Lately, I have been reading a lot about psychopaths and how their personalities and the decisions they make effect the rest of us. I became fascinated about this subject years ago when I came to the conclusion that my adult son is/was, to a certain degree, a psychopath. As I go back in time and think about destructive and manipulative behavior through the years. Not to mention the clinical diagnosis of anti-social personality disorder he was given by several doctors, I have come to realize the world as he sees it is a series of cons and manipulations to simply get what he wants regardless of the cost to others. He does not and has not been able to take responsibility for what he has done to family members because he simply does not view things the same way you or I would. It is said that when it comes to emotions and feelings in others, psychopaths “when listening to a song, hear the words but NOT the music.” In other words, you might point out to them how their actions affected someone deeply or even caused them great pain but they don’t understand and have already rationalized what happened and why and will be planning the next con.
At first glance, when most people think of the term psychopath, they think of serial killers, mass murderers, and perhaps ruthless dictators and despots who put their citizens in mass graves. And while it true these ruthless individuals are psychopaths, we fail to notice the havoc and destruction the psychopaths who run our corporations and even hold some government positions, do to individuals, families, and nations.
There are several great books on the subject: “The Psychopath Test” by Jon Ronson, “Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths go to Work” and also “Without Conscience” The Psychopaths Among us” both by Dr. Robert Hare (who formulated the PCL-R Checklist for psychopathy.) Once you learn or even begin to think about what type of “monsters” could be making decisions that affect many of us, it is a lot more frightening that watching out for another Jeffrey Dahlmer.
The OWS or Occupy Wall Street movement happening right now illustrates my point. The top 1% have taken hold and managed to retain most of the wealth and power over the bottom 99%. Of that top percent there are a high proportion of psychopaths. These are men and women who will do anything to get to the top regardless of who they have to crush along the way. CEO’s like Al Dunlap the once CEO of Sunbeam who was nicknamed “Chainsaw” (there is also a book about him with this title.) He was hired by Sunbeam, which was losing money, precisely because he was great at slashing job and closing down entire plants and decimating entire communities.
Al Dunlap was good at doing this because he enjoyed firing people and would often simple come into a plant and come up with “fun and amusing” ways to fire employees who had been with the company for years and years. He laughed and joked about it and while the company stocks plummeted and more and more plants were closing, he had a fleet of 7 corporate jets at his disposal and he squandered millions. His view was that the world is made up of “predators and prey and he is a predator.” He ran the company into the ground with his lavish lifestyle and still lives in a mansion in Florida never having to accept responsibility for the damage he did before someone finally let him go.
Some of the common traits on the checklist (and there are more), Glibness/superficial charm, Grandiose sense of self-worth, Need for stimulation/prone to boredom, Pathological lying, Conning/manipulative, Lack of remorse or guilt, Shallow affect, Callous/lack of empathy, Poor behavior controls, Failure to accept responsibility for own actions, Criminal versatility, and these are just some of the traits, are exactly why these people rose to the top and why they do not care what happens to the rest of us.
If you are your cronies can do what the banks and mortgage companies did and completely ruin an economy and fore millions from their homes………if you and your business partners fraudulently manipulate the markets knowing you are doing so as to make millions regardless of the cost to others……..if, like Madoff and many others, you can cheat your close friends and others out of their complete life savings for years and years knowing you are conning and destroying them………..if you are a CEO slashing benefits and jobs to save company money while you set aside millions for your pleasure………..if you lie and cheat your way into public office and then make decisions callously with no regard to the promises you made or what it will do to others………if you are a corporate manager of lawyer who cheats and finds a way to hide company profits offshore to avoid paying your fair share of taxes or you shut down a plant and open it in Mexico where you do NOT have to pay a fair wage or worry about polluting an entire communities drinking water…………if you are a politician who knowingly promotes a bill or law to benefit a wealthy donor or corporation who pads your expense account………and if you are a doctor who gets expensive trips, gifts, and kickbacks from a pharmaceutical company if you prescribe their medicines regardless of if the patient really needs them and regardless of potential harm…………..if you are a dictator of a country and you hoard every single resource for your family, cronies, and friends while the rest of your country is starving in refugee camps…….and last but not least, if you knowingly allow children to be molested by your assistant coach and never call the police because you do not want to stain your college sports program then to some degree or another you are a psychopath.
These people, the percent who have no feelings or regard for the rights of others and who are at the top making decisions for the rest of us, ARE part of that 1% and do not and will not even begin to understand that what they are doing is wrong and if they do, they simply don’t care because they are not capable of really caring They are predators and the rest of us are prey. They will funnel several million into their accounts by shutting down a plant and ramping up production and hours with less pay elsewhere……..they will smile and manipulate everyone and everything they can so they can purchase yet another million dollar mansion with a matching yacht and not think twice about the families they destroyed. These are psychopaths and sadly, many of them are in control and getting that control away from them will be difficult because when you have a conscience and care about how your lifestyle and decisions affect others, it is hard to best or take the reins away from others who are prepared to do anything and everything to win regardless of who gets stepped on.
I support Occupy Wall Street and what they are trying to accomplish because appealing to psychopaths “sense of fairness” will not get anywhere because these people have no sense of fairness. Perhaps trying to stop the machine, as the saying goes, is the only way but I fear that the psychopaths at the top are just smiling down on all of the pain they have caused and are not hearing a thing because they are planning their next move that will only benefit themselves and NOT those of us at the bottom. Don’t get me wrong either; I am not against hard work and getting ahead in life. I love success but I agree with what Elizabeth Warren said “good for you but you didn’t get there all by yourself.” Unfortunately though, if someone
