Psychopath

[Namechange50008]

I've just learnt apparently one per cent of the population is a psychopath.
But generally not in the film way (e.g American Psycho) but in an actual mental health way (e.g high impulsivity/low boredom threshold/egocentric/superficially charming/liars).
There's the Hare Checklist which I've got really into.
But what it boils down is that they don't seem to feel emotions.
I can't comprehend this - I get angry and sad and anxious and all the emotions - and am fascinated. One per seems huge.
Does anyone think they know a psychopath? Genuinely? This isn't an AIBU BTW. I'm honestly just really interested.

I thought I wrote this post! Interesting how school staff have probably all come across one child like this.

The child I taught had no redeeming qualities. All the other "difficult" children I taught I had a massive soft spot for. This boy... No. And all the school staff felt the same about him

Things like this make me wonder a lot about the correlation with personality profiles such as Myers-Briggs, DISC, OCEAN etc.

I always correlate strongly across these tests, and feel similar to you - high degree of emotional intelligence and emotional readings, but very different in personal response to that info.

I've reviewed several checklists of autism, NPD, psychopathy, the works. There's always a LOT missing, but a few dispersed ticks.

One thing that always fascinates me about AIBU is the sheer number of posts where I just wouldn't care enough to post.

Annoyed by a stranger in public? Well, some strangers are idiots, or just in a bad mood. It matters not.

In laws don't seem interested in your life? Good, I won't be interested in theirs then (and I have a great relationship with my in laws but I wouldn't care if it was non existent!).

Husband/friend/parent treating you badly all the time? Well, they can behave as badly as they like, but I can withdraw my company.

Part of it is learned self-sufficiency, but a bigger part of it is my head "running the numbers" - 8 billion people on this planet, can't please all of em. Won't try. Plenty of options.

I don't mind flawed people as long as I can understand and take account of their flaws - they'll be taking account of mine. But what I won't do is create expectations that are clearly counter to their personalities, not will I expect them to change.

@thecatsthecats I would like to be more emotionally cool. Funnily enough I meditate to get there. Perhaps the traits you describe have a little in common with equanimity. Also cold-water swimming helps. Those of us who get too fearful could do with this.

I am assuming I may be Autistic due to the way I have always felt since a child, my children and I did score high over the threshold on tests I was recommended to do. I still get confused with myself though as it feels weird, conflicting almost.

I don't know for sure but I would say I am highly emotionally intelligent to the point I am in full control of my own, if that makes sense. To me it's I can feel everything deeply, more than most I would say but I don't show it on the surface or let them take over and I can use my emotions as and when needed to process them. I can be upset or angry and inside my mind I am running through all scenarios, conversing with myself but keeping myself at a level state rather than them taking over. On the surface I have a default state, nobody generally knows my mood it seems, I could be very happy or find something funny and all will show is a slight smile. I've never understood people who hysterically laugh over most things that are to me, not funny at all or at best basic humor. As apposed to wit or in some cases sarcasm, which I find funny.

As for other people in general I am kind and helpful to most people. Everyone seems to like me, I've never had any issues but I don't necessarily trust people or care about those people. I have a longing to know people and I am very lonely but at the same time I can't just go out and meet people. I generally only need a partner and that it seems is my one blind spot or weakness when it comes to trusting people. Yet, other people in general such as groups of people I get a sense very fast who is who in the hierarchy of that circle, who is genuine and who is not, say at the workplace or social in general. I have always been on the outside looking in, I belong to no group, I am not interested in it.

Same as with you, I can read things or people talk about things that are a big deal to them and I just cannot understand why energy is being wasted on it. I mean I understand people have feelings and they worry, just like I do internally but not over small things or people who clearly are not worth thinking about. Same with frustration and anger. I see people lose their minds over such insignificant, material things or simple challenges when they cannot do something or things don't work or break. It blows my mind sometimes I don't understand, frustrating yes but find the solution to the problem, moaning or anger is counterintuitive.

I know people are selfish, I know people are who they are and I can't change them or expect them to change. I will mix with anyone I do not care everyone is on the same level to me, I don't look down on anyone, except those who have done wrong. However, I really struggle to process why people do things to me when I have shown nothing but respect, care or kindness and gone above and beyond. Generally those who take advantage or betray me I remove entirely, they are no longer on mind, they are not worth knowing.

This time though it's the worst betrayal I have ever experienced and I cannot remove them because they have the only true bond I have ever known. So I must endure once again and fight the illogical with logic and reason.

I haven’t done the others, but I’ve consistently come out as ENTJ every time I’ve taken the MBTI.

I relate to a lot of what you’ve said. I take people for what they are, and it’s never occurred to me to pass comment on what they should or shouldn’t be/think/feel. Similarly, I genuinely don’t care if people judge me negatively or dislike me. I don’t fear it, and it doesn’t hurt my feelings. I do not believe that ‘keeping the peace’ is the most important of considerations above all others, and it amazes me what people will put up with in the name of being seen as ‘nice’. I’m not an anxious person.

I’m an observer - I prefer to sit back and read a person or situation before I either take action or make a judgement. I am good at reading people, so my cognitive empathy is well developed. I don’t ‘feel’ it, but I find that a lot of people are drawn to me precisely because of that quality. I’m not the person you’d seek out to sit and cry with, but I am the person that will give their honest opinion, and provide solutions to perceived problems. On one hand I have zero qualms about using whatever I have at hand to my advantage if I do believe it will be to my benefit, but I am generally a fair person when it comes to how I treat people. I’ve never been prone to jealously, or taking a dislike to someone for petty reasons. I just don’t care enough for that.

Have name changed for this. I too have psychopath traits and I'm a narcissist.

I have no empathy for humans, yet I can feel it towards animals. I am more upset about animals being abused than I am children. I don't care about children and would rescue a dog above a child in a dangerous situation any time.

My world has to revolve around me and my needs. I have friends and family and I pretend that I care and that I'm a normal human being, but there's nothing there really.

It is exhausting trying to fit in and I'm a loner by nature so live for the times when I'm on my own, or just with my dog, so I can stop pretending to be nice.

I know I'm cleverer than everyone I work with, but I pretend that it takes me longer to do things than it really does so I can get away with skiving for large periods of the day.

I lie to people about what I want from life and let them think that I am supporting my junior colleagues to climb the ladder. In reality I don't care about them and will shaft them to achieve what I want. I'm clever, so they don't realise I've done this so often that it makes me despise them for their weakness.

I'm not cruel, but I know I wouldn't do anything to stop a human from being hurt.

I have broken a lot of laws and have lied about financial and academic situations so people feel sorry for me.

I know I'm a despicable human being but I don't care.

How do people with high psychopathic traits get into relationships? Is a lot of it based on convenience? All my relationships have been based on love.

@Namechange50008 Can't say for sure and I think mine was perhaps a narcissist but as far as I can work out it was a total lie. It seemed and felt like love but looking back it moved extremely fast relationship wise and felt off. That person I met vanished and became someone new entirely and did so multiple times throughout to where I am now where they have once again became someone new entirely.

Wasn't just a case of oh they are older now, everything they valued and stood for changed, the way they spoke, tone and saw things changed, their past and timeline changed. Like personality switches almost but they never reverted just a new persona that seemed to get what they wanted at the time. Had a different past than they actually did, which was fabricated or twisted in some way with a few truths thrown in, events never happened or were twisted from the truth to support this new character.

As for psychopaths not sure, but maybe there is some form of connection there in that circumstance rather than deceit.

In my experience- faking love at the beginning and controlling strategies after a while, dropping the mask.

My partner is a man who I work with, nit the same company, but a collaborator. He was married when I met him.

He started flirting with me a year or so ago. I flirted back because I liked the attention. We then progressed to meeting up for coffee and started hugging, then kissing and eventually slept together at Christmas.

He told me he loved me and I do genuinely love him too. He left his wife for me soon after Christmas and now lives near me with plans to move in at some point. He loves me because I'm different and because I pay him more attention than his wife did. She was always with the children and he felt neglected. I changed that.

I guess we're together because he's as selfish as me. I have no qualms about breaking up his marriage or him leaving his kids. He is a typical Disney dad but I don't care because I don't need a relationship with his kids and they are teenagers so will soon have their own lives.

For me, I used to pursue relationships because I enjoyed sex, and I wanted a willing partner to be available and close at hand.

As I've aged, the sex is still a part of it, but the ageing has also made me far less tolerant of other people's foibles, so I no longer see the convenience of sex being sufficient to over-ride my dislike of living with other people. I have a partner, but we do not live together, which is an arrangement preferred by us both. I still get the bonus of a sexual relationship but without the nuisance of having to share my living space with someone else, plus the fact that we aren't in each other's hair constantly means that I actually do far more enjoy doing typical 'relationship' things like socialising, short trips, visiting places of interest, cinema and so on when we are actually together.

It was different when I was younger. I put up with the drudgery and infuriating parts of living together because I thought that's just what you had to accept if you wanted a long-term sexual partner, but I've since realised there are plenty of people who feel as I do, and understand that living together is not a compulsory part of long-term relationships.

I am totally aromantic. I see romantic gestures and acts as completely cringe and wholly unwelcome in a relationship, so I don't crave the closeness of being with a partner 24/7, I don't necessarily miss them when they are not around, I don't hang on the door opening and feel flutters when they come in from work etc. I still enjoy company when I feel need of it, but it has to be on my terms, and I don't 'dream' about futures with partners and so on because they're just an NPC really, and who knows?, I might decide next week I've had enough and leave them.

I've always viewed all relationships as soluble. It does not mean I am not committed, it simply means that I view the commitment as open-ended, and on a 'rolling contact' basis. It's why I don't really think about 'where will WE be in 5 or 10 years', because I see that as folly. Humans, or at least, my perception of the majority of them, is that they are needy and overly prone to emotion. I hate clinginess, so any sort of "what ARE we?/where are we going?/what do you want out of this relationship?" type stuff I see as completely ridiculous. It just 'is'. Live life in the moment, because you can not predict the future. Either of us could be hit by a bus, drop dead tomorrow, or just decide we've had enough of the other one. We might just fall out over something trivial, and that will be the straw that breaks the camels back.

I also do not see any merit in the typical financial boons to sharing living spaces etc. To me, people who become utterly dependent on a partner are fools. I can not for the life of me understand SAHM's for example. To me, it's tantamount to actively asking to be left high and dry. It doesn't mean I can't empathise with someone in a difficult position through no fault of their own, but I can't help feeling a bit 'more fool you, you opted to put yourself in a ridiculously vulnerable position to begin with'. I value and cherish my total independence above all else, and I would not sacrifice that for anything or anybody else.

@whumpthereitis interesting that you're ENTJ, as I'm INTJ, and also CD on DISC (conscientious/dominant), and, errrrrm, I forget on OCEAN but it lines up with the other two.

I do not believe that ‘keeping the peace’ is the most important of considerations above all others, and it amazes me what people will put up with in the name of being seen as ‘nice’.

This bit stuck out to me, because I often get accused of giving advice on MN threads which is "keeping the peace", but that I see as just an expedient way to mitigate or resolve someone's emotional reaction regarding something I don't care about. My husband (mostly) appreciates this, funnily enough!

Hard to think of an example - but basically if someone has got wound up about something that isn't worth fighting over, I take whatever small and not-inconvenient I think right to fix it. Take the fight out of the situation. The downside being that if I misjudge and the person feels dismissed as a result, then obviously it's worse.

I get that, but there's a world away from "keeping the peace" and being a psychopath. I think it's when you tick basically every box you start to wonder! It is the lying and deception that gets me. I couldn't throw colleagues under the bus. 1) I wouldn't be subtle enough 2) I couldn't morally do it 3) I couldn't handle the guilt 4) I would be scared of being found out.

The Rules are for other people...
See Johnson. His Headmaster noticed it when he was quite young.
He later practised it in all areas of his life.
Threatening the journalist. Cheating on all his wives. Lying to Parliament.
To the Queen. Rule breaking at every opportunity.

I've known a psychopath. Well known British businessman.
I also knew a man who watched his wife of many years fall down the stairs whilst holding his newborn baby. Didn't make any attempt to help. Smiled & walked away.

Yeah but that's because you have that in you but others do not. If you come across someone who lacks empathy, guilt or remorse it's not part of the equation.

I couldn't do that either, not because I deeply care about the person or people but because morally it's wrong and I wouldn't want it to happen to me either.

Narcissists for example do all manner of things to others and they do not care. However, you do anything to them then they care, only they then react and lash out further hurting others.

I don't know what I would be, other than perhaps autistic but my role as a whole, everyone I come across I seem to be some form of mediator.

I do not like confrontation or conflict, not because I'm fearful of it but because it seems pointless. I can quite easily diffuse arguments, resolve issues across the board because I do tend to see things and think logically but also I can see both points of view. It's hard to explain but I can almost sympathise or feel others feelings and kind of be in their shoes.

I found this quite useful for my own children also, where they were emotional over something whether that was sad or angry and I could calmly and logically navigate their issue at hand to help them see the bigger picture, another side for them to understand and process it.

However, maybe it's the autistic side I do often land myself in trouble because I can be extremely blunt. Not out of being nasty, more of the phrase or word I have chosen that's perhaps a little bit too realistic for people's liking.

Yes, I get the mediator thing too. I often end up being in the position of being the only person who everyone is on good speaking term with.

Some people take issue with that, on the grounds that I haven't picked a side, but usually I can't see that there's a side to pick - just two people who I can see think differently.

Funnily enough this came up recently with another friend. Neither of us took sides in a HUGE falling out in the social group a few years back. The neutral friend and I were discussing how one side accepted that we hadn't taken sides. The other side lobbied my neutral friend HARD to take sides, and made no such effort with me. Neutral friend reckoned that they simply knew it wouldn't work on me.

It does lead to weaker friendships in some ways - enemy and beloved of none - but on the whole I think I'm happier with a few loyal and close friends, and no drama from the wider group.

Really, it does depend on the circumstances. When I wrote that I was thinking not about minor inconvenience, but about situations where someone is getting the absolute piss taken out of them, but they’re just letting it happens because they fear conflict, and they don’t want to be thought of as a bad person. Instead they end up inwardly seething with resentment as they’re getting walked all over, as if that’s in any way preferable. I don’t understand it. I’ve never felt awkward about saying no to people (diplomatically and undiplomatically), and someone thinking I’m a bad person really has any something I worry about. However, I am in a position where I don’t need to be worried about it, which is probably the most significant factor at play.

Really isn’t*

Yeah that what I have experienced and nothing works on me, I'm immune to it almost so it's pointless trying.

For me in general it's more of a case of why can't everyone just live why does there need to be drama and if there is, work it out. Doesn't need to be dragged out or made into something bigger or sides being taken.

I don't have any friends at all to be honest, I know people but I don't socialize at all. I would like friends and again I am lonely always have been but I just cannot seem to find anyone genuine or that wants to have a friendship. I can honestly say I have never had one friend who I can talk to or rely on and I've never like met up regularly and hung out. More a case of people come in and out of my life and I never see them again.

It does make it easier as a whole but it's also very lonely at the same time.

I know a someone I strongly suspect as being on the spectrum of psychopathy. He never showed any emotion not even anger. He would always take the short term reward over a long term one. He’s used to be a bit of a legend, last one up always a party animal. Now we are older he’s a sad alcoholic drug addict who looks down on the rest of us for having families and being ‘losers’.

@thecatsthecats

I’ve just done the DISC and scored Dominant. I haven’t read into it properly yet, but at first glance it correlates with ENTJ.

I relate to this as well. I find even if I’m not involved in drama, the parties that are tend to want me to be the sounding board for it, and I get looked at to ‘fix’ whatever is going on, as if that’s my role. Funnily enough I don’t seem to be expected to choose sides either, it tends to go without saying that I won’t.

So I definitely love my husband and always have. He is extremely similar to me and the only person I can truly be myself around. I’ve never ever had anything close to that with anyone else. I also love my kids. I’m not incapable of love or emotion by any means, I just reserve it for a handful of people and everyone else gets nothing.

I’m also not narcissistic in any way - other than a sense of grandiosity perhaps - but honestly I feel that’s justified 😂

The poster before who said they never comment on threads because they don’t care enough to - that’s me. I feign an emotional response to real life situations because dead eyes when someone is grieving doesn’t go down well with most people. I don’t take any pleasure in their misfortune though; I simply do not care

@JibbaJab - yes to the chameleon-like changes. I see that in my exH.