Sociopathy: What is a Sociopath?

I have been re-reading the wonderful book by Harvard professor Dr. Marth Stout, The Sociopath Next Door

It has even more applicability to the world of scientology today than when I first read it.

I had always thought that David Miscavige was a unicorn — unique, cruel and deranged. That it had been my misfortune to have encountered him, but I would never run into anyone like him again. Then I read Dr. Stout’s book and realized that there are recognized and identifiable personality traits that sociopaths share. And by her estimation they constitute about 4% of the population.

She describes the attributes of a sociopath early in the book this way:

Imagine – if you can – not having a conscience, none at all, no feelings of guilt or remorse no matter what you do, no limiting sense of concern for the well-being of strangers, friends, or even family members. Imagine no struggles with shame, not a single one in your whole life, no matter what kind of selfish, lazy, harmful, or immoral action you had taken. And pretend that the concept of responsibility is unknown to you, except as a burden others seem to accept without question, like gullible fools.

I am going to touch upon various aspects of sociopathy in a series of posts to come.

Psychopathy and sociopathy are interchangeable according to Dr. Stout. The term malignant narcissism has become more widely known recently, and it seems to be a harmonic of sociopathy, perhaps not quite as severe. It is defined as: a syndrome characterized by a narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), antisocial features, paranoid traits, and ego syntonic aggression. Other symptoms may include an absence of conscience, a psychological need for power, and a sense of importance (grandiosity).

Even Hubbard had a term for this type — he called it the “aberrative personality.” I did an earlier post about this comparing David Miscavige to the Hubbard criteria. Hubbard’s version has similarities to the real definition and characteristics, though framed in scientology terms.  It also includes one of Hubbard’s weird additions: “inhibition of eating” which makes no sense at all.

Back to reality though. Dr. Stout goes on to describe what drives the sociopath:

Making people jump means you have power – or this is the way you see it – and bullying provides you with an adrenaline rush. It is fun. Maybe you cannot be the CEO of a multinational corporation, but you can frighten a few people, or cause them to scurry around like chickens, or steal from them, or – maybe best of all – create situations that cause them to feel bad about themselves. And this is power, especially when the people you manipulate are superior to you in some way. Most invigorating of all is to bring down people who are smarter or more accomplished than you, or perhaps classier, more attractive or popular or morally admirable. This is not only good fun; it is existential vengeance. And without a conscience, it is amazingly easy to do. You quietly lie to the boss or to the boss’s boss, cry some crocodile tears, or sabotage a coworker’s project, or gaslight a patient (or a child), bait people with promises, or provide a little misinformation that will never be traced back to you.

We see many of these traits played out in the world of scientology by Miscavige — his drive for power is all consuming. I have often said when people ask me whether his motivation is to accumulate personal wealth, that this misses the boat. He does not NEED personal money. He has the billions of scientology available to him at the snap of his fingers. Personal money is a potential liability with the IRS as he is not tax exempt, but the organization is of course, and is thus beyond governmental scrutiny. What drives Miscavige is POWER. Which I believe is the ability to get people to do things that are not in their best interest — submitting to being beaten without fighting back, handing over more money than they can afford, abandoning their family, sacrificing their time for useless causes, telling lies etc. etc.

Sociopathy is a fertile subject that everyone should understand for their own protection and peace of mind. It is far more prevalent than is generally understood. Almost certainly everyone has come in contact with such a person and may even be under their influence today.