B. U. G. S.

Peter asks:

Do you have some pointers to spot a sociopath? Are there any?

So far, all I can tell when talking to people who act a good part, is that some seem to have empty vibes like comatose patients. I think of them to myself as “flat-liners; it’s almost like there is no one there. I can miss this if the person’s act is really good or if there is a lot of emotion in the room. I met Clinton once and shook his hand a couple of times just to see what I felt. Although it was neat to speak with an ex-president, and there was a lot of enthusiasm abounding, I can’t say that I felt anything around and from him. If this was not because he was tired, maybe I found what a high-performing psychopath feels like.

I used to think that a bureaucrat who is utterly cold and lifeless was that way because he was socially stunted and a nerd stuck in an office (so many administrators are short, fat, bald and ugly). I have since learned that there ought to be some sort of emotional vibe emanating from someone or I should get the heck away from him. This kind of person has no restraint on their behavior and they will cause as much harm as they can — at random. Although the emotion is totally flat, there is still a strand of undirected malice leaking from them (and they often don’t give very good eye-contact either). Clinton, however, was just blank and acted the way one would expect him to in public, smiles and all. (However, I did think his handshake was fishlike and that he couldn’t look me directly in the eye for more than millisecond.)

Sorry Bob, this was an intuitive response. I am looking to you for any consistent patterns to remember for spotting a psychopath. I think this would help all of us, if you can enunciate them.

Comment by Peter

MY REPLY:

The point of comments for me is that they make ME think. So my answer is useless to you but your comment is valuable to me.

Straight question from Peter:

“Do you have some pointers to spot a sociopath? Are there any?”

Straight answer from Bob, after some thought:

I don’t know.

I can TELL someone is a psychopath, but it is practical experience because I HAD to learn to tell.

Your description of a definite psychopath, Bill Clinton is instructive. A true psychopath can look you in the eye.

But Clinton was tired and you weren’t worth the trouble to him.

All the commentators, including the conservative, talk about how CHARMING Clinton is. They can’t HELP liking him. He makes them think they are the only person in the world to them.

And he looks them straight in the eye. That is supposed to tell a Practical Man that someone is trustworthy.

Which is yet another reason why the person who thinks he is a Practical Man is the world’s stooge.

A person who cannot look you in the eye becasue he doesn’t believe what is saying is not a psychopath. He cannot look you inthe eye because he is not confident of what he is saying. But a true psychopath couldn’t care less.

George Bush, Senior told the Shiites to rise against Saddam. He said he would back them if htey did. Then they rose and he did nothing.

Stalin did exactly the same thing to the Jews who rose against the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto. Russian tanks sat there and watched while the Jews killed Germans and waited for the Communists, their allies against the hated Nordic gentiles, to come to their support.

Stalin was a definite psychopath. Bush may or not have been an actual psychopath.

From the point of view of the Warsaw Ghetto or the Shiites, it made no difference. To me, George Bush, Senior is hte prime example ofhte group that calls itself The Greatest Generation. Psychopaths have no conscience, the Greatest Generation was so morally weak that they NEVER showed the slightest sign of moral courage. They didn’t sell anybody out, they GAVE everything away.

In the first volume of Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn talks about Winston Churchill, the hero of The Greatest Generation. He HATES the man.

Churchill promised two million Soviets who fought against Stalin that if they surrendered to the Allies,t ehy woud be protected. As soon as they did so, he turned them over to Stalin, which was considerably worse than killing them on the spot. In fact, when they finally realize what was happening, most of them TRIED to commit suicide, but Stalin wanted them alive, so Churchill made sure they had no means to do it.

I have SEEN what Communists do to people they hate and who fall into their hands. If you fight them you carry a grenade, and it is not to be thrown at them.

I can’t make you understand what a horrible man Churchill was.

But was he a psychopath? Are those who worship him psychopaths? Is George Bush, Senior a psychopath or just a member of the The Greatest Generation?

My doctor brother can give you an informed opinion. Mine is entirely practical.

I can tell the difference between extreme moral weakness and INBORN psychopathy. That’s just experience.

In some way, it is easier to deal with a psychopath than with a person who has not the slightest hint of moral courage. Neither reacts to shame, but they both react to fear.

Let me think about this a bit and see if I can explain it further.