Comments on NYCGA (Occupy Wall Street) meeting on Psychopathy in Banking/Finance

My post at http://www.nycga.net/groups/alternative-banking/forum/topic/minutes-from-sunday-march-11-2012-subgroup-topic-psychopathy-in-bankingfinance/:

I totally agree that the “Wall Street financial services sector attracts psychopaths” far beyond the norm in the general population. I have worked, at least a year, for some seven investment banks over the last 25 years, including 11 years at UBS, so I claim to speak with personal knowledge. Deceitful ruthless cutthroats rise to the top.

Part of this is due to corporations having the freedom to act sociopathically (as someone else pointed out, they can be sued if they don’t). Sociopaths naturally will rise to the top — they have no ‘friction’ or ‘drag’ from consciences holding them back from going for the greatest profit. And part is due to the nature of capitalism itself and the profit drive.

My suggestion is simply to keep corporations relatively small, so sociopathic or not, the damage they can inflict is limited. Taking an example from nature, infants do indeed get murderously angry, but being small it doesn’t matter (unless they grow up with unmollified, unresolved infantile rage). As an added bonus, smallish corporations couldn’t overpower democracy.

There were suggestions that Wall St. employees be given psychological tests for sociopathy. I don’t think that is necessary (or would be effective, see below). I don’t mean to be flip, but we don’t want millions of sociopaths on welfare. There is nothing rare about sociopathy.

Just as sociopaths very often make rule abiding prison inmates they can also be rule abiding investment professionals. The rules just have to be very clear and punishment sure and swift. Unfortunately the financial services sector has been set up by and for sociopaths. So we have a problem.

Regarding tests, I don’t believe there is a psychological test in the world that advanced sociopaths wouldn’t simply laugh at. However, research has shown that there are now detectable brain structure differences in sociopaths. All regulators need to be tested for and filtered out by these structures. (See links at bottom.)

These advanced sociopaths are called SAPs — socially adept psychopaths, who can be unbelievably skillful at both manipulation and avoiding detection.

In terms of unionization, it’d be great if it could work. Though to my experience Wall St. support staff are incredibly loyal to and proud to work for Wall St. Of course the loyalty is only in one direction. I was at Drexel at the end, I recall a meeting to explain the firm’s demise and many of my co-workers went (I was freelance so I couldn’t go), seeking to find out what had happened to their livelihoods — only to be told the meeting was for professionals only. The support staff were clearly only ‘so many truck o’ dog’ to the bankers.

“Political Ponerology: A Science on The Nature of Evil adjusted for Political Purposes” is one of the great books of history. It is a scientific study of the development of pathocracies (governments under the control of evil individuals and movements).

Selections and commentary on “Political Ponerology”: http://www.cassiopaea.org/cass/political_ponerology_lobaczewski.htm, http://www.sott.net/articles/show/159686-In-Memoriam-Andrzej-M-obaczewski . To purchase the book: http://www.ponerology.com/ .

It is discussed further here:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/ponerology-101-snakes-in-suits/

http://occupywallst.org/forum/a-book-everyone-needs-to-read-and-its-free-dr-andr/

http://occupywallst.org/forum/democide-when-your-government-kills-you

If interested here are some links to my own blog:

http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2012/01/03/pathwhisperer-postscomments-on-occupywallst-org/

On SAPs:
http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2011/09/20/post-redux-are-saps-socially-adept-psychopaths-real/

http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2009/04/15/sociopathic-through-lines/

On sociopathic brain structures:
http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/criminal-minds-will-testing-the-brain-even-before-birth-separate-the-good-seeds-from-the-bad/

http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2011/02/02/the-tucson-tragedy-reopen-the-mental-hospitals-require-candidates-to-submit-brain-scans/

http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2012/01/04/psychopaths-caused-the-financial-crisis-and-they-will-do-it-again-and-again-unless-they-are-removed-from-power/

Wall St./General:
http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2008/10/11/welcome-to-our-sociopaths-gone-wild-economy/

http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2008/09/24/commonalities-between-wall-street-speculators-andor-fed-bankers-and-sociopaths/

http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/2011/12/22/sociopathy-and-the-nypd/

Post Redux: Are SAPs (Socially Adept Psychopaths) real?

I’m bringing this post back — it’s been a while, also there happen to be multiple searches today for Thomas Capano.

Obviously I think they are.  It’s why I write this blog. From my Mission Statement:  [My aim is] to share information about sociopathy and sociopathic behavior in everyday life. “It’s as though there’s a dangerous fish in all the waters of the world, that is never mentioned”  http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/about/.

To the best of my knowledge, the term SAPs originated with Roger Canup.

In the last section I pointed out that the problem of plausible lies is the most serious problem facing humanity today. I will now discuss the people who have been telling plausible lies: the Socially Adept Psychopaths or S.A.Ps (pronounced SAPS) of the world. An example of S.A.P. thought processes is in order.

Most people have heard of Ted Bundy; the serial killer who was executed in Florida several years ago. Not many people are aware of the fact that Bundy was studying to become a prosecutor, and that eventually he hoped to become a judge. Those that do know that fact see it as some strangely ironic twist – an inexplicable quirk in Bundy’s bizarre makeup. It never seems to occur to most people that the perfect place for a psychopathic serial killer to hide in society is as a prosecutor or a judge; but I assure you that it occurs to the Psychopaths of the world. I would estimate that about 10% of the prosecutors and judges in the United States are in fact, S.A.Ps. The ONLY difference between them and Ted Bundy is that they were able to control outward signs of their Psychopathy until they achieved their goal of being in a position of authority.

http://users.hal-pc.org/~rcanup/sap.html.

For most of their lives Thomas Capano and Ira Einhorn passed as SAPs and led seemingly responsible lives — it was only the insult to the ego of a lover leaving and the subsequent murder of same that exposed them.

Thomas Capano
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Capano

Ira Einhorn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Einhorn

If their girlfriends, who they ended up murdering, and victims of other psychopaths had known enough about sociopathy to suspect it, perhaps they wouldn’t have gone back one last time, or gone back alone to retrieve their belongings, or tried to do the right thing and explain why they were leaving in person, or tried to stay just friends, or agreed to meet in private, etc.  In my opinion, it’s incredibly irresponsible of law enforcement and the media not to inform the public about sociopathic criminals.

Brain Scans Show Abnormalities In Psychopaths

Adrian Raine’s “successful” psychopaths are essentially the same as SAPs.

In the study of the hippocampus, the research team [led by Adrian Raine of USC] expanded the scope of previous studies by comparing the brains of two groups for the first time: “successful” psychopaths – those who had committed crimes but had never been caught – and “unsuccessful” psychopaths – those who had been caught.
. . .
The difference between successful psychopaths (those who avoid getting arrested) and unsuccessful psychopaths is that the more successful ones have a greater ability to learn fear of getting caught and to therefore guide their own behavior to minimize the chances of getting caught.
. . .
“There’s faulty wiring going on in psychopaths. They’re wired differently than other people,” Raine said. “In a way, it’s literally true in this case.”

He found that the psychopaths’ corpus callosums were an average of 23 percent larger and 7 percent longer than the control groups’.
. . .
With an increased corpus callosum came less remorse, fewer emotions and less social connectedness – the classic hallmarks of a psychopath, he said.

“These people don’t react. They don’t care,” Raine said. “Why that occurs, we don’t fully know, but we are beginning to get important clues from neuro-imaging research.”

http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/001998.html

Unusual search: Can cats sense someone is a sociopath?

This is the first time I’ve ever seen this search.  All I can say, the most extreme female sociopath I’ve ever known said cats and dogs hated her.  Was this just something unique to her or do dogs and cats have some innate sense of fairplay?  Did they recognize her as a rapacious, reptilian-minded predator?  I don’t know.

Other searches

Pseudologia fantastica in real person: Yep, it’s real alright.  Actually if one is not immediately caught up and swept away by the pseudologue’s “pity play” then they are more obvious than regular sociopaths — their stories are so extreme and fantastical.

How to get a workplace sociopath to leave: Good luck.

How to let go of a sociopath: This will happen when your soul (not your mind) realizes there is no soul in the other person.  If this doesn’t happen, perhaps the other person is not a sociopath or perhaps you are actually fighting a realization that one of your parents is sociopathic ($50 please).

Or in the emotional immediacy of transsociopathica‘s words:

A few months after you have recovered you will wonder what you ever saw in these things. They will rapidly seem cold, ugly, empty, pathetic, distorted and almost deformed to you. That’s because this is what they are, always were, and you are finally perceiving them in their real unmasked state. This ‘broken beast’ is all that’s left and the only memory you’ll have of them going into the future. It’s all they deserve, because it is all they are.  http://transsociopathica.blogspot.com/2009/10/farewell-my-sociopath-hello-real-love.html

Sociopath at parties: Due to few inhibitions and no shame they can be real lives of the party.  Read “The Incredible Charlie Carewe” ($94, http://www.amazon.com/incredible-Charlie-Carewe-Mary-Astor/dp/B00005W69S Some are also very, very skillful at party crashing.

Sociopath and blackmailing: Goes together like ham and eggs.  They love crimes without consequence.

Pictures of  Thomas Capano: Hmmm.  This is a repeat search.  He’s the only one of my blog’s possible sociopaths (more than possible in his case) whose picture people seem particularly interested in.  I don’t know why.

I was with a sociopath for 8 years…why? For one thing, since no one is ever informed of this possibility as they are growing up or upon reaching romantic age, it often takes years for someone to realize their situation.  Also, as the sociopath often cons relatives of the non-sociopath, individuals in your position are really on their own.  Addressing this is one of the main missions of my blog.

You have a lot of company.  Ann Landers was married for thirty years to the sociopath, in my opinion of course, Jules Lederer (who she described as the best salesman in the world).  They met while she was shopping for a wedding dress for her upcoming marriage to another person.  Just the kind of challenge that might appeal to a “super” sociopath.  Also, as I recall, her sister, Dear Abby, criticized her after the divorce for not understanding her husband.

Are sociopaths giving to neighbors and friends? I have witnessed such behavior, but it was only used to engender goodwill to set up later depredations.  Like a “pity play” (all sociopaths excel at inducing people to feel sorry for them) it brings people to their side emotionally.  Often, it seems, they want a reservoir of protectors before they commit their antisocial depredations (such as date/friend rape, “dress gray” rape, tricking a teen neighbor into prostitution, outright thievery, “murder by suicide” bullying (this is no exaggeration), blackmail, etc.).  They want the accuser to be met with angry disbelief (anger that such a nice person would be accused).  Not only do they wish to protect themselves through “plausible lies,” they want to place their victims in the position of having to claim “implausible truths.”

Can God change a sociopath? The short answer is no.  That would be akin to changing a stone into a block of wood, or lead to gold.  If the question is actually can sociopaths be lead to see the error of their ways and cease being sociopaths, unfortunately the answer is absolutely not.  Sociopaths have their own nature, they are the way they are born to be.  “Socially acceptable psychopaths” (SAPs) who, by definition are capable as passing in normal society, can choose whether or not to follow society’s norms and laws but they can’t feel them.  Justice and empathy are just empty words, even to them.  This searcher might be interested in the post,  “More structural brain abnormalities seen in psychopaths,” over at Psychopathy 101, http://psychopathy101.wordpress.com/2009/09/28/more-structural-brain-abnormalities-seen-in-psychopaths/.  I think its clear that most sociopaths are born with these brain structures.

Drifter & sociopath: The drifters and rolling stones of life are in fact often sociopaths, driven by boredom and lack of emotional bonds.  Boredom is simply one of their prime driving forces.  Thus the backwaters, catch basins and outposts of empires or large nations have a much higher sociopathic percentage — for example, California, Australia and New Zealand.

Will my baby be born a sociopath?: Here’s a heart breaker.  From the little I know, it seems the genetics of sociopathy is very complex.  I’ll try to look into this further.  If this searcher was attracted to a sociopath because one of her parents was sociopathic the odds aren’t good.

Sociopathic through lines

I’d like to look at the continuum from imprisoned failed sociopaths to SAPs (socially adept sociopaths).  Basically they are all adherents of the credo, ‘you call it cheating, I call it winning.’  The failed sociopaths have problems with the cheating part (i.e., getting caught), the SAPs can be phenomenal at it.

In my opinion across the spectrum they all have characteristics in common.  They are all like a child in a candy store.  Their wants are as big as their eyes, with the same childhood sense of entitlement.  They want everything they see.  A low level sociopath will simply reach out and start taking and end up in jail.  A SAP will be able to restrain this reaching until safe opportunities present themselves.  But the basic desires are identical. There is also a whole panoply of related arrested development characteristics.  In my opinion, all sociopaths are in a state of immature sexuality.  Essentially they never progress past childhood sex play, orgasms are simply thrown in.  Similarly, their personality, reasoning, moral, etc. development are also stunted.

Though they may not choose to do so, all sociopaths in my opinion see nothing intrinsically wrong with seducing a 13 year-old girl neighbor into prostitution, incest, “Dress Grey” raping of a straight or closeted gay buddy (i.e., individuals who would be unlikely to press charges due to the publicity), spreading AIDs with no concern, torturing a child in front of a parent, or a parent in front of a child, viewing others as tissue paper to be used and discarded, etc.  I believe this to be true no matter how well educated, well dressed or well spoken a sociopath may be.

What then separates the SAPs from the failed (and caught) sociopaths? I see the situation as being the balancing of two countervailing pressures.  One pressure, drive actually, is to reach out, take and dominate.  The other pressure is simply the need to get away with it, which has both internal and external aspects.  Failed sociopaths lack the internal resources to restrain themselves (apparently, some people, including many professional researchers, consider only these individuals to be true sociopaths — they couldn’t be more wrong).  Other sociopaths have the internal resources, but only if the external environment (i.e., the threat of some punishment) necessitates it.  The continuum is really a scale of talent at being hypocritical.  The advanced SAPs are simply magnificent hypocrites – able to bide their time, be patient, realistically assess their position in the food chain (the concept of the food chain is central to sociopath life stories), restrain their arrogance, desire for dominance and rudeness and wait for opportunities without consequence for indulging their sociopathic wants, etc.  Hypocrisy is simply their main lifetool, as swimming is the main lifetool for a fish.

It is always educational, when evaluating a possible sociopath, to note how the individual consistently behaves around those “lower in the food chain” — it can be quite amazing.  If a superior is a devotee, sadly they will often believe the sociopath and not their eyes.

Apparently, the current rage in the field is the argument over whether sociopathy is a normal-to-special-trait continuum (similar to tallness) or a present/not present trait (such as blue eyes).   It is the latter.  The only way that so-called scientists can make the former argument is that they have no idea of what they are talking about.  See the story of the five blind men and the elephant.  This is quite apparent from the amazing quote from J. Seabrook’s “Suffering Souls, the Search for the Roots of Psychopathy” in The New Yorker, “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.” http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/11/10/081110fa_fact_seabrook

Are SAPs (Socially Adept Psychopaths) Real?

Obviously I think they are.  It’s why I write this blog. From my Mission Statement:  [My aim is] to share information about sociopathy and sociopathic behavior in everyday life. “It’s as though there’s a dangerous fish in all the waters of the world, that is never mentioned”  http://pathwhisperer.wordpress.com/about/.

To the best of my knowledge, the term SAPs originated with Roger Canup.

In the last section I pointed out that the problem of plausible lies is the most serious problem facing humanity today. I will now discuss the people who have been telling plausible lies: the Socially Adept Psychopaths or S.A.Ps (pronounced SAPS) of the world. An example of S.A.P. thought processes is in order.

Most people have heard of Ted Bundy; the serial killer who was executed in Florida several years ago. Not many people are aware of the fact that Bundy was studying to become a prosecutor, and that eventually he hoped to become a judge. Those that do know that fact see it as some strangely ironic twist – an inexplicable quirk in Bundy’s bizarre makeup. It never seems to occur to most people that the perfect place for a psychopathic serial killer to hide in society is as a prosecutor or a judge; but I assure you that it occurs to the Psychopaths of the world. I would estimate that about 10% of the prosecutors and judges in the United States are in fact, S.A.Ps. The ONLY difference between them and Ted Bundy is that they were able to control outward signs of their Psychopathy until they achieved their goal of being in a position of authority.

http://users.hal-pc.org/~rcanup/sap.html.

For most of their lives Thomas Capano and Ira Einhorn passed as SAPs, in my opinion — it was only the insult to the ego of a lover leaving and the subsequent murder of same that exposed them.

Thomas Capano
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Capano

Ira Einhorn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Einhorn

If the murdered women and others in their position had known enough about sociopathy to suspect it in these cases perhaps they wouldn’t have gone back one last time, gone back to retrieve their belongings alone, tried to do the right thing and explain why they were leaving in person, tried to stay just friends, agree to meet in private, etc.  In my opinion, it’s incredibly irresponsible of law enforcement and the media not to inform the public about sociopathic criminals.

Brain Scans Show Abnormalities In Psychopaths

Adrian Raine’s “successful” psychopaths are essentially the same as SAPs.

In the study of the hippocampus, the research team [led by Adrian Raine of USC] expanded the scope of previous studies by comparing the brains of two groups for the first time: “successful” psychopaths – those who had committed crimes but had never been caught – and “unsuccessful” psychopaths – those who had been caught.
. . .
The difference between successful psychopaths (those who avoid getting arrested) and unsuccessful psychopaths is that the more successful ones have a greater ability to learn fear of getting caught and to therefore guide their own behavior to minimize the chances of getting caught.
. . .
“There’s faulty wiring going on in psychopaths. They’re wired differently than other people,” Raine said. “In a way, it’s literally true in this case.”

He found that the psychopaths’ corpus callosums were an average of 23 percent larger and 7 percent longer than the control groups’.
. . .
With an increased corpus callosum came less remorse, fewer emotions and less social connectedness – the classic hallmarks of a psychopath, he said.

“These people don’t react. They don’t care,” Raine said. “Why that occurs, we don’t fully know, but we are beginning to get important clues from neuro-imaging research.”

http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/001998.html

More recent and widespread research can be found at the linked Swedish site, It Affects Us All.  Their research page is Forskning, http://user.tninet.se/csz433c/homepages/evah/html/forskning.htm.  The research links with English synopses are towards the bottom.