Chalk it up to being feverish and a little woozy, but it's fun. My hobby today is recognizing and naming the sociopaths that I have had the misfortune to encounter in my life. Backstory- I just finished the sociopath next door by Martha Stout, Ph.D. So I have decided that there are a few who I have been around for a while. She postulates that 4% of the population in this country are sociopaths. And that's not a good thing. They are nasty people. Who do nasty things. Not all are psychopaths, but some are.
Of the group who I have encountered, I am thinking that Ratbastard is one, as is The Canadian. Also possible- an ex employer (not the last one) who seemed to get great delight in jerking people's chains for no apparent reason (she wasn't one of the smart sociopaths, but a stupid one with too much power). Also one ex boyfriend is a likely candidate. And an ex inlaw. And possibly a close relative...but that has to remain kind of obscure. It's kind of scary to realize that if she is correct, 4 out of every 100 people out there in this country (other countries have different #s) is entirely without the concept of conscience. Scary.
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www.nyt.com
March 6, 2005
Ruthless People
By Pamela Paul
THE SOCIOPATH NEXT DOOR
The Ruthless Versus
the Rest of Us.
By Martha Stout.
241 pp. Broadway Books. $24.95.
Judging by book titles, Americans either envy their neighbors (''The Millionaire Next Door'') or fear them (''The Sociopath Next Door''). In some cases, they may very well do both. But just as most of us aren't having backyard barbecues with the trust-fund set, neither are we living down the street from dangerously ill people whose ruthless behavior constitutes a covert public menace. Despite the alarmist appeals of Martha Stout, a practicing psychologist and an instructor in the psychiatry department at Harvard Medical School, readers are unlikely to set down ''The Sociopath Next Door'' with a new awareness of a previously unrealized threat. Instead, they're apt to feel a new awareness of the ludicrous nature of pop psychology.
http://query.nytimes.com/search/article-printpage.html?res=9A0DE0DF143DF935A35750C0A9639C8B63
Ah- but everyone needs a hobby! And diagnosing psychosis and neurosis among one's least favorite people is fun, and rewarding. You see, they screwed you over because they were certifiable.
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