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Saturday, December 2, 2017

"The Mask of Sanity"

I recently read Hervey Cleckley's The Mask of Sanity, the first book about sociopathy (and one which had been on my reading list for a long time). It was recommended by commenter GUINEA HENWEED, who has said he's a psychopath. (He provided this free link to the book.) A self-proclaimed psychopath, by the way, is someone you'll almost never encounter in real life.

Cleckley lived from 1903 to 1984, and published the book in 1941. He was a psychiatrist who first worked at the Veterans Administration, and subsequently at University Hospital in Augusta, Georgia. It was there that he came across number of apparently sane people who'd been committed by their families after repeated brushes with the law.

Cleckley deserves to be called the father of the field of sociopathy; before him, sociopaths had never really been defined as a specific syndrome. Previously, the phrase "morally insane" had been applied to sociopaths, but not much was really known about them. (Individual sociopaths were more likely to have simply been termed evil, or shameless, or villainous, or, even earlier, as being "possessed by the devil" or some such.)

Cleckley came into contact with enough of them to realize that there was something at work there that couldn't be classified as ordinary insanity, yet wasn't quite normal, either. He noticed the traits these people all seemed to have in common, and described what he saw in straightforward terms.

What struck me most about the book was the way Cleckley's experience at that hospital colored his perception of sociopaths.

All the people he described were inexplicably irresponsible, and most had drinking problems. They would do things like go on a bender and wander aimlessly around the countryside, then be found lying in the woods somewhere. They could never hold onto a job, let alone stick with long term goals. When younger, almost all were truants from school. Many loved practical jokes. And they would write bad checks, commit petty thefts, and freeload.

Almost all of the cases that Cleckley saw had parents who worried about them and were mystified by their behavior, so brought them to the psychiatric ward of University Hospital.

What was missing from Cleckley's descriptions was the poison. I've never known a sociopath who wasn't consumed with jealousy, envy, spite, and hatred. I've always said that the two surest giveaways of sociopathy are serial killing and a constant, willful dishonesty; but endlessly overflowing with ill will would come in a close third.

At the time Cleckley wrote his book, they hadn't yet made the connection between sociopaths and serial killing. Had he worked in an institution for the criminally insane, and had he dealt with sociopathic killers, his experience -- and his book -- would have undoubtedly taken on a different hue.

Cleckley alluded to subjects who got into numerous street brawls or arguments, yet he seemed to attribute this to the alcohol they had consumed and the company they kept. Had he actually witnessed those brawls, and seen how they got started, as opposed to just seeing their aftermath, his view might have shifted.

Cleckley also never touched on the extreme schadenfreude which causes so many sociopaths to actively undermine their colleagues and acquaintances, purely for pleasure of watching them fail.

He also never mentioned the inherent emotional falseness that accompanies sociopathy much of the time. Sociopaths are forever laying claim to some noble motivation, or tender feeling, which they are simply incapable of.

Also missing was any sense of the dysfunctional backgrounds from which sociopaths usually spring. The idea that most sociopaths come from loving families is simply misleading. In my experience, even with the ones from outwardly successful families, something is always missing, and that something is usually a bond between the mother and child. (In other words, love is absent.)

Yet Cleckley generally described the sociopaths' families as concerned and worried about their wayward child. Cleckley's views seem to have been skewed by the fact that University Hospital was the type of place where a concerned relative would take the black sheep of the family.

He did capture sociopathic egotism. In the various case histories, he described how they strutted about, puffed up with pride, and how they see themselves as being better than everyone else.

He also described the absence of shame or even embarrassment in their personalities well. And he did recognize how sociopaths are easily bored.

Clerkly also painted a vivid picture of the way sociopaths come across when you first meet them -- even more reliable, sane, honest, stable, and straightforward than most people. And he recognized how extremely that contrasts that with the way they actually are (far less so in every regard).

Cleckley made an effort to describe his patients' appearances, and how that affected one's view of them. He even discussed their attractiveness in a way that people these days are reluctant to do for fear of being labeled superficial.

And he described perfectly the manner in which sociopaths expect you to believe them no matter how outrageous their claims, and how they lie in such a wholesomely convincing manner that you're inclined to believe them. And he captures their utter lack of embarrassment when caught in a lie.

Cleckley mentioned something I hadn't been aware of, but which makes perfect sense: sociopaths are far more likely to make melodramatic threats of suicide, which they almost never follow through with.

Given that Cleckley's contact with sociopaths was limited to those who were institutionalized, he also seemed to have little sense of how sociopaths can achieve success as well. In his practice, he would never have come across, for instance, CEO's, the type who masquerade as pillars of the community, and pay lip service to all the right values, as so many sociopaths do.

He just met the feckless ones who wound up in the nuthouse, whose families cared enough about them to actually put them in a private sanatorium. These, he gave a great description of. But his mix of patients wasn't exactly a typical cross section of the sociopathic population.

At the end of the book, on page 364, Cleckley lists "failure to follow any life plan" as one of the  defining characteristic of sociopaths. Had he met, say, Bill or Hillary Clinton, they would undoubtedly have shifted his opinion on that matter. There are plenty of sociopaths -- in Washington DC, on Wall Street, and in Hollywood -- who have very adroitly realized their life's ambitions in a way that ordinary people are not able to, simply because they are more skillful at manipulation and shamelessly self-promoting.

But, people like that generally don't get sent to psychiatric institutions of the sort where Cleckley practiced. They are, instead, lauded as great human beings by those who don't understand sociopathy, or who have something to gain from the sociopaths.

But this is basically a minor quibble. Hervey Cleckley is unquestionably the father of the field, and deserves immense credit for having been the first to define sociopathy.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

I skimmed this book years ago online. When you're around a sociopath, it's critical that you stay grounded in reality because they can cause you to feel like you're in an alternate reality, lose your bearings.

- Susan

Anonymous said...

DUDE, I am thrilled with the shout-out, I wasn't expecting it.

I am glad that you did read Mister Cleckley's book. Obviously, you disagreed with him here and there (but I am never someone who says "accept SOME BOOK uncritically," each person should prioritize their own personal anecdotal experience over the endless lies and tales and statistics of other people) but I am thinking that you enjoyed encountering him. Wasn't he a NICE MAN?

We always tend to think of people in the past, with old-fashioned educations, as being stupid, but old-fashioned Mister Cleckley kept his eyes open and did good work. Did you get any laughs out of his writing style, about foolish psychopaths "wallowing in remote cornfields" or whatever? Lots of funny sentences in that book, to my taste.

====GUINEA HENWEED

John Craig said...

Susan --
Actually, come to think of it, that's something else Clerkly didn't mention: gaslighting.

John Craig said...

GUINEA HENWEED --
A nice man? I wasn't thinking along those lines, but he did come across like a decent guy, and more to the point, he is the originator, the first to try to define sociopathy. (For me to find fault with his incomplete characterization is a little like someone saying Isaac Newton wasn't all that great because other people came along later who built more powerful reflecting telescopes.)

I know what you're saying about the tendency to look down on people from previous educations because they were naive about certain things, but honestly, today's political correctness ranks up there with any foolishness in history, and maybe surpasses them. No question about Cleckley's good work. I didn't find it as humorous as you seem to have, though I did admire it.

Anonymous said...

The "failure to follow life plan" thing struck me as odd too. AIUI, this is typically a sign of low IQ or lack of education: such people can have stable jobs they even enjoy, but it probably wasn't their life goal to become a call centre operator/cleaner/shop assistant. I think back to when I took a temporary job at a call centre, and being somewhat shocked to find my low-IQ colleagues still there years later, doing the same job, despite how much they groaned about the tediousness of the work. The intelligent ones had either moved on or been promoted within the company. I can't see a sociopath staying in a commercial call centre for long. The sociopaths get the interesting jobs: they can charm their way through job interviews and end up in high-paying roles with power. Cleckley just misinterpreted a low-IQ trait for a sociopathic one. As for the fat, 30-something guy he described who wanted to be a professional swimmer: loads of thick people come up with unrealistic life goals. I've known two barely-literate young adults with learning difficulties who said they wanted to be doctors.

Regarding the parents of Cleckley's sociopaths: see the term 'identified patient'.

- Gethin

John Craig said...

Gethin --
Yes, completely agreed, sociopaths come in a full range of IQ's, and the smarter ones don't end up in psych wards as a rule; they end up in the CEO's office, or even the Oval Office. Cleckley just saw the losers. Even more recent editions of the DSM seem to "discriminate" against low IQ sociopaths, as they -- fairly recently -- listed an inability to pay off one's debts as a sign of sociopathy. Given what I've seen with Wall Streeters, politicians, and Hollywood, not being able to pay off debts is merely a symptom of being poor, not necessarily of sociopathy.

I don't remember the "identified patient" bit; can you enlighten me? (Sorry, I don't feel like looking through the entire book again, and I'll admit, I skimmed the last part.)

Anonymous said...

Sorry, I wasn't clear: 'identified patient' wasn't in the book. It's a term to describe a family that is dysfunctional but masks it to appear normal to outsiders, and has a "problem child" or other black sheep on whom it projects all its faults. It's a way for the family to avoid confronting the many problems it has by focusing on the one person. I thought it probably explained why the families of Cleckley's sociopaths seemed so normal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identified_patient

- Gethin

John Craig said...

Gethin --
Aaaahhhhh, interesting, thank you. I hadn't even been familiar with that concept before, but it makes sense, and fits perfectly with the descriptions the book.

Anonymous said...

Where do trolls fit in with sociopathy? Entire armies of them flood pages, once they attacked a website for epilepsy with flashing images. Of course many of them would deny it, saying they are truth speakers or speaking in the name of free speech. Like how they are fighting in the name of natural selection when they attack webpages for cancer, disability, ALS, down syndrome, blindness, depression, and more posting images of mutilated animals, encouraging suicide calling them a burden on society etc then claim to be speaking in the name of truth or freedom...they cant all be sociopaths and i honestly think 90% of them do believe what they are saying. “We could help do many homeless people if we stopped helping cancer ridden children, tards, cripples, and mentally ill deprresed wastes of space!, burdens on society!” Im like what? Many homeless people have cancer or are crippled too! I even pointed that out , mentioned that tobacco use and obesity each has an even greater societal cost than disabilities or depression by twice as much but they ignore my posts. Then the SJWs come in and act like asses, feeding them. They lose battles for other people! Thats what i hate about them, if they do attack people who are truly bad, they lose the fight, they “help” when their help is the opposite!

But yeah, any clues? They cant all be sociopaths, some maybe, but what are they?

-Ga

John Craig said...

Ga --
I can't answer that with any authority, all I can do is make a guess. Probably some of them are sociopaths; look at it from the other angle: if you were a sociopath, what sorts of comments would you be inclined to make? And probably a lot of the trolls are just people looking to let off some steam, or vent their frustration. (Picking a fight on the internet is a lot less risky than picking a fight in a bar.) I'ma big believer in freedom of speech, but I suppose a lot of sociopaths hide their poison behind that.

The thing about SJW's, though, is that even if, as you rightly point out, they lose the fight......they think they've won it. That's what's so infuriating about them. Anyway, that's getting a little away from your original question, to which my answer is a definitely "I don't know, but some of them must be."

Anonymous said...

Autistic people and their families are the biggest target, a game server was hacked, minevradt for autistic children, it was flooded with posts saying “kill yourselves if you love your parents”, and was randomed for 1000 dollars or they wouldnt stop. Same on youtube, any video related to autism is flooded. I blame neurodiversity/sjws for making this target. It wasnt that way 10 years ago.

What bugged me off is a video they attacked had a mentally retarded man, and it was also flooded with so called “eugenicists” (who dont know what it really is, they think killing the disabled is eugenics, thats not how it works!) the usual “they should be all killed, burdens on society!” comments flooded in, but then one comment said “look, an inbred Hilary voter!” It got 100 upvotes! I found out many people on ED and 4chan love Trump, so do some neo nazis! They dont realize he is firmly against them and what they do and believe, yet they like him!

Not once has has Trump condoned this or supported them, and people will associate anyone against Hilary woth them. Like how SJWs do with people they support (who dont support them) on the other side of the political spectrum. There seemed too many of tgese same comments for it to be a false flag or some paid trolls by Clinton supporters. But i hope it was.

-Ga

John Craig said...

Ga --
The "kill yourself" comments, as well as putting that flashing light on the site for epileptics, does sound like the work of sociopaths.

Anonymous said...

I just noticed how messy my writing is on my iphone, im on a trip. Sorry about that man, hard to read.

I asked an uncle of mine and he does believe there are people paid to troll, some pretending to be pro trump/putin while acting like bigots and homophobes. He says they work for the “Cabal”. (I asked them who they are, he said “everyone, they have many names but are all the same group!”, he is a little nutty sometimes)

He said some with six screens controlling multiple accounts. Well i would be surprised but not shocked if some “Trump supporter” trolls are agents for the Clintons. But whonare the Cabal? Sorry for the poor grammar, still using iPhone

-Ga

John Craig said...

Ga --
No problem on the grammar. I don't know anything about The Cabal, though its existence wouldn't surprise me. I guess they'd be funded by George Soros-types, if they do exist.

Anonymous said...

I had a hypothetical insight. I imagine the omission in much material of the dysfunctional background in many sociopath's lives is because that is what people would prefer to see.

It gives an average person satisfaction that evil is not often created but you have all these bad people who were just born bad because of genetics (then why hasn't it spread everywhere?) and as long as you are not a sociopath, it means you must have been born "right" and can do no harm. You have no flaws when you compare yourself to an extreme case of badness. Of course almost everyone looks like a saint standing next to Stalin, but nobody is clean or perfect.

The implication society screws up and creates many of it's own problems is disturbing to people who would believe they would always be naturally good in predestined way. What if you had been abused? Would you be the person you are now? These questions cause uncomfortable feelings to arise, so the premise is thrown out. It erases any possible feelings you too could screw up as a parent. As long as you are not a sociopath you must have "good person" genes and your child will do alright.

This is similar to the arguments about numerous disorders being purely genetic (such as ASD which is becoming some new "sociopath" on the internet, I've seen a lot of antipathy not only just from trolls, or some organ diseases like of the liver and lungs) instead of the reality, a combination of genetic predisposition, epigenetics, chance, and provoking environmental factors during pregnancy or even after in certain cases (at least with severity once it's been established) which we, as society, are responsible for unleashing into the world. Just cull "undesirables" and the entire future will be disease free is what they wish, and also because it provides any answer. If that were so, wouldn't we have weeded out every single disease both mind and body in the 300,000 years humans were struggling as hunter-gathers in the jungle? Does it ever occur to them if scientists are still unsure about many conditions or states, how can they be? Of course they would deny they give a damn about any "science" when you confront them with this, but then they turn around spouting their own newsarticle science when it fits their narratives about the "others" whoever they are.

Not that sociopaths at least should be given extra mercy, maybe they should be given less, but don't act like their parents are blame free or they don't exist for complex reasons too hard to prevent with your "solution" whatever is may be, you casual observer.

It's not so simple. There is no way to prevent sociopathy forever by mere sterilization. It doesn't work that way. Maybe some rare organic cases, but some utopia is not out of reach just because people are too chicken to solve it with such a method. It's harder, and can instill feelings of collective guilt into a lot of people when you realize it is that hard to comprehend, and that this perfection of your is impossible. What is is just doing better than what we have now or controlling it. Like crime, it won't go away, you just got to do better at handling it until it is manageable.

-Ga

John Craig said...

Ga --
I suppose there's a certain amount of that mindset you describe, that people want to think that they would have been good no matter what. It reminds me a little of the way liberals believe that people from other eras should be judged by today's standards, as if had they been born into a slaveholding family in South Carolina back in 1821 they would have held the exact same values they hold now. It's moronic, actually. I just put up a post mocking that mindset, about how JFK and FDR and LBJ and so on should have their legacies disavowed because all three had mistresses while in the White House.

Agree about sociopathy never being wiped out. In a way, it's actually the natural state of things, it's only the bond between parent and child (usually mother and child) that prevents that state. So, whenever that bond is disrupted for whatever reason, sociopathy is far more likely to result. Which is partly why there are so many sociopaths who grew up in orphanages.

Steven said...

Relevant to above:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/your-online-secrets/201409/internet-trolls-are-narcissists-psychopaths-and-sadists

I heard of a study about this recently but this is all I could find, from 2014.

John Craig said...

Steven -
Thank you for that.