it, you have to take it just as seriously as you would if you were abused in any other way as a child, and you need to incorporate it into whatever therapy you're doing," she says. " You have to acknowledge it."

READERS: Have you ever been bullied? How did you deal with it? Does it affect you now? Or have you ever been the bully? Why and is there anything someone could've done to make you stop? Share your experiences and opinions below, keeping in mind USA TODAY's community guidelines against personal attacks and hate speech:

A Reporter at Large Suffering Souls Reporting & Essays

The New Yorker

... ...

At thirty-eight, Kiehl is one of the world’s leading younger investigators in psychopathy, the condition of moral emptiness that affects between fifteen to twenty-five per cent of the North American prison population, and is believed by some psychologists to exist in one per cent of the general adult male population. (Female psychopaths are thought to be much rarer.) Psychopaths don’t exhibit the manias, hysterias, and neuroses that are present in other types of mental illness. Their main defect, what psychologists call “severe emotional detachment”—a total lack of empathy and remorse—is concealed, and harder to describe than the symptoms of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. This absence of easily readable signs has led to debate among mental-health practitioners about what qualifies as psychopathy and how to diagnose it. Psychopathy isn’t identified as a disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association’s canon; instead, a more general term, “antisocial personality disorder,” known as A.P.D., covers the condition.

There is also little consensus among researchers about what causes psychopathy. Considerable evidence, including several large-scale studies of twins, points toward a genetic component. Yet psychopaths are more likely to come from neglectful families than from loving, nurturing ones. Psychopathy could be dimensional, like high blood pressure, or it might be categorical, like leukemia. Researchers argue over whether tests used to measure it should focus on behavior or attempt to incorporate personality traits—like deceitfulness, glibness, and lack of remorse—as well. The only point on which everyone agrees is that psychopathy is extremely difficult to treat. And for some researchers the word “psychopath” has been tainted by its long and seamy relationship with criminality and popular culture, which began with true-crime pulps and continues today in TV shows like CBS’s “Criminal Minds” and in the work of authors like Thomas Harris and Patricia Cornwell. The word is so loaded with baleful connotations that it tends to empurple any surrounding prose.

Kiehl is frustrated by the lack of respect shown to psychopathy by the mental-health establishment. “Think about it,” he told me. “Crime is a trillion-dollar-a-year problem. The average psychopath will be convicted of four violent crimes by the age of forty. And yet hardly anyone is funding research into the science. Schizophrenia, which causes much less crime, has a hundred times more research money devoted to it.” I asked why, and Kiehl said, “Because schizophrenics are seen as victims, and psychopaths are seen as predators. The former we feel empathy for, the latter we lock up.”

In January of 2007, Kiehl arranged to have a portable functional magnetic-resonance-imaging scanner brought into Western—the first fMRI ever installed in a prison. So far, he has recruited hundreds of volunteers from among the inmates. The data from these scans, Kiehl hopes, will confirm his theory, published in Psychiatry Research, in 2006, that psychopathy is caused by a defect in what he calls “the paralimbic system,” a network of brain regions, stretching from the orbital frontal cortex to the posterior cingulate cortex, that are involved in processing emotion, inhibition, and attentional control. His dream is to confound the received wisdom by helping to discover a treatment for psychopathy. “If you could target the brain region involved, then maybe you could find a drug that treats that region,” he told me. “If you could treat just five per cent of them, that would be a Nobel Prize right there.”

The four hundred and six prisoners in the Western New Mexico facility are serving sentences ranging from a year to life without parole. New Mexico uses a classification system that assigns each inmate a number from one to six, with six being reserved for the most violent offenders; Western has inmates of all levels up to five. Although not all psychopaths are violent, Kiehl told me, the majority are fours, fives, and sixes.

Unlike most academic psychopathy researchers, Kiehl has spent many hours in the company of his subjects. When he meets colleagues at conferences, he told me, “they always ask, ‘What are they like?’ These are guys who have spent twenty years studying psychopaths and never met one.” Although the number of psychopaths who are not in prisons is thought to exceed the number who are—if the one-per-cent figure is correct, there are more than a million psychopaths at large in the United States alone—they are much harder to identify in the outside world. Some are “successful psychopaths,” holding down good jobs in many types of industries. It is generally only if they commit a crime and enter the criminal-justice system that they become available for research.

In the conference room where Western’s warden, Anthony Romero, greeted Kiehl, there was a framed tableau of illegal items confiscated from inmates, including handmade shivs and crude tattooing devices. Romero explained that Kiehl was using the scanner not only to study psychopathy but also to measure the level of craving in the brains of substance abusers as they go through a treatment program, also run by Kiehl, which is funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The volunteer rate among the inmates is more than ninety per cent (although some are too muscle-bound to fit inside the scanning tube). As a “collateral benefit,” Kiehl throws in a free clinical examination of their brains. (He has discovered previously undetected tumors in about five per cent of the volunteers.) In addition to the pay they receive for their time (a dollar an hour, Western’s standard rate for prison labor), inmates get pictures of their brains that they can post in their cells. “There’s a lot of joking among the prisoners about who’s got the biggest brain,” Romero said.

The scanner was housed in a tractor-trailer parked behind the prison’s I.D. center. We followed a correctional officer through an internal courtyard to the rehab wing, which consisted of a large common area surrounded by two-man cells. The prisoners were standing at attention outside their cells, some holding mops and brooms. I entered a vacant cell and saw the occupant’s brain, a grainy black-and-white image on a piece of a paper, its edges curling, tacked up over the desk.

Then we walked through the common room and out a door at the other end, passing under a large poster with lines that read, “I am here because there is no refuge, finally, from myself.” The officer led us along a corridor of offices in which students from the University of New Mexico, where Kiehl is on the faculty, conduct psychopathy interviews and also counsel participants in the drug-treatment program. Carla Harenski, one of Kiehl’s postdocs, was interviewing a beefy guy with a tattoo on his neck. Her office, like those of all the researchers in the lab, is equipped with a button she can press to call for help if an interview gets out of hand.

In order to distinguish psychopaths from non-psychopaths among the Western volunteers, Kiehl and his students use the revised version of the Psychopathy Checklist, or PCL-R, a twenty-item diagnostic instrument created by Robert Hare, a Canadian psychologist, based on his long experience in working with psychopaths in prisons. Kiehl was taught to use the checklist by Hare himself, under whom he earned his doctorate, at the University of British Columbia. Researchers interview an inmate for up to three hours, and compare the inmate’s statements against what is known of his record and his personal history. The interviewer “scores” the subject on each of the twenty items:

• parasitic life style,
• pathological lying, conning,
• proneness to boredom,
• shallow emotions,
• lack of empathy,
• poor impulse control,
• promiscuity,
• irresponsibility,
• record of juvenile delinquency,
• criminal versatility,

among other tendencies—with zero, one, or two, depending on how pronounced that trait is.

Most researchers agree that anyone who scores thirty or higher on the PCL-R is considered to be a psychopath. Kiehl says, “Someone who scores a thirty-five, a thirty-six, they are just different. You say to yourself, ‘Aha, here you are. You are why I do this.’ ”

Harenski recently interviewed a Western inmate who scored a 38.9. “He had killed his girlfriend because he thought she was cheating on him,” she told me. “He was so charming about telling it that I found it hard not to fall into laughing along in surprise, even when he was describing awful things.” Harenski, who is thirty, did not experience the involuntary skin-crawling sensation that, according to a survey conducted by the psychologists Reid and M. J. Meloy, one in three mental-health and criminal-justice professionals report feeling on interviewing a psychopath; in their paper on the subject, Meloy and Meloy speculate that this reaction may be an ancient intraspecies predator-response system. “I was just excited,” Harenski continued. “I was saying to myself, ‘Wow. I found a real one.’ ”

... ... ...

Psychopaths are as old as Cain, and they are believed to exist in all cultures, although they are more prevalent in individualistic societies in the West. The Yupik Eskimos use the term kunlangeta to describe a man who repeatedly lies, cheats, steals, and takes sexual advantage of women, according to a 1976 study by Jane M. Murphy, an anthropologist then at Harvard University. She asked an Eskimo what the group would typically do with a kunlangeta, and he replied, “Somebody would have pushed him off the ice when nobody else was looking.”

The condition was first described clinically in 1801, by the French surgeon Philippe Pinel. He called it “mania without delirium.” In the early nineteenth century, the American surgeon Benjamin Rush wrote about a type of “moral derangement” in which the sufferer was neither delusional nor psychotic but nevertheless engaged in profoundly antisocial behavior, including horrifying acts of violence. Rush noted that the condition appeared early in life. The term “moral insanity” became popular in the mid-nineteenth century, and was widely used in the U.S. and in England to describe incorrigible criminals. The word “psychopath” (literally, “suffering soul”) was coined in Germany in the eighteen-eighties. By the nineteen-twenties, “constitutional psychopathic inferiority” had become the catchall phrase psychiatrists used for a general mixture of violent and antisocial characteristics found in irredeemable criminals, who appeared to lack a conscience.

In the late nineteen-thirties, an American psychiatrist named Hervey Cleckley began collecting data on a certain kind of patient he encountered in the course of his work in a psychiatric hospital in Augusta, Georgia. These people were from varied social and family backgrounds. Some were poor, but others were sons of Augusta’s most prosperous and respected families. Cleckley set about sharpening the vague construct of constitutional psychopathic inferiority, and distinguishing it from other forms of mental illness. He eventually isolated sixteen traits exhibited by patients he called “primary” psychopaths; these included being charming and intelligent, unreliable, dishonest, irresponsible, self-centered, emotionally shallow, and lacking in empathy and insight.

“Beauty and ugliness, except in a very superficial sense, goodness, evil, love, horror, and humor have no actual meaning, no power to move him,” Cleckley wrote of the psychopath in his 1941 book, “The Mask of Sanity,” which became the foundation of the modern science. The psychopath talks “entertainingly,” Cleckley explained, and is “brilliant and charming,” but nonetheless “carries disaster lightly in each hand.” Cleckley emphasized his subjects’ deceptive, predatory nature, writing that the psychopath is capable of “concealing behind a perfect mimicry of normal emotion, fine intelligence, and social responsibility a grossly disabled and irresponsible personality.” This mimicry allows psychopaths to function, and even thrive, in normal society. Indeed, as Cleckley also argued, the individualistic, winner-take-all aspect of American culture nurtures psychopathy.

The psychiatric profession wanted little to do with psychopathy, for several reasons. For one thing, it was thought to be incurable. Not only did the talking cure fail with psychopaths but several studies suggested that talk therapy made the condition worse, by enabling psychopaths to practice the art of manipulation. There were no valid instruments to measure the personality traits that were commonly associated with the condition; researchers could study only the psychopaths’ behavior, in most cases through their criminal records. Finally, the emphasis in the word “psychopath” on an internal sickness was at odds with liberal mid-century social thought, which tended to look for external causes of social deviancy; “sociopath,” coined in 1930 by the psychologist G. E. Partridge, became the preferred term. In 1958, the American Psychiatric Association used the term “sociopathic personality” to describe the disorder in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. In the 1968 edition, the condition was renamed “general antisocial personality disorder.”

Cleckley’s book fell out of favor, and Cleckley described himself late in life as “a voice crying in the wilderness.” When he died, in 1984, he was remembered mostly for his popular study of multiple-personality disorder, written with Corbett Thigpen, “The Three Faces of Eve.”

In 1960, Robert Hare took a job as the resident psychologist in a maximum-security prison about twenty miles outside Vancouver. On his first day, a tall, slim, dark-haired inmate came into his office and said, “Hey, Doc, how’s it going? Look, I’ve got a problem. I need your help.” Hare later wrote of this encounter, “The air around him seemed to buzz, and the eye contact he made with me was so direct and intense that I wondered if I had ever really looked anybody in the eye before.” Hare asked the inmate, whom he called Ray in his account, to tell him about his problem. “In response, he pulled out a knife and waved it in front of my nose, all the while smiling and maintaining that intense eye contact,” Hare wrote in his 1993 book, “Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us.” Ray said he was planning to use the knife on another inmate, who was making overtures to his “ ‘protégé,’ a prison term for the more passive member of a homosexual pairing.” Ray never harmed Hare, but he successfully manipulated him throughout Hare’s eight months at the prison, and two and a half years later, after Hare had joined the faculty at the University of British Columbia, Ray, now paroled, tried to register there with a forged transcript.

Hare wasn’t familiar with the psychopathy literature when he was working at the prison. Later that year, he moved with his family to London, Ontario, where he pursued a Ph.D. at the University of Western Ontario. (When his brakes failed at the first steep hill on the trip east, he recalled that Ray had worked on his car in the prison garage.) His dissertation was on the effects of punishment on human learning and performance. One day in the library, he came across “The Mask of Sanity.” Reading Cleckley’s case histories put Hare in mind of Ray, and of other types he had encountered in the maximum-security prison. Were these men psychopaths? Over the next year, Hare read not only Cleckley but also the early literature Cleckley had synthesized. After receiving his doctorate, in 1963, and returning to Vancouver, he set about what would be his life’s work: the study of psychopathy, and the creation of the Psychopathy Checklist, the twenty-item diagnostic instrument that Kiehl is using at Western.

Thanks to the checklist, scientists working in different places can be confident that the subjects they are studying are taxonomically similar. The PCL also has a wide variety of forensic applications. It is employed throughout Canada in parole-board hearings and is gaining popularity in the U.S. In the thirty-seven states that allow the death penalty, a high psychopathy score is often used by prosecutors as an “aggravating factor” in the penalty phase of capital cases. Psychopathy scores have also been used in child-custody cases; a high score may result in one parent’s loss of custody. Hare’s influence on the field of psychopathy is profound. Today, Hare’s former students hold important administrative positions throughout the Canadian prison system, and are prominently represented in the next two generations of psychopathy researchers around the world.

One day when Kent Kiehl was eight years old, his father, Jeff, a copy editor at the Tacoma News Tribune, came home talking about a local man named Ted Bundy. “This was a guy who had grown up just down the street,” Kiehl told me, “and he had supposedly killed all these women.” Bundy, whose family moved to Tacoma when he was a child, is known to have sexually assaulted and murdered at least thirty women in the nineteen-seventies. But to outward appearances he was an exceptionally promising young man. He had received glowing letters of recommendation both from a psychology professor at the University of Washington, where he was an undergraduate (“he is exceedingly bright, personable, highly motivated, and conscientious”), and from the Republican governor of Washington, Dan Evans, for whom he worked. His good looks, charm, and verbal skills—qualities that made him such an effective predator—convinced many in the Tacoma community that he was innocent, up until the time he was convicted of murder and sentenced to death, in 1979. Bundy was executed in Florida in 1989.

... ... ...

Another hypothesis is that psychopaths lack fear of personal injury and, more important, moral fear—fear of punishment. David Lykken pioneered this theory in the nineteen-fifties, and it has been taken up by James Blair, Christopher Patrick, and others. The updated version of this model posits that psychopathy is a result of a dysfunction of the amygdala, the almond-shaped bundle of gray matter situated in the midbrain, which is another area instrumental in emotional processing.

... ... ...

Today, Kiehl and Hare have a complementary but complicated relationship. Kiehl claims Hare as a mentor, and sees his own work as validating Hare’s checklist, by advancing a neurological mechanism for psychopathy. Hare is less gung ho about using fMRI as a diagnostic tool. “Some claim, in a sense, this is the new phrenology,” Hare said, referring to the discredited nineteenth-century practice of reading the bumps on people’s heads, “only this time the bumps are on the inside.” (Hare himself is a “strong proponent” of brain-imaging technology, but he noted that scans in isolation will always be insufficient.) Hare sees himself as a generalist, and Kiehl as “more of a data-driven guy.” Hare added that, while Kiehl’s brashness sometimes puts people off, “that’s why Kent gets things done.”

Robert Hare is bearded and slight, and has a detached, feline manner. He is in his early seventies, and his position at the University of British Columbia is emeritus. I met him in May, at a Homewood Suites hotel in Albany, where he was conducting a two-day seminar in psychopathy and the use of the checklist, sponsored by the New York State Office of Mental Health’s Bureau of Sex Offender Education and Treatment. A substantial percentage of sex offenders are psychopaths. New York State recently began creating special programs housed in psychiatric facilities for sex offenders who have completed their prison terms but are judged too dangerous to release.

Hare’s Psychopathy Checklist now exists in three variations. (There’s one for juveniles, the PCL-YV, and one designed for the general population—the “screening” version.) He collects a royalty fee every time the official PCL scoring sheet is used. The complete psychopathy kit, which includes a book-length manual on how to administer the checklist, costs two hundred and sixty-three dollars. It has been translated into more than twenty languages. The Albany seminar was one of roughly half a dozen that Hare conducts each year. He was giving a talk on psychopathy and culpability in Las Vegas the following week; then he was off to Rome, to instruct the carabinieri in the use of the checklist, and in profiling psychopaths. In Albany, his audience was composed mostly of psychologists and other mental-health professionals.

Hare sees himself as continuing the work that Cleckley started—warning society of a devastating and costly mental disorder that it mostly continues to ignore. Hare’s forensic experience has taught him that psychopathy is of vital concern to mental-health workers in prisons as well as to people in law enforcement and on parole boards; people who come into daily contact with dangerous and destructive individuals need an instrument that will allow them to identify psychopaths and make risk assessments based on their predictive behavior. (According to several national and international studies, psychopathic criminal offenders are three times more likely to return to prison within a year of their release.) Mary Ellen O’Toole, one of the F.B.I.’s top criminal profilers, whose job is “to investigate the most extreme and violent crimes from all over the world, including serial murders, serial rapes, child abductions, school shootings, workplace violence, domestic homicides, and other crimes of extreme and/or bizarre violence,” told me that she uses her psychopathy training, some of which came under Hare, when she is investigating crime scenes. She looks for evidence of, “for example, lack of remorse, thrill seeking, or impulsivity that could be consistent with the traits and characteristics of psychopathy.” This information, in turn, can be useful in “the investigation, the interview, even the prosecution of the offender.”

Hare wants to disassociate psychopathy from the DSM’s catchall diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder. “It’s like having pneumonia versus having a cold,” he said. “They share some common symptoms, but one is much more virulent.” Before the fourth edition of the DSM came out, in 1994, Hare published several articles pointing to field research that showed a difference between psychopathy and A.P.D. John Gunderson, the psychiatrist who chaired the personality-disorders work group for the revision, told Hare that, intellectually, he had “won the battle,” Hare recalls; even so, in DSM-IV “psychopathy” appears only as a synonym for A.P.D. (Gunderson says this was a function of institutional inertia.) Hare has continued to follow preparations for the next edition, due out in 2012, and recently sent an e-mail to a senior member of the task force inquiring about what revisions, if any, were planned for A.P.D. The reply, Hare said, was noncommittal.

Hare has published two books that translate some of the concepts of psychopathy for a general audience and attempt to teach people how to identify the “successful psychopaths” in their midst. In the introduction to “Without Conscience,” he writes, “It is very likely that at some point in your life you will come into painful contact with a psychopath. For your own physical, psychological, and financial well-being it is crucial that you know how to identify the psychopath.” Among the professions likely to attract psychopaths, he writes, are law enforcement, the military, politics, and medicine, although he notes that these have norms and are self-policing. The most agreeable vocation for psychopaths, according to Hare, is business. In his second book, “Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work,” written with Paul Babiack, Hare flirts with pop psychology when he points out that many traits that may be desirable in a corporate context, such as ruthlessness, lack of social conscience, and single-minded devotion to success, would be considered psychopathic outside of it.

On the evening of the first day of the seminar, Hare and I went out for dinner at Smokey Bones, a rib joint. As I sped along Wolf Road, a traffic light ahead turned yellow. I momentarily thought about flooring it, and probably would have, if not for my passenger; instead, I slowed down and stopped. But the car on my left went flying by, through what was now a red light.

“Wow, look at that,” Hare said. “Now, that man might be a psychopath. That was psychopathic behavior, certainly—to put others in the intersection in danger in order to realize your own goals.”

But the problem is that “psychopathic behavior”—egocentricity, for example, or lack of realistic long-term goals—is present in far more than one per cent of the adult male population. This blurriness in the psychopathic profile can make it possible to see psychopaths everywhere or nowhere. In the mid-fifties, Robert Lindner, the author of “Rebel Without a Cause: A Hypnoanalysis of a Criminal Psychopath,” explained juvenile delinquency as an outbreak of mass psychopathy. Norman Mailer inverted this notion in “The White Negro,” admiring the hipster as a “philosophical psychopath” for having the courage of nonconformity. In the sixties, sociopathy replaced psychopathy as the dominant construct. Now, in our age of genetic determinism, society is once again seeing psychopaths everywhere, and this will no doubt provoke others to say they are nowhere, and the cycle of overexposure and underfunding will continue.

Hare is urbane and well read, and during dinner he seasoned his clinical descriptions of the psychopath with references to characters from film and literature. Harry Lime, the villain played by Orson Welles in “The Third Man,” is one example. “Iago was a classic psychopath,” he added. “The way Shakespeare wrote him. In films and plays he is portrayed as evil-seeming, but he isn’t written that way.” Hare was friendly but wary of me—several times he said, “I have to see your eyeballs before I can tell you that.” We talked about the checklist. “Am I happy about the way the checklist can be used?” Hare asked rhetorically. “No, not always. Am I happy it is used to help condemn people to death? No, I am not.” Nor does he approve of its use in child-custody cases. However, he believes that, when properly used as a predictor of risk in forensic settings, the social benefits of the checklist far outweigh its drawbacks. Hare rejects the notion that a distinction ought to be made between a violent psychopath, like Ted Bundy, and a nonviolent one who commits financial crimes. Both, he said, are willing to do whatever it takes. He went on, “Can you say Ted Bundy caused more disaster than the guys at Enron? How many destroyed lives and suicides followed as a result of so many people losing their savings?”

... ... ...

Schadenfreude

Definition from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary

Main Entry: >

Pronunciation:

\ˈshä-d^ən-ˌfrȯi-də\

Function:

noun

Usage:

often capitalized

Etymology:

German, from Schaden damage + Freude joy

Date:

1895

: enjoyment obtained from the troubles of others

Schadenfreude

A very apt word describing sociopath sadism.

Wikipedia

Schadenfreude (IPA: [ˈʃaːdənˌfʁɔʏ̯də] Audio (German) (help·info)) is enjoyment taken from the misfortune of someone else. The word referring to this emotion has been borrowed from German by the English language^[1] and is sometimes also used as a loanword by other languages.

Philosopher and sociologist Theodor Adorno defined schadenfreude as “largely unanticipated delight in the suffering of another which is cognized as trivial and/or appropriate.”^[2]

Spelling, etymology, and English equivalents

In German, Schadenfreude is capitalized, as are all nouns in the German language. When used as a loanword in English, however, it is not, unless the origin of the word is meant to be emphasized. The corresponding German adjective is schadenfroh.

The word derives from Schaden (damage, harm) and Freude (joy); Schaden derives from the Middle High German schade, from the Old High German scado. Freude comes from the Middle High German vreude, from the Old High German frewida, from frō, (happy). A distinction exists between "secret schadenfreude" (a private feeling) and "open schadenfreude" (Hohn, a German word roughly translated as "scorn") which is outright public derision.

Little-used English words synonymous with schadenfreude have been derived from the Greek word ἐπιχαιρεκακία.^[3][4] Nathan Bailey's 18th-century Universal Etymological English Dictionary, for example, contains an entry for epicharikaky that gives its etymology as a compound of epi (upon), chaira (joy), and kakon (evil).^[5][6] A popular modern collection of rare words, however, gives its spelling as "epicaricacy." ^[7]

A more common English expression with a similar meaning is 'Roman holiday', a metaphor taken from the poem "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" by George Gordon, Lord Byron, where a gladiator in Ancient Rome expects to be "butcher'd to make a Roman holiday" while the audience would take pleasure from watching his suffering. The term suggests debauchery and disorder in addition to sadistic enjoyment.^[8]

Another phrase with a meaning similar to Schadenfreude is "morose delectation" ("delectatio morosa" in Latin), meaning "the habit of dwelling with enjoyment on evil thoughts".^[9] The medieval church taught morose delectation as a sin.^[10][11] French writer Pierre Klossowski (1905-2001) maintained that the appeal of sadism is morose delectation.^[12][13]

The Buddhist concept of mudita, "sympathetic joy" or "happiness in another's good fortune," is cited as an example of the opposite of schadenfreude.^[14][15] Alternatively envy, unhappiness in another's good fortune, could be considered the counterpart of schadenfreude.

Literary and philosophical discussion of the emotion of schadenfreude

Aristotle

In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle used the term epikhairekakia (alternatively epikairekakia; ἐπιχαιρεκακία in Greek) as part of a triad of terms, in which epikhairekakia stands as the opposite of phthonos, and nemesis occupies the mean. Nemesis is "a painful response to another's undeserved good fortune," while phthonos is "a painful response to any good fortune," deserved or not. The epikhairekakos person actually takes pleasure in another's ill fortune.^[16][17]

Seventeenth Century

During the 17th century, Robert Burton wrote in his work The Anatomy of Melancholy, "Out of these two [the concupiscible and irascible powers] arise those mixed affections and passions of anger, which is a desire of revenge; hatred, which is inveterate anger; zeal, which is offended with him who hurts that he loves; and ἐπιχαιρεκακία, a compound affection of joy and hate, when we rejoice at other men's mischief, and are grieved at their prosperity; pride, self-love, emulation, envy, shame, &c., of which elsewhere."^[18]

Scientific studies of schadenfreude

A New York Times article in 2002 cited a number of scientific studies of schadenfreude. Many such studies are based on social comparison theory, the idea that when people around us have bad luck, we look better to ourselves. Other researchers have found that people with low self-esteem are more likely to feel schadenfreude than are people who have high self-esteem.^[19]

One recent (2006) experiment suggests that men, but not women, enjoy seeing "bad" people suffer. The study was designed to measure empathy, by watching which brain centers are stimulated when subjects inside an MRI observe someone having a painful experience. Researchers expected that the brain's empathy center would show more stimulation when those seen as "good" got an electric shock than they would if the shock was given to someone the subject had reason to consider bad. This was indeed the result for their female subjects, but for male subjects the brain's pleasure centers also lit up when someone else got a shock that the male thought was well-deserved.^[20]

[Jun 18, 2008] Bad guys really do get the most girls by Mason Inman

NewScientist.com

NICE guys knew it, now two studies have confirmed it: bad boys get the most girls. The finding may help explain why a nasty suite of antisocial personality traits known as the "dark triad" persists in the human population, despite their potentially grave cultural costs.

The traits are:

• the self-obsession of narcissism;
• the impulsive, thrill-seeking and callous behaviour of psychopaths;
• and the deceitful and exploitative nature of Machiavellianism.

At their extreme, these traits would be highly detrimental for life in traditional human societies. People with these personalities risk being shunned by others and shut out of relationships, leaving them without a mate, hungry and vulnerable to predators.

But being just slightly evil could have an upside: a prolific sex life, says Peter Jonason at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. "We have some evidence that the three traits are really the same thing and may represent a successful evolutionary strategy."

Jonason and his colleagues subjected 200 college students to personality tests designed to rank them for each of the dark triad traits. They also asked about their attitudes to sexual relationships and about their sex lives, including how many partners they'd had and whether they were seeking brief affairs.

The study found that those who scored higher on the dark triad personality traits tended to have more partners and more desire for short-term relationships, Jonason reported at the Human Behavior and Evolution Society meeting in Kyoto, Japan, earlier this month. But the correlation only held in males.

James Bond epitomises this set of traits, Jonason says. "He's clearly disagreeable, very extroverted and likes trying new things - killing people, new women." Just as Bond seduces woman after woman, people with dark triad traits may be more successful with a quantity-style or shotgun approach to reproduction, even if they don't stick around for parenting. "The strategy seems to have worked. We still have these traits," Jonason says.

This observation seems to hold across cultures. David Schmitt of Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, presented preliminary results at the same meeting from a survey of more than 35,000 people in 57 countries. He found a similar link between the dark triad and reproductive success in men. "It is universal across cultures for high dark triad scorers to be more active in short-term mating," Schmitt says. "They are more likely to try and poach other people's partners for a brief affair."

Barbara Oakley of Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, says that the studies "verify something a lot of people have conjectured about".

Christopher von Rueden of the University of California at Santa Barbara says that the studies are important because they confirm that personality variation has direct fitness consequences.

"They still have to explain why it hasn't spread to everyone," says Matthew Keller of the University of Colorado in Boulder. "There must be some cost of the traits." One possibility, both Keller and Jonason suggest, is that the strategy is most successful when dark triad personalities are rare. Otherwise, others would become more wary and guarded.

Related Articles

• Narcissists brilliant workers, but terrible colleagues 15 March 2002
• Overconfidence is a disadvantage in war 21 June 2006

Weblinks

• Peter Jonason, New Mexico State University
• David Schmitt, Bradley University
• Christopher von Rueden
• Barbara Oakley of Oakland University
• Matthew Keller, University of Colorado

From issue 2661 of New Scientist magazine, 18 June 2008, page 12

[May 23, 2008] The Resiliency Advantage Master Change, Thrive Under Pressure, and Bounce Back from Setbacks Al Siebert Books

Amazon.com

A practical book the provides valuable tools for confronting life's difficult challenges!!!, December 29, 2006

By Stephen Pletko "Uncle Stevie" (London, Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews
+++++

Self-rate yourself on a scale from 1 (meaning little agreement) to 5 (meaning strongly agree) on the following ten items:

(1) In a crisis or chaotic situation, I calm myself and focus on taking useful actions.
(2) I'm usually optimistic, seeing difficulties as temporary and believe things will eventually turn out well.
(3) I can tolerate high levels of uncertainty and ambiguity.
(4) I'm good at bouncing back from difficulties and quickly adapt to new developments.
(5) I'm self-confident and have a healthy concept of who I am.
(6) I prefer to work without a written job description since I'm more effective when I'm free to do what I think is best in each situation.
(7) I trust my intuition and "read" people well.
(8) I'm a good listener and have good empathy skills.
(9) I've been made stronger and better by difficult experiences.
(10) I've converted misfortune into good luck and even found benefits in bad experiences.

A low score of (under 25) means your resiliency skills are weak and you would greatly benefit from this amazing, easy-to-read, psychobabble-free book by Dr. Al Siebert, a clinical psychologist and Director of "The Resiliency Center". (`Resiliency' means (i) coping well with ongoing negative change (ii) sustaining good health and energy under constant pressure (iii) bouncing back from setbacks and adversities (iv) changing to a new way of living and working when an old way no longer works (v) and doing all this without acting in harmful ways.)
A middle score of (25 to 45) means your resiliency skills are adequate but probably can be greatly enhanced by using this book.
A high score of (over 45) means you have good resiliency skills and this book will validate many things you are doing right.

This book in a nutshell presents five resiliency "levels" or skills (level four is divided into 4 sub-levels while level 5 is divided into 3 sub-levels) so, in affect, the reader is presented with ten essential resiliency skills that Siebert has distilled from "the emerging new science of resiliency psychology." This book, besides other important things, shows you how to:

(1) Sustain strong, healthy energy in non-stop pressure and change
(2) Bounce back quickly from setbacks
(3) Gain strength from adversities
(4) Convert misfortune into good fortune
(5) Overcome tendencies to feel like a victim, and stay detached from victim reactions of others
(6) Overcome the three main resiliency barriers.

Who is this book written for? Siebert explains: "The resiliency guidelines in this book focus mainly on resiliency in the workplace, but they apply broadly to all aspects of life." (Actually, I think Siebert is being too restrictive in saying that these principles "focus mainly on resiliency in the workplace." Personally, I think these principles are essential to know so as to effectively play the game of life.)

What will this book NOT tell you? It "will not tell you what to do or how to act or think...Resilient people are those who decide that somehow, some way, they will do the very best they can to survive, cope, and make things turn out well." This book helps you develop your own unique way of being resilient by being both self-reliant and socially responsible.

As a physically disabled person, my personal favorite chapter was entitled "Mastering Extreme Resiliency Challenges." Included here are true stories from 9/11 survivors. I feel Siebert outdoes himself in this penultimate chapter.

Finally, this book has some key features. Important definitions, exercises, and other important and essential information are isolated from the main narrative as inserts so as to highlight key ideas. Each chapter is broken up into sections with anecdotes, examples, and true stories instead of having one long narrative. At the end of each chapter are insightful "Resiliency Development Activities" that help you utilize and think about the information from each chapter.

In conclusion, this is truly a helpful and unique book. Discover for yourself why this book was named the winner of the 2006 Independent Publisher Book Awards in the "Self Help" category at BookExpo America (the largest book publishing event in the United States) and why it was endorsed by the past president of the American Psychological Association!!

Our Life is Not Determined By What Happens But How We React, October 28, 2005

By Norman Goldman "Editor of Bookpleasures.com" (Montreal)

After reading Dr. Al Siebert's enlightening book, The Resiliency Advantage, I was reminded of the old adage that was often drummed into me by my parents, that our life is not determined by what happens to us but how we react to what happens, not by what life brings to us, but by the attitudes we bring to life. Thinking positively creates a chain reaction pertaining to our thoughts, events and outcomes-a kind of catalyst that can create extraordinary results.

Siebert begins his book by telling his readers how he came to the conclusion that clinical psychology and psychiatry are not mental health professions but rather mental illness professions. There does not seem to be any focus on what makes individuals mentally healthy, but rather on what causes mental illnesses and how do we go about treating these illnesses.

This prompted Siebert to do extensive research as to why some people survive many of life's ordeals while others seem to continually flounder. As a result of his thirst for knowledge of the subject matter he developed a good understanding of what he calls "the survivor personality."

In 1996 he published his first book on the topic, "The Survivor Personality," and we now have the follow up, The Resiliency Advantage, that reflects the tremendous amount of knowledge Siebert accumulated in his search for the causes and effects of the survivor personality.

According to Siebert there exist several levels of resiliency that he deals with in depth in his book: optimizing your health, emotions and well-being; developing good problem solving skills; strengthening your inner selfs; unleashing your curiosity and enjoy learning from the school of life; power of positive expectations; integrating paradoxical abilities; allowing everything to work well or the synergy talent; the talent for serendipity.
In order to reinforce the learning of these principles, Siebert provides many exercises, as well as brief case histories showing just how they work out in practice.

There is some excellent material in this book, particularly the sections dealing with learning from failures, benefits of curious and playful questioning, the power of positive expectations, hope, optimism, and self-reliance. It is also heartening to learn, as the author points out, that resiliency psychology, a relatively new discipline, is making good progress and is now recognized as quite vital in understanding how it can help people fare better during adversity and recover more quickly from life's ordeals.

Writing about new disciplines is always a challenge, given the negative feedback one often receives from the traditionalists. However, Siebert has risen to the occasion with his breezy style of writing, and he admirably presents an accessible work that could have easily strayed, leaving his readers with a sense of boredom.

Norm Goldman Editor of Bookpleasures

[May 22, 2008] Carolyn Baker - BEWARE OF THE PSYCHOPATH MY SON, By Clinton Callahan

[The following is extracted from two articles: Twilight of the Psychopaths, by Dr. Kevin Barrett and The Trick of the Psychopath's Trade by Silvia Cattori. Both articles are recommended. Both articles reference the book Political Ponerology: A science on the nature of evil adjusted for political purposes, by Andrzej Lobaczewski. Cattori's article is longer and includes an interview with the book's editors, Laura Knight-Jadczyk and Henry See.]

I make the effort to share this information because it gives me, at last, a plausible answer to a long-unanswered question: Why, no matter how much intelligent goodwill exists in the world, is there so much war, suffering and injustice? It doesn't seem to matter what creative plan, ideology, religion, or philosophy great minds come up with, nothing seems to improve our lot. Since the dawn of civilization, this pattern repeats itself over and over again.

The answer is that civilization, as we know it, is largely the creation of psychopaths. All civilizations, our own included, have been built on slavery and mass murder. Psychopaths have played a disproportionate role in the development of civilization, because they are hard-wired to lie, kill, cheat, steal, torture, manipulate, and generally inflict great suffering on other humans without feeling any remorse, in order to establish their own sense of security through domination. The inventor of civilization - the first tribal chieftain who successfully brainwashed an army of controlled mass murderers - was almost certainly a genetic psychopath. Since that momentous discovery, psychopaths have enjoyed a significant advantage over non-psychopaths in the struggle for power in civilizational hierarchies - especially military hierarchies.

Behind the apparent insanity of contemporary history, is the actual insanity of psychopaths fighting to preserve their disproportionate power. And as their power grows ever-more-threatened, the psychopaths grow ever-more-desperate. We are witnessing the apotheosis of the overworld - the overlapping criminal syndicates that lurk above ordinary society and law just as the underworld lurks below it.

During the past fifty years, psychopaths have gained almost absolute control of all the branches of government. You can notice this if you observe carefully that no matter what illegal thing a modern politician does, no one will really take him to task. All of the so called scandals that have come up, any one of which would have taken down an authentic administration, are just farces played out for the public, to distract them, to make them think that the democracy is still working.

One of the main factors to consider in terms of how a society can be taken over by a group of pathological deviants is that the psychopaths' only limitation is the participation of susceptible individuals within that given society. Lobaczewski gives an average figure for the most active deviants of approximately 6% of a given population. (1% essential psychopaths and up to 5% other psychopathies and characteropathies.) The essential psychopath is at the center of the web. The others form the first tier of the psychopath's control system.

The next tier of such a system is composed of individuals who were born normal, but are either already warped by long-term exposure to psychopathic material via familial or social influences, or who, through psychic weakness have chosen to meet the demands of psychopathy for their own selfish ends. Numerically, according to Lobaczewski, this group is about 12% of a given population under normal conditions.

So approximately 18% of any given population is active in the creation and imposition of a Pathocracy. The 6% group constitutes the Pathocratic nobility and the 12% group forms the new bourgeoisie, whose economic situation is the most advantageous.

When you understand the true nature of psychopathic influence, that it is conscienceless, emotionless, selfish, cold and calculating, and devoid of any moral or ethical standards, you are horrified, but at the same time everything suddenly begins to makes sense. Our society is ever more soulless because the people who lead it and who set the example are soulless - they literally have no conscience.

In his book Political Ponerology, Andrej Lobaczewski explains that clinical psychopaths enjoy advantages even in non-violent competitions to climb the ranks of social hierarchies. Because they can lie without remorse (and without the telltale physiological stress that is measured by lie detector tests), psychopaths can always say whatever is necessary to get what they want. In court, for example, psychopaths can tell extreme bald-faced lies in a plausible manner, while their sane opponents are handicapped by an emotional predisposition to remain within hailing distance of the truth. Too often, the judge or jury imagines that the truth must be somewhere in the middle, and then issues decisions that benefit the psychopath. As with judges and juries, so too with those charged with decisions concerning who to promote and who not to promote in corporate, military and governmental hierarchies. The result is that all hierarchies inevitably become top-heavy with psychopaths. Since psychopaths have no limitations on what they can or will do to get to the top, the ones in charge are generally pathological. It is not power that corrupts, it is that corrupt individuals seek power.

How can we distinguish between psychopaths and healthy people? What is the portrait of a true psychopath?

Such a dangerous question has almost never been successfully asked. The reason is that we mistakenly confuse healthy for normal. Human psychological diversity is the health of our race. There is no normal because healthy humans continuously evolve beyond all normalizing standards. The terrorism of searching through hierarchies for anyone deviating from normal is no different from witch hunts or Inquisitions. You must remember that hierarchies thrive on such low dramas, torturing victims until they confess to evil beliefs. Not so long ago the church and state ongoingly acquired significant income and property through witch hunts and Inquisitions. This continued for over two hundred and fifty years. Ten generations of Europeans understood pogrom as normal life. Let us not return to that nightmare. Testing for normal is guaranteed to backfire in our face. There is no normal. But there is conscience.

We have very little empirical evidence to support the idea that true psychopathy is the result of an abused childhood, and much empirical evidence to support that it is genetic. The neurobiological model offers us the greatest hope of being able to identify even the most devious psychopath. Other recent studies lead to similar results and conclusions: that psychopaths have great difficulty processing verbal and nonverbal affective (emotional) material, that they tend to confuse the emotional significance of events, and most importantly, that these deficits show up in brain scans! A missing internal connection between the feeling heart and the thinking brain is detectable.

Psychopaths are incapable of authentic deep emotions. In fact, when Robert Hare, a Canadian psychologist who spent his career studying psychopathy, did brain scans on psychopaths while showing them two sets of words, one set of neutral words with no emotional associations and a second set with emotionally charged words, while different areas of the brain lit up in the non-psychopathic control group, in the psychopaths, both sets were processed in the same area of the brain, the area that deals with language. They did not have an emotional reaction until they intellectually concluded that it would be better if they had one, and then they whipped up an emotional response just for show.

The simplest, clearest and truest portrait of the psychopath is given in the titles of three seminal works on the subject: Without Conscience by Robert Hare, The Mask of Sanity by Hervey Cleckley, and Snakes in Suits by Robert Hare and Paul Babiak. A psychopath is exactly that: conscienceless. The most important thing to remember is that this lack of conscience is hidden from view behind a mask of normality that is often so convincing that even experts are deceived. As a result, psychopaths become the Snakes in Suits that control our world.

Psychopaths lack a sense of remorse or empathy with others. They can be extremely charming and are experts at using talk to charm and hypnotize their prey. They are also irresponsible. Nothing is ever their fault; someone else or the world at large is always to blame for all of their problems or their mistakes. Martha Stout, in her book The Sociopath Next Door, identifies what she calls the pity ploy. Psychopaths use pity to manipulate. They convince you to give them one more chance, and to not tell anyone about what they have done. So another trait - and a very important one - is their ability to control the flow of information.

They also seem to have little real conception of past or future, living entirely for their immediate needs and desires. Because of the barren quality of their inner life, they are often seeking new thrills, anything from feeling the power of manipulating others to engaging in illegal activities simply for the rush of adrenaline.

Another trait of the psychopath is what Lobaczewski calls their special psychological knowledge of normal people. They have studied us. They know us better than we know ourselves. They are experts in knowing how to push our buttons, to use our emotions against us. But beyond that, they even seem to have some sort of hypnotic power over us. When we begin to get caught up in the web of the psychopath, our ability to think deteriorates, gets muddied. They seem to cast some sort of spell over us. It is only later when we are no longer in their presence, out of their spell, that the clarity of thought returns and we find ourselves wondering how it was that we were unable to respond or counter what they were doing.

Psychopaths learn to recognize each other in a crowd as early as childhood, and they develop an awareness of the existence of other individuals similar to themselves. They also become conscious of being of a different world from the majority of other people surrounding them. They view us from a certain distance.

Think about the ramifications of this statement: Psychopaths are, to some extent, self-aware as a group even in childhood! Recognizing their fundamental difference from the rest of humanity, their allegiance would be to others of their kind, that is, to other psychopaths.

Their own twisted sense of honor compels them to cheat and revile non-psychopaths and their values. In contradiction to the ideals of normal people, psychopaths feel breaking promises and agreements is normal behavior.

Not only do they covet possessions and power and feel they have the right to them just because they exist and can take them, but they gain special pleasure in usurping and taking from others; what they can plagiarize, swindle, and extort are fruits far sweeter than those they can earn through honest labor. They also learn very early how their personalities can have traumatizing effects on the personalities of non-psychopaths, and how to take advantage of this root of terror for purposes of achieving their goals.

So now, imagine how human beings who are totally in the dark about the presence of psychopaths can be easily deceived and manipulated by these individuals, gaining power in different countries, pretending to be loyal to the local populations while at the same time playing up obvious and easily discernable physical differences between groups (such as race, skin color, religion, etc). Psychologically normal humans would be set against one another on the basis of unimportant differences (think of Rwanda 1994, think of Israelis and Palestinians) while the deviants in power, with a fundamental difference from the rest of us, a lack of conscience, an inability to feel for another human being, reaped the benefits and pulled the strings.

We are seeing the final desperate power-grab or endgame (Alex Jones) of brutal, cunning gangs of CIA drug-runners and President-killers; money-laundering international bankers and their hit-men - economic and otherwise; corrupt military contractors and gung-ho generals; corporate predators and their political enablers; brainwashers and mind-rapists euphemistically known as psy-ops and PR specialists - in short, the whole crew of certifiable psychopaths running our so-called civilization. And they are running scared.

Why does the Pathocracy fear losing its control? Because it is threatened by the spread of knowledge. The greatest fear of any psychopath is of being found out.

Psychopaths go through life knowing that they are completely different from other people. Deep down they know something is missing in them. They quickly learn to hide their lack of empathy, while carefully studying others' emotions so as to mimic normalcy while cold-bloodedly manipulating the normals.

Today, thanks to new information technologies, we are on the brink of unmasking the psychopaths and building a civilization of, by and for the healthy human being - a civilization without war, a civilization based on truth, a civilization in which the saintly few rather than the diabolical few would gravitate to positions of power. We already have the knowledge necessary to diagnose psychopathic personalities and keep them out of power. We have the knowledge necessary to dismantle the institutions in which psychopaths especially flourish - militaries, intelligence agencies, large corporations, and secret societies. We simply need to disseminate this knowledge, and the will to use it, as widely and as quickly as possible.

Until the knowledge and awareness of pathological human beings is given the attention it deserves and becomes part of the general knowledge of all human beings, there is no way that things can be changed in any way that is effective and long-lasting. If half the people agitating for truth or stopping the war or saving the earth would focus their efforts, time and money on exposing psychopathy, we might get somewhere.

One might ask if the weak point of our society has been our tolerance of psychopathic behavior? Our disbelief that someone could seem like an intelligent leader and still be acting deceptively on their own behalf without conscience? Or is it merely ignorance?

If the general voting public is not aware that there exists a category of people we sometimes perceive as almost human, who look like us, who work with us, who are found in every race, every culture, speaking every language, but who are lacking conscience, how can the general public take care to block them from taking over the hierarchies? General ignorance of psychopathology may prove to be the downfall of civilization. We stand by like grazing sheep as political/corporate elites throw armies of our innocent sons and daughters against fabricated enemies as a way of generating trillions in profits, vying against each other for pathological hegemony.

Nearly everyone who has been part of an organization working for social change has probably seen the same dynamic play out: The good and sincere work of many can be destroyed by the actions of one person. That doesn't bode well for bringing some sort of justice to the planet! In fact, if psychopaths dominate political hierarchies, is it any wonder that peaceful demonstrations have zero impact on the outcome of political decisions? Perhaps it is time to choose something other than massive, distant hierarchies as a way of governing ourselves?

So many efforts to provide essays, research reports, exposés and books to leaders so they might take the new information to heart and change their behavior have come to naught. For example, in the final paragraph of his revised edition of the book, The Party's Over, Richard Heinberg writes:

I still believe that if the people of the world can be helped to understand the situation we are in, the options available, and the consequences of the path we are currently on, then it is at least possible that they can be persuaded to undertake the considerable effort and sacrifice that will be entailed in a peaceful transition to a sustainable, locally based, decentralized, low-energy, resource-conserving social regime. But inspired leadership will be required.

And that is the just-murdered fantasy. There are no inspired leaders anymore. And in hierarchical structures there can't be. Assuming that you can elect men or women to office who will see reason and the light of day, and who will change and learn and grow, make compassionate decisions and take conscientious actions... is a foolish, childish dream. Continuing to dream it simply plays into psychopathic agendas.

Only when the 75% of humanity with a healthy conscience come to understand that we have a natural predator, a group of people who live amongst us, viewing us as powerless victims to be freely fed upon for achieving their inhuman ends, only then will we take the fierce and immediate actions needed to defend what is preciously human. Psychological deviants have to be removed from any position of power over people of conscience, period. People must be made aware that such individuals exist and must learn how to spot them and their manipulations. The hard part is that one must also struggle against those tendencies to mercy and kindness in oneself in order not to become prey.

The real problem is that the knowledge of psychopathy and how psychopaths rule the world has been effectively hidden. People do not have the adequate, nuanced knowledge they need to really make a change from the bottom up. Again and again, throughout history it has been meet the new boss, same as the old boss. If there is any work that is deserving of full time efforts and devotion for the sake of helping humanity in this present dark time, it is the study of psychopathy and the propagation of this information as far and wide and fast as possible.

There are only two things that can bring a psychopath under submission:

1. A bigger psychopath.
2. The non-violent, absolute refusal to submit to psychopathic controls no matter the consequences (non-violent noncompliance).

Let us choose path 2! If individuals simply sat down and refused to lift a hand to further one single aim of the psychopathic agenda, if people refused to pay taxes, if soldiers refused to fight, if government workers and corporate drones and prison guards refused to go to work, if doctors refused to treat psychopathic elites and their families, the whole system would grind to a screeching halt.

True change happens in the moment that a person becomes aware of psychopathy in all its chilling details. From this new awareness, the world looks different, and entirely new actions can be taken. Distinguishing between human and psychopathic qualities begins the foundation of responsibility upon which we have a real chance to create sustainable culture.

Clinton Callahan, originator of Possibility Management, author of Radiant Joy Brilliant Love, founder of Callahan Academy, empowers responsible creative leadership through authentic personal development. http://www.just-stop.org/

[May 18, 2008] naked capitalism Bail Out Housing to Salve Damaged Psyches

"...being fired (47) is far worse than foreclosure (30), and if it leads to a change in financial status (38) and/or change to a different line of work (36) those are separate, additive stress factors. "

Now admittedly, this is not a validated instrument, but a widely used stress scoring test puts loss of spouse as 100 and divorce at 73. Foreclosure is 30, below sex difficulties (39), pregnancy (40), or personal injury (53). Change in residence is 20.

Note that if we as a society were worried about psychological damage, being fired (47) is far worse than foreclosure (30), and if it leads to a change in financial status (38) and/or change to a different line of work (36) those are separate, additive stress factors.

Yet policy-makers have no qualms about advocating more open trade even though it produces industry restructurings that produce unemployment that does more psychological damage than foreclosures. As a society, we'll pursue efficiency that first cost blue collar jobs, and now that we've gotten inured to that, white collar ones as well (although Alan Blinder draws the line there).

[May 14, 2008] The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick) by Seth Godin

Edition: Hardcover Price: $10.36

The Perfect Book (for the person who needs to be told the obvious), May 22, 2007 By Robert Schmidt (Honolulu, HI USA) - The Dip, by Seth Godin, is a very small book (80 pages) that says, in short:

- Winners quit (regroup. cut their losses, switch gears) whenever necessary on the path to winning.

- Be the best, and the world comes knocking at your door.

- Work through the pain, because the reward is waiting for you further down the road.

If any of these comments/suggestions seem unclear, take at look at The Dip.

If you understand already, you've just saved $12.95.

This is not a "how-to" book. It is meant to be a motivational piece of writing. Work hard... the financial rewards are greatest for the hardest worker. Work through "the dip," or that period where the gains don't seem to be coming as quickly as you'd like. Don't stop running the marathon at mile 25.

Look, the very successful don't read these books. The barely successful can't read these books. So it is written for the somewhat successful, or the person who is looking for "something" else. Here's the shortened version: "Work and study hard. Don't give up. Persevere. However, consider alternatives. Share this book with others."

Don't get me wrong... this is not, in any sense, a bad book, or a book giving bad advice. To me, the advice seems pretty obvious.

Work hard, play hard, and be well.

[Apr 30, 2008] Amazon.com Too Nice for Your Own Good How to Stop Making 9 Self-Sabotaging Mistakes Duke Robinson Books

"Too nice" people serve as a natural feeding ground for sociopaths. See also Groupthink

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing; Reprint edition (November 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-13: 978-0446673860
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.8 inches

Niceness Mistakes-For Good!, June 11, 2003 By Ilaxi S. Patel "Editor, kidsfreesouls.com & A... (India) - See all my reviews

How oft we create a wave to spell trouble with our own perfections being true and honest with good faith and intentions? We take on too much not saying what we want and that's exactly what the book reveals - the niceness mistakes that 'Damage' us! Unconsciously, we have planted strong messages in the back of our minds and with good intentions by our mentors, follow the moral code of conducts in life. Be good, be nice, be cool, share and care, don't be selfish, be reasonable, don't hurt others, help friends, say yes and so on. In real, trying to reach perfection and taking on too much lead us to exhaustion and sooner or later the ship of our life start sinking. The author gives an insight to the nine unconscious mistakes we often make daily and helps us correct them and pulls a person out of frustration and stress.

In not saying what you want and taking on too much, it leads to suppressed anger. Robinson provides healthy tips to express anger to orchestrate a balanced life. Life itself is like riding a bike up and down roads that are bumpy, curvy, hilly while juggling bananas, balloons and bowling balls says Robinson and so this is when you have a fall, life needs balancing back to pedal and steer with too much/too little, too rational/too emotional, to fast/too slow, too cautious/too reckless, too strong/too weak, etc. and remain upright empowering to get what you need and deserve. Irony is, sometimes our niceness betrays us and this book is a key to understanding our mistakes and bring about a 'change' in us. Robinson makes us a nicer person making one realise the mistakes, why we make and how to give up.

In doing so, Robinson guides in:

1. Liberating from the bondage of other's expectations
2. Saying no and saving work overloads
3. Telling what we want and analyze what we receive is worth or not
4. Express anger that heal and maintain relationships too.
5. Face irrationality and criticism
6. Tell truth to friends when they fail us
7. Care for others but do no burden own trying to run their lives.
8. In pain and grief, feel competent enough

A change is always welcome even for the nice to be nicer and avoid the mistakes that we keep making out of the blue. Our good intentions turn out to be damn-in-way for others who often misunderstand or shrug off not appreciating your worth as human being. This book is indeed a gem collection for every person who has learned to live being 'Nice' and remain being so without being emotionally hung up sometimes. Good Pick!

Former title was better., April 8, 2007

By Geoffrey J. Barnes "CyberBronco" (Miami, FL United States)
The former title of this book was Good Intentions. From the information I gathered in the first few pages it was first published in 1997. I am not sure if that refers to the first publication under the current title or the previous one. I say that because the text feels more dated than just 10 years old.

I bought this book at Borders. The title caught my eye and a scan of the first few lines of each chapter confirmed I would like this book. As someone who is always accused of being too nice a guy and winding up burned more than once by relationships and employers, I thought I was on to something! Unfortunately I feel burned again by being naive enough to buy this book. There are those reading this that will say I should have done my homework first before making a purchase. Well, I'm sorry but I am not one of those jerks who sits in Barnes and Noble all day, taking up space and breaking in the backs of books I never intend to purchase. I wish those chairs would run a few megawatts of electricity through them every 10 minutes to get those creepy people out of the stores. They never buy anything and they smell bad! When my cell phone rings in the store, they have the nerve to "Shush" me. Hey people! This is a retail establishment! Buy something or move back into the library!

To give an example of what I am referring to in this book go to page 201, Mistake #8: Rescuing Others. The first page gives an example of a guy with a nephew who is having trouble staying in school or keeping a job. This is actually the chapter that made me buy the book. After getting a few pages into the chapter you realize they are only referring to people who try to rescue addicts and nothing else. My nephew is not an addict, but he otherwise fits the description in the example. Too bad this book didn't stick to its original title: Good Intentions. It is a better description of what is being preached here.

Mistake #7 is called Giving Advice. It tells you to never give advice, and lists several reasons why you should not. Ironically advice is what this book is based upon. The author is giving all of us poor "Nice" guys advice.

I believe the author had "good intentions" when he wrote this book. I believe the publisher had a great money making idea when he re-released this book under its new title.

What is Mobbing? Workplace Mobbing in Academe (2004).

Budget Cuts Are Not the Only Way Workers Are Forced from Jobs: Workplace Abuse

“The mobbing syndrome is a malicious attempt to force a person out of the workplace through unjustified accusations, humiliation, general harassment, emotional abuse, and/or terror. “It is a ‘ganging up’ by the leader(s) - organization, superior, co-worker, or subordinate - who rallies others into systematic and frequent ‘mob-like’ behavior.

“Because the organization ignores, condones, or even instigates the behavior, it can be said that the victim, seemingly helpless against the powerful and many, is indeed ‘mobbed.’ The result is always injury - physical or mental distress or illness and social misery and, most often, expulsion from the workplace.”

-Mobbing: Emotional Abuse in the American Workplace, by Davenport, Schwartz, and Elliott, 1999.

When a budget crisis hits a large institution, certain workers often seem to be treated as though they are“expendable,” and are often the first forced out. But this is not the only manner in which workers are driven out of the workplace. Mobbing has been recognized for many years in Europe, and it is also beginning to be identified as a serious workplace problem in the United States. The authors above go on to say, “Mobbing is an emotional assault. Through innuendo, rumors, and public discrediting, a hostile environment is created in which one individual gathers others to willingly, or unwillingly participate in continuous malevolent actions to force a person out of the workplace.”

“These actions escalate into abusive and terrorizing behavior. The victim feels increasingly helpless when the organization does not put a stop to the behavior or may even plan or condone it... Frequently productivity is affected... Resignation, termination, or early retirement, the negotiated voluntary or involuntary expulsion from the workplace, follows. For the victim, death - through illness or suicide - may be the final chapter in the mobbing story.” -ibid

Much of the original research on mobbing was done by Swedish researcher Heinz Leymann in the 1980’s. His findings have been slow in making it to the United States. However a number of local statutes have been enacted, and publications, conferences, and resources have surfaced recently in the U.S. For example, Peralta Community College District in Oakland recently established a regulation outlawing such behavior.

Often mobbing activities are directed at whistleblowers. Brian Martin, in Whistleblowing and Nonviolencen (Peace and Change, Vol. 24, No. 3, January 1999) describes attacks on whistleblowers this way:

Whistleblowing, in casual usage, means speaking out from within an organization to expose a social problem or, more generally, dissenting from dominant views or practices... The most common experience of whistleblowers is that they are attacked. Instead of their messages being evaluated, the full power of the organization is turned against the whistleblower. This is commonly called the shoot-the-messanger syndrome,... The means of suppression are impressive, nonetheless. They include ostracism by colleagues, petty harassment (including snide remarks, assignment to trivial tasks and invoking of regulations not normally enforced), spreading of rumors, formal reprimands, transfer to positions with no work (or too much work), demotion, referral to psychiatrists, dismissal, and blacklisting.

Whistleblowers often discover that formal channels for complaint or remedy are ineffective or easily blocked. As Martin explains, “Appeal bodies are part of the wider system of power and usually seek or reach accommodation with other powerful groups. Hence such bodies are highly unlikely to support a single individual against elites from a major organization, who usually have links with elites elsewhere.”

Whistleblowers have other resources, according to Martin: “One strategy is based on ‘mobilization,’ namely winning supporters by circulating relevant documents, holding meetings and obtaining media coverage.” Howeve, such attempts at mobilization are often met by more severe mobbing and harassment.

Kenneth Westhues, has identified academic institutions as a primary location for mobbing attacks:

“Ordinarily, colleagues in positions of local power explain the situation in terms of failings of the targeted professor: bad teaching, too few publications or the wrong kind, ethical misconduct, shirking of duties, failure to live up to legitimate expectations of the job... Sometimes, however, the target's failings have little to do with why he or she is in trouble. The evidence may point to a sharply contrasting explanation: that colleagues and/or administrators have ganged up on the targeted professor for no good reason, to the point that collectively shunning, shaming, and tormenting the target bolsters the group's solidarity, its esprit de corps.” - Workplace Mobbing in Academe (2004)

Westhues also tracks the trajectory of mobbing, and its consequences for victims and perpetrators. Here are more of his comments:

“Mobbing ... is an impassioned, collective campaign by co-workers to exclude, punish, and humiliate a targeted worker. Initiated most often by a person in a position of power or influence, mobbing is a desperate urge to crush and eliminate the target. The urge travels through the workplace like a virus, infecting one person after another. The target comes to be viewed as absolutely abhorrent, with no redeeming qualities, outside the circle of acceptance and respectability, deserving only of contempt. As the campaign proceeds, a steadily larger range of hostile ploys and communications comes to be seen as legitimate.”

“Not infrequently, mobbing spelled the end of the target’s career, marriage, health, and livelihood. From a study of circumstances surrounding suicides in Sweden, Leymann estimated that about twelve percent of people who take their own lives have recently been mobbed at work.... By Leymann’s and others' estimates, between two and five percent of adults are mobbed sometime during their working lives. The other 95 percent, involved in the process only as observers, bystanders, or perpetrators (though occasionally also as rescuers or guardians of the target), mostly deny, gloss over, and forget the mobbing cases in which they took part. That is one reason it has taken so long for the phenomenon to be identified and researched.

“Workplace mobbing is normally carried out politely, without any violence, and with ample written documentation. Yet even without the blood, the bloodlust is essentially the same: contagion and mimicking of unfriendly, hostile acts toward the target; relentless undermining of the target’s self-confidence; group solidarity against one whom all agree does not belong; and the euphoria of collective attack.

“The worker most vulnerable to being mobbed is an average or high achiever who is personally invested in a formally secure job, but who nonetheless somehow threatens or puts to shame co-workers and/or managers. “Ironically, it is in workplaces where workers’ rights are formally protected that the complex and devious incursions on human dignity that constitute mobbing most commonly occur. Union shops are one example... University faculties are another, on account of the special protections of tenure and academic freedom professors have...Mobbing appears to be more common in the professional service sector, where work is complex, goals ambiguous, best practices debatable, and market discipline far away. Scapegoating is an effective if temporary means of achieving group solidarity, when it cannot be achieved in a more constructive way. It is a turning inward, a diversion of energy away from serving nebulous external purposes toward the deliciously clear, specific goal of ruining a disliked co-worker's life. Less time, skill, and energy are required to write off a persistent critic as a "difficult professor" than to rebut the critic's arguments. Chalking up dissent to the dissenter's real or imagined flaws of character relieves overworked administrators of uncertainty and ambiguity. It lets them feel good about themselves.

Westhues (and others) point out that the best way to deal with mobbing is to nip it in the bud. Organizations not able to do this are at least as much at fault as the perpetrators of the attacks. To stop it requires an open atmosphere at the very beginning: “The basic priority for constructive resolution of workplace conflict, namely to keep the conversation going, to let competing positions be expressed and the evidence for them reviewed, to listen to what opponents say, to respond honestly and respectfully, to try not to silence anyone.”

Westhues lists three points for a strong academic institution which has vaccinated itself against mobbing:

1. Protect freedom of speech.
2. Keep academic organization loose. A tight ship cannot be a university. It has to be full of contradiction and brimming with debate in order to fulfill its public purposes.
3. Focus attention on these purposes, like educating youth, producing useful knowledge, and above all seeking truth.

These quotes on mobbing were collected and prepared by Karl Schaffer(schafferkarl@fhda.edu, x8214), as a public service to the DeAnza College community. In addition to the sources cited above, google “mobbing” or “workplace abuse” for more info.

[Apr 24, 2008] Cool to Be Frugal

If you think that cannot leave job because you cannot take the pay cuts, think again. There might be some compensating factors which you overlooked. A better health is definitely one factor that should be entered into the equation... Also kid might understand your decisions better that you think...

Changes in behavior begin with changes in attitudes. And there's no better place to build a proper attitude than in the youth of America.

Cool to Be Frugal

Professor Depew was once again on top of the changing attitudes story with point number 5 of Monday's Five Things.

We ran across an interesting piece in USA Today this morning playing right into our theme of a growing wave of resentment against consumption and a disassociation from luxury goods and symbols of wealth.

According to the article, "Teens Turn to Thrift as Jobs Vanish and Prices Rise," rising costs of typical teenage indulgences are causing teens to do something they rarely do: be thrifty. As the article notes, "It's even becoming cool to be frugal."

Let's take a closer look at the article.

The stalwart retailers of teen apparel, such as Abercrombie, based in the Columbus, Ohio, suburb of New Albany, and American Eagle Outfitters Inc., are reporting sluggish sales, defying the myth that teen spending is recession-proof: It holds up longer, but can eventually fold.

It's even becoming cool to be frugal.

Last week, Ellegirl.com, the teen offshoot of Elle magazine, launched a new video fixture called Self-Made Girl, which shows teens how to make clothes and accessories. The first video offers tips on how to create a prom clutch.

"It's a little tacky in the economic unrest to tote a big logo bag," said Holly Siegel, the site's senior editor. She said it's no longer about teens "one-upping each other," but rather where they can get it cheap.

Economists say this teen spending slump could be the worst in 17 years, when teen frugality led to the demise of once-hot Merry-Go-Round Enterprises Inc. and ushered in an era of flannel shirts and torn jeans.

Sales at teen retailers open at least a year averaged a 0.5% decline last year, compared to a 3.3% increase in 2006 and a 12.1% gain in 2005, according to a UBS-International Council of Shopping Centers tally. Among the few bright spots is Aeropostale Inc., whose jeans are about 30% cheaper than Abercrombie & Fitch. Candace Corlett, principal at consulting firm WSL Strategic Retail, said low-price chains like H&M and Steve & Barry's should do well.

"It is way cooler to get a super deal on that shirt rather than being able to spend the most money on something," said Anna D'Agrosa, director of Consumer Insights at The Zandl Group, a market research company focusing on teens. "Kids are becoming really aware of what is happening to their economy and to their families."

Teen Awareness

"Kids are becoming really aware of what is happening to their economy and to their families."

Every teen is going to have a friend or classmate whose parents lost their home. Walking Away Will Be The Next Mortgage Crisis. And as foreclosures skyrocket and parents lose their homes, these kids will remember it for the rest of their lives.

Secular changes in behavior start with secular changes in attitudes. That secular change in attitudes is now underway and it's not just with teens either. Many baby boomers facing retirement are half scared to death.

Greenspan had the wind of spendthrift consumers at his back. Bernanke has the wind of increasingly frugal consumers blowing briskly in his face. The implications should be obvious. Those who think Deflation In A Fiat Regime cannot happen, need to think again.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

[Mar 11, 2008] Human brain appears 'hard-wired' for hierarchy

Human imaging studies have for the first time identified brain circuitry associated with social status, according to researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) of the National Institutes of Health. They found that different brain areas are activated when a person moves up or down in a pecking order – or simply views perceived social superiors or inferiors. Circuitry activated by important events responded to a potential change in hierarchical status as much as it did to winning money.Our position in social hierarchies strongly influences motivation as well as physical and mental health,” said NIMH Director Thomas R Insel, M.D. “This first glimpse into how the brain processes that information advances our understanding of an important factor that can impact public health.”

Caroline Zink, Ph.D., Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg, M.D., Ph.D., and colleagues of the NIMH Genes Cognition and Psychosis Program, report on their functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study in the April 24, 2008, issue of the journal Neuron. Meyer-Lindenberg is now director of Germany’s Central Institute of Mental Health.

Prior studies have shown that social status strongly predicts health. Animals chronically stressed by their hierarchical position have high rates of cardiovascular and depression/anxiety-like syndromes. A classic study of British civil servants found that the lower one ranked, the higher the odds for developing cardiovascular disease and dying early. Lower social rank likely compromises health through psychological effects, such as by limiting control over one’s life and interactions with others. However, in hierarchies that allow for more upward mobility, those at the top who stand to lose their positions can have higher risk for stress-related illness. Yet little is known about how the human brain translates such factors into health risk.

To find out, the NIMH researchers created an artificial social hierarchy in which 72 participants played an interactive computer game for money. They were assigned a status that they were told was based on their playing skill. In fact, the game outcomes were predetermined and the other “players” simulated by computer. While their brain activity was monitored by fMRI, participants intermittently saw pictures and scores of an inferior and a superior “player” they thought were simultaneously playing in other rooms.

Although they knew the perceived players’ scores would not affect their own outcomes or reward –and were instructed to ignore them – participants’ brain activity and behavior were highly influenced by their position in the implied hierarchy.

“The processing of hierarchical information seems to be hard-wired, occurring even outside of an explicitly competitive environment, underscoring how important it is for us,” said Zink.

Key study findings included:

• The area that signals an event’s importance, called the ventral striatum, responded to the prospect of a rise or fall in rank as much as it did to the monetary reward, confirming the high value accorded social status.
• Just viewing a superior human “player,” as opposed to a perceived inferior one or a computer, activated an area near the front of the brain that appears to size people up – making interpersonal judgments and assessing social status. A circuit involving the mid-front part of the brain that processes the intentions and motives of others and emotion processing areas deep in the brain activated when the hierarchy became unstable, allowing for upward and downward mobility.
• Performing better than the superior “player” activated areas higher and toward the front of the brain controlling action planning, while performing worse than an inferior “player” activated areas lower in the brain associated with emotional pain and frustration.
• The more positive the mood experienced by participants while at the top of an unstable hierarchy, the stronger was activity in this emotional pain circuitry when they viewed an outcome that threatened to move them down in status. In other words, people who felt more joy when they won also felt more pain when they lost.

“Such activation of emotional pain circuitry may underlie a heightened risk for stress-related health problems among competitive individuals,” suggested Meyer-Lindenberg.

In collaboration with other NIMH researchers, Zink and colleagues are planning follow-up studies to explore brain activity in response to the experimental social hierarchy in patients with mental illnesses like schizophrenia or autism, which are marked by social and thinking deficits. The researchers will also be exploring whether particular gene variants might differentially affect brain responses in similar experiments.

Source: National Institute of Mental Health

Comment

Posted by superhuman 20 minutes ago Provide size of the samples and how other possible explanations were ruled out, theres to many idiotic social 'science' to take such articles seriously without being able to at least verify the assumptions and statistics behind them.

For example where is the proof that subjects really interpreted results in terms of social hierarchy? What authors think was associated with social status can simply be an anticipation of difficulty of the game - since player rank is linked to gaming ability if you see a player higher ranked you know he won more games therefore you anticipate tougher game and enjoy victory more, loosing to inferior player is also more frustrating.

[Mar 11, 2008] Politics, and Scandal, as Usual - New York Times by N. R. Kleinfield

While this case has nothing to do with toxic managers, it demonstrates an interesting mechanism at work in positions of power:

• “Sex and power are extremely connected, because they’re basically an expression of this huge energy that these people have.” '.

• ..when you get into a position of power, you think you’re above the law.”

• ... "There’s no tenure. It’s often hard to know what the criteria for success are. It’s either all or nothing — you either win or you lose. And so it inspires a risk-taking person to go into that line of work. But on the public side, they’re supposed to show stability and responsibility, and so this risky nature may show itself more on the private side.”

NYT | March 11, 2008

It keeps happening. Recklessly, shamelessly, cavalierly — as if this time they’re the ones who will somehow manage to get away with it all.

But many of them don’t.

Congressmen, senators, governors, presidents, mayors — politicians at all levels keep starring in this familiar and non-partisan soap opera rerun. They engage in clandestine sexual entanglements, commonly cloaked in the tawdry textures of hotel pseudonyms and airport bathrooms and pay-by-the-hour copulation. All too often, their stealthy frolics then poison their political careers.

And now add to the lengthening list Gov. Eliot Spitzer, husband, father of three teenage daughters, who authorities on Monday said had been involved with a ring of prostitutes.

“I think biologists could tell you this has something to do with natural selection — the person who acquires power becomes the alpha male,” said Tom Fiedler, who teaches a course in press and politics at Harvard’s Kennedy School. He was involved in reporting Gary Hart’s notorious fling with Donna Rice in 1987 that terminated the senator’s presidential bid.

Politics and sex is an old story, and as Mr. Fiedler and others point out, it simply reinforces the lessons of the aphrodisiac of power taught in Shakespeare. Its prime characters constitute a crowded society.

Governor Spitzer’s startling appearance with his wife, Silda, at his side is itself something of a contrapuntal answer to New Jersey’s 2004 entry in this dubious catalog of political misbehavior, Gov. James E. McGreevey’s relinquishing office after disclosing a gay affair.

By now, many of the more publicized escapades have become embedded in political lore, from President Bill Clinton encounters with Monica Lewinsky to Senator Bob Packwood and his unwanted advances on women to Representative Mark Foley and his lewd e-mails to House pages.

Who can forget the late Wilbur D. Mills, the one-time powerful head of the House Ways and Means Committee, and his dalliances back in 1974 with the stripper Fanne Foxe? She’s the one who barreled out of Mr. Mills’s car and waded into the Tidal Basin in Washington when the park police stopped them. Enterprisingly, she went and changed her name from the Argentine Firecracker to the Tidal Basin Bombshell, and got a book out of her adventures.

There was, as well, Representative Gary Condit, whose career imploded when it came out that he had been involved with Chandra Levy, an intern who was murdered. And Wayne Hays, the Ohio representative, who quit in 1976 after it was revealed that the job requirements of Elizabeth Ray were less as a secretary than as his mistress. In her famous words: “I can’t type. I can’t file. I can’t even answer the phone.”

Sexual missteps among politicians are nothing peculiar to the United States, having firm grounding in England, for instance, and turning up with good regularity throughout the world. But they seem to reach more absurdist proportions in this country, and have almost the quality of a catch-me-if-you-can game at a time when private borders have gotten extremely porous.

“There is a broader anxiety about what is private anymore,” said Paul Apostolidis, a political science professor at Whitman College and the co-editor of the book “Public Affairs: Politics in the Age of Sex Scandals.” “It’s not that politicians are behaving more badly. We’re just learning about it more often.”

But why does it go on repeatedly when the ramifications can be so dire?

“I don’t see why we would expect politics to be more free of the psychological contradictions of other humans beings,” Mr. Apostolidis said. “People do self-destructive things that are not rational.”

Psychologists mention the sense of entitlement felt by those who attain political standing that blinds them to the consequences of their actions. And they say that ambitious politicians are invigorated by risk and feel impervious.

Dr. Frank Farley, a psychologist at Temple University, said that many politicians are what he calls Type T personalities, with T standing for thrill-seeking. “Politics is an uncertain business,” he said. “You’re at the whim of the electorate. There’s no tenure. It’s often hard to know what the criteria for success are. It’s either all or nothing — you either win or you lose. And so it inspires a risk-taking person to go into that line of work. But on the public side, they’re supposed to show stability and responsibility, and so this risky nature may show itself more on the private side.”

Despite the intensified scrutiny of politicians in recent times, and the ongoing parade of those who do get caught, Dr. Farley said public officials keep acting recklessly because their nature is hard to restrain. “It’s deep,” he said. “It’s very hard to throttle back.”

Dr. Judy Kuriansky, an adjunct professor of clinical psychology at Columbia University’s Teachers College, said that “sex and power are extremely connected, because they’re basically an expression of this huge energy that these people have.”

Not uncommonly, she said, politicians speak out vigorously against the very behavior that they then indulge in, as is the case with Governor Spitzer. “You project wrong onto others that is symptomatic of your own behavior,” she said. “It’s called a defense mechanism. Basically, it’s unconscious.”

Moreover, she added, “Even though Spitzer is a lawyer, when you get into a position of power, you think you’re above the law.”

Some secrets do in fact have long lives. Not until 2004, three decades afterward, did it come out that Neil Goldschmidt, who became governor of Oregon in the 1980s, had sexually abused a 14-year-old babysitter while he was mayor of Portland.

Well, what could Oregon legislators do at that point? They took his official portrait and hung it in a less visible spot in the state capitol.

Not always, of course, are political careers ruined by sexual irregularities. Rep. Barney Frank continued to win re-election in Massachusetts even after it was disclosed in 1989 that he had hired a male prostitute who ran a brothel out of his apartment.

It is sometimes speculated that certain politicians, at least subconsciously, want to be caught and have their careers upended. But do they?

“I’ve never seen it,” said Dr. Farley. “I don’t believe it’s a factor with these people. It’s just in their nature to push things. I don’t think they have a death wish. I think they have a life wish. They just love all aspects of life — some of it too much.”

[Mar 9, 2008] Bullying more harmful than sexual harassment on the job, say researchers

Workplace bullying, such as belittling comments, persistent criticism of work and withholding resources, appears to inflict more harm on employees than sexual harassment, say researchers who presented their findings at a conference today.

“As sexual harassment becomes less acceptable in society, organizations may be more attuned to helping victims, who may therefore find it easier to cope,” said lead author M. Sandy Hershcovis, PhD, of the University of Manitoba. “In contrast, non-violent forms of workplace aggression such as incivility and bullying are not illegal, leaving victims to fend for themselves.”

This finding was presented at the Seventh International Conference on Work, Stress and Health, co-sponsored by the American Psychological Association, the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health and the Society for Occupational Health Psychology.

Hershcovis and co-author Julian Barling, PhD, of Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, reviewed 110 studies conducted over 21 years that compared the consequences of employees’ experience of sexual harassment and workplace aggression. Specifically, the authors looked at the effect on job, co-worker and supervisor satisfaction, workers’ stress, anger and anxiety levels as well as workers’ mental and physical health. Job turnover and emotional ties to the job were also compared.

The authors distinguished among different forms of workplace aggression.

• Incivility included rudeness and discourteous verbal and non-verbal behaviors.
• Bullying included persistently criticizing employees’ work; yelling; repeatedly reminding employees of mistakes; spreading gossip or lies; ignoring or excluding workers; and insulting employees’ habits, attitudes or private life.
• Interpersonal conflict included behaviors that involved hostility, verbal aggression and angry exchanges.

Both bullying and sexual harassment can create negative work environments and unhealthy consequences for employees, but the researchers found that workplace aggression has more severe consequences. Employees who experienced bullying, incivility or interpersonal conflict were more likely to quit their jobs, have lower well-being, be less satisfied with their jobs and have less satisfying relations with their bosses than employees who were sexually harassed, the researchers found.

Furthermore, bullied employees reported more job stress, less job commitment and higher levels of anger and anxiety. No differences were found between employees experiencing either type of mistreatment on how satisfied they were with their co-workers or with their work.

“Bullying is often more subtle, and may include behaviors that do not appear obvious to others,” said Hershcovis. “For instance, how does an employee report to their boss that they have been excluded from lunch? Or that they are being ignored by a coworker? The insidious nature of these behaviors makes them difficult to deal with and sanction.”

From a total of 128 samples that were used, 46 included subjects who experienced sexual harassment, 86 experienced workplace aggression and six experienced both. Sample sizes ranged from 1,491 to 53,470 people. Participants ranged from 18 to 65 years old. The work aggression samples included both men and women. The sexual harassment samples examined primarily women because, Hershcovis said, past research has shown that men interpret and respond differently to the behaviors that women perceive as sexual harassment.

Source: American Psychological Association

[Jan 30, 2008] Angry Bear/OldVet: Scheming Your Way from Rags to Riches

This one is by OldVet...

”Scheming your way from riches to rags”

This seems an opportune time for Angrybears to gird up their loins financially. For those who have not already succumbed to the lures of the “greater fool” theory of housing markets, please be aware that in declining economies the clever may turn to other schemes to part you from your cash. Ponzi operators such as hedge funds, private equity funds, Nigerian con artists with “special opportunites” and other wickedly complex characters will importune you to “invest” for quick returns. Pyramid scheme operators will urge you to “invest in yourself and your future” with the promise of riches and income streams in perpetuity by recruiting friends and neighbors to buy and sell inventories of overpriced crap.

Wikipedia’s definition of a Ponzi scheme and a pyramid scheme distinguish them from financial “bubbles” thusly:

- A pyramid scheme is a form of fraud similar in some ways to a Ponzi scheme, relying as it does on a disbelief in financial reality, including the hope of an extremely high rate of return. However, several characteristics distinguish pyramid schemes from Ponzi schemes:

- In a Ponzi scheme, the schemer acts as a “hub” for the victims, interacting with all of them directly. In a pyramid scheme, those who recruit additional participants benefit directly (in fact, failure to recruit typically means no investment return).

- A Ponzi scheme claims to rely on some esoteric investment approach, insider connections, etc., and often attracts well-to-do investors; pyramid schemes explicitly claim that new money will be the source of payout for the initial investments.

- A pyramid scheme is bound to collapse a lot faster, simply because of the demand for exponential increases in participants to sustain it. By contrast, Ponzi schemes can survive simply by getting most participants to "reinvest" their money, with a relatively small number of new participants.

- A bubble. A bubble relies on suspension of belief and an expectation of large profits, but it is not the same as a Ponzi scheme. A bubble involves ever-rising (and unsustainable) prices in an open market (be that shares of a stock, housing prices, the price of tulip bulbs, or anything else). As long as buyers are willing to pay ever-increasing prices, sellers can get out with a profit. And there doesn't need to be a schemer behind a bubble. (In fact, a bubble can arise without any fraud at all - for example, housing prices in a local market that rise sharply but eventually drop sharply because of overbuilding.) Bubbles are often said to be based on "greater fool" theory.

Armed with this knowledge and alert to these potential pitfalls, I would only add that the operators of such schemes have identifiable personality characteristics. From investigator Bill Branscum we learn:

His system makes it possible for him to pay incredible rates of return. The elaborate office, exquisitely tailored suits, involvement with the church, and generosity toward charitable organizations are all classic window dressing. . . Ponzi or Pyramid - either way, the con artists who perpetrate these scams are swindlers with sociopathic personalities who view everyone around them as bit part players in their own personal play. These people are devious beyond comprehension. Uninhibited by anything akin to conscience or remorse, they have no mercy and feel nobody's pain. Charm and charisma can conceal a lot. It is hard to imagine that one of the most likeable people you ever met in your life, totally trusted by those you respect and admire, would destroy everything you worked your entire life to build while looking you in the eye and smiling in your face all the while.

Oh my!! Is there any way to protect yourself from these smooth operators? Yes. Become a psychopath. That’s your best shot, according to a study.

Wanted: psychopaths to play the stock market. The US team found that people with certain brain injuries which suppress their emotions could make the best stock market traders. They took a selection of 41 people of normal IQ, 15 of whom had suffered lesions on the areas of the brain that affect emotions, and made them play a simple investment game. Those with brain damage significantly out performed those without, the researchers from Stanford Graduate School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Iowa found.

[Dec 1, 2007] The Psychopath The Mask of Sanity

Imagine - if you can - not having a conscience, none at all, no feelings of guilt or remorse no matter what you do, no limiting sense of concern for the well-being of strangers, friends, or even family members. Imagine no struggles with shame, not a single one in your whole life, no matter what kind of selfish, lazy, harmful, or immoral action you had taken. 

And pretend that the concept of responsibility is unknown to you, except as a burden others seem to accept without question, like gullible fools. 

Now add to this strange fantasy the ability to conceal from other people that your psychological makeup is radically different from theirs. Since everyone simply assumes that conscience is universal among human beings, hiding the fact that you are conscience-free is nearly effortless. 

You are not held back from any of your desires by guilt or shame, and you are never confronted by others for your cold-bloodedness. The ice water in your veins is so bizarre, so completely outside of their personal experience, that they seldom even guess at your condition.

In other words, you are completely free of internal restraints, and your unhampered liberty to do just as you please, with no pangs of conscience, is conveniently invisible to the world. 

You can do anything at all, and still your strange advantage over the majority of people, who are kept in line by their consciences will most likely remain undiscovered.

... ... ...

Crazy and frightening - and real, in about 4 percent of the population....

The prevalence rate for anorexic eating disorders is estimated a 3.43 percent, deemed to be nearly epidemic, and yet this figure is a fraction lower than the rate for antisocial personality. The high-profile disorders classed as schizophrenia occur in only about 1 percent of [the population] - a mere quarter of the rate of antisocial personality - and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that the rate of colon cancer in the United States, considered "alarmingly high," is about 40 per 100,000 - one hundred times lower than the rate of antisocial personality. 

The high incidence of sociopathy in human society has a profound effect on the rest of us who must live on this planet, too, even those of us who have not been clinically traumatized. The individuals who constitute this 4 percent drain our relationships, our bank accounts, our accomplishments, our self-esteem, our very peace on earth. 

Yet surprisingly, many people know nothing about this disorder, or if they do, they think only in terms of violent psychopathy - murderers, serial killers, mass murderers - people who have conspicuously broken the law many times over, and who, if caught, will be imprisoned, maybe even put to death by our legal system. 

We are not commonly aware of, nor do we usually identify, the larger number of nonviolent sociopaths among us, people who often are not blatant lawbreakers, and against whom our formal legal system provides little defense.

Most of us would not imagine any correspondence between conceiving an ethnic genocide and, say, guiltlessly lying to one's boss about a coworker. But the psychological correspondence is not only there; it is chilling. Simple and profound, the link is the absence of the inner mechanism that beats up on us, emotionally speaking, when we make a choice we view as immoral, unethical, neglectful, or selfish. 

Most of us feel mildly guilty if we eat the last piece of cake in the kitchen, let alone what we would feel if we intentionally and methodically set about to hurt another person. 

Those who have no conscience at all are a group unto themselves, whether they be homicidal tyrants or merely ruthless social snipers.

The presence or absence of conscience is a deep human division, arguably more significant than intelligence, race, or even gender.

What differentiates a sociopath who lives off the labors of others from one who occasionally robs convenience stores, or from one who is a contemporary robber baron - or what makes the difference between an ordinary bully and a sociopathic murderer - is nothing more than social status, drive, intellect, blood lust, or simple opportunity. 

What distinguishes all of these people from the rest of us is an utterly empty hole in the psyche, where there should be the most evolved of all humanizing functions. [Martha Stout, Ph.D., The Sociopath Next Door] (highly recommended)

[Oct 24, 2007 ] 5 Signs You are About to Lose Your Job

By Flexo on Wednesday, October 24th, 2007 in Career and Work | 12 Comments Many of us depend on our employers for our livelihood. Even those not living paycheck-to-paycheck count on being employed to build up savings, invest and insure for the future, and of course pay the bills. Here are some things to look out for. If these apply to you, start hedging your bets and planning for what life will be like without your job.

Fewer responsibilities. Are you being asked to train others on your job? If your responsibilities are being transferred to someone else—and you are not receiving more responsibilities to compensate—you may be on your way to being downsized, rightsized, or “made redundant.”

Exclusion. If you are no longer included in the types of meetings of which you were formerly a part, the group may be moving on without you. It is entirely possible that your boss is recognizing that you have an excessive amount of work to do and is excluding you to allow you to complete other assignments, but if this is not communicated to you, your team is simply getting used to working without you.

Blame for small mistakes. If your small mistakes — everyone makes them—are becoming topics of conversation or your bosses are assigning blame to you for other small problems, there are at least two things happening. First, recognizing your errors will help your boss feel further justified for letting you go. Also, once you are gone, it will be much easier to assign blame to you. You will not be around to defend yourself.

Talk around the water cooler. Word travels fast. If you hear a rumor that the company has it in for you, chances are it’s true. If not, someone has a personal vendetta against you and is starting rumors to make you crazy. I see that as a highly unlikely possibility. Either way, I wouldn’t want to stay in either environment, so striking the first blow by quitting may keep you sane.

Bad review. If your year has progressed well but you’re surprised with low ratings at your annual or semi-annual performance review, you could be on your way out. Bad reviews shouldn’t sneak up on you. If you truly are performing poorly and the review is the first time you’ve received negative feedback, then there are communication problems within your department. But if you feel you’re doing well, there should be no disagreement. If those negative reviews were unsuspected and undeserved, start looking for a new job.

It’s good to be prepared for losing your job even if there are no signs yet. Anything can happen, and anything can happen quickly.

[Jul 10, 2007] MSN Careers - Five Common Workplace Dilemmas - Career Advice Article by Rachel Zupek, CareerBuilder.com

Created May 16, 2007Last updated: April 29, 2012