KAH - The subject of the extremely narrow point of view of
most Americans as opposed to the majority of other peoples in the world
came up in a conversation the other day. The people having the
conversation were, as it happens, mostly American.
One of them commented that Americans had been "programmed" to
their point of view by mass media propaganda for a
very long time and that it was simply a very normal part of American
life and basically, always had been.
She concluded,
"Whoever denies it is either ignorant or has an
agenda."
That may be so.
It may be true that the "pied pipers" of denial have an agenda.
But what, then, does one say or do about the ignorance of the vast
majority of Americans? Why and how is it that the trap of Fascism is
closing on them before their very eyes and no matter how many voices -
the number is increasing every day - are raised to point out this
danger, they simply do not seem to get it?
The conversation
continued with a comment from another individual suggesting that one
must take into account how effective the "official culture" actually is
in the US. It isn't just a question of ignorance, but a question of the
long-term thoroughness of the propagandizing that began in the early
days of the last century.
It was proposed that this propaganda is so complete that not only
are most people in the US ignorant of what is taking place on the US
political scene, and in the world as a direct result of US policy, they
are ignorant of the fact that they are ignorant. They have been
inculcated with the view that their view is the only "right" one" and,
consequently, they really "don't know any better".
In short:
"What do you do if you don't know that you don't know
something?"
Well, the thing is, at some point in time, no matter how thorough
the programming has been, most people will eventually end up coming
across some bit or piece of information that isn't going to quite "jibe"
with the "official culture;" it isn't going to "fit" in with their view
of reality, with what they have been taught, and it is usually just a
little bit uncomfortable when this happens. Or it ought to be.
My
question is, why is complete denial, even aggressive behavior in some
instances, the reaction of some when the objective facts of reality are
pointed out to them, while there are others who react with an increased
sense of curiosity, an increased desire for additional information?
Why do some shun knowledge and others crave it?
Why do
some resist the programming, and others welcome it?
It is as
though with some people - those who most avidly embrace the "we are
right" view - have minds that are closed from the very get-go, and they
are entirely incapable of opening them, even just a crack. There is no
curiosity in them. There are no questions in their minds. There are no
"what ifs?" or "maybes".
It seems to me that the propaganda of
the Official Culture then, while quite effective, may not be the sole
reason why so many Americans are apathetic when it comes to what their
government is doing, both in the US and abroad. It seems as though there
may be some distinct differences in human beings at a very basic level
that needs to be considered here.
In my opinion, (KAH),
all of us who were raised in the US have been duped via this Official
Culture mind control imposed through the educational system and the mass
media. But there are some of us who seem to have the ability to
question, to wonder, to open our minds to other possibilities - even if
they seem far-fetched.
And invariably, this opening of the mind to other views has been
enriching and rewarding on many levels, not the least of which is a
humanitarian view of all peoples and cultures.
-
Is being able to open your mind and ask questions just a matter
of "courage?"
-
Is a closed mind simply evidence of being a coward? Is
resistance to the "official culture" a consequence of a fundamental
"rebellious nature" and are those who "go along with the crowd" better
"team players," even if the team is on the moral low-road?
-
Is the difference one that exists between people who are
willing to face the "terror of the situation" and those who simply
cannot live in the state of tension produced by having to make moral
decisions themselves?
-
Or, is there something deeper here?
-
If so, what is it?
-
And whatever it is, why is it so "active" in the present day
and time?
-
What is the "fog" that surrounds America and the minds of its
people?
In the past, I have encountered many people who I considered to
be open-minded, but ultimately discovered that they are not so when they
absolutely refuse to even admit the possibility of what is so obvious to
so many intelligent and compassionate people.
For example, the obvious psychopathy of
Bush and other world leaders, certainly reveals to us
that the "terror of the situation" is manifesting on quite a grander
scale than any of us might have dreamed possible a few years ago. There
it is. Clues and signs everywhere. It's as plain as the nose on your
face. But most Americans would rather cut off that nose with the result
that they spite the face.
It is terrifying enough when one
realizes that the Bush Reich and other elite groups around the
globe are wreaking havoc on the planet without regard for
life in any form, apart from their own, but when we also have to face
the fact that there are so many people out there, that - even when faced
with the certain facts of this global tinder-box - either cannot see it
or WILL not see it, well, that makes this situation just a little bit
more terrifying.
Again, we return to the problem: what is WRONG
with Americans?
We already know that the "Land of the Free" is
gone, but what about the "Home of the Brave?" It never takes courage to
support a bully - but it takes a LOT of courage to stand up against one.
Has America lost that courage that gave them the intestinal fortitude to
stand up to the most mighty military power in the world of the time -
England - to declare their independence from bullies and to stand for
what was right? What happened to "Give me liberty or give me death?"
Because surely America has chosen death in giving up their
liberty!
When I was growing up in the West, my brothers and I
were subjected to very intense "racist attitudes" from our step-parents.
We lived in a small farming-ranching community where that sort of belief
system is generally passed on from one generation to the next and nobody
ever really questions it.
However, at a very early age, I
instinctively rebelled against this view of the world. It seems that I
had a sort of natural, intrinsic love, respect and a fascination for
other cultures and peoples. Of course, it drove my step-parents CRAZY.
There was a lot of tension between us because of this.
My love
for and curiosity about other cultures led me to travel extensively as I
grew up. I was curious; I wanted to explore; I wanted to KNOW. When I
eventually married outside my own culture, well, I had crossed the line
and all contact with my family had to be terminated. The price they were
willing to pay for their racist beliefs was high - in my opinion - more
so for them than for me, though certainly this rejection was
painful.
My point is, I resisted this racist program intensely.
It was all around me, in the town, the schools, the church we attended.
But I wanted no part of it. It seems that it went against my very
nature. But for others, it seemed very "natural" to "fall for" this
cultural programming - to be "comfortable" within a milieu that excluded
nearly everyone else as human beings.
Again it seems as though there may be two different types of
people and two different ways to deal with the question of one's own
ignorance.
Some individuals, when faced with certain facts about
their own ignorance, deny vehemently that they ARE ignorant and resort
to platitudes and clichés even including that old saw about the
difference between "book learning" and "common sense." Others, when
confronted with their own ignorance, immediately set about rectifying it
no matter how painful it might be.
When I first moved abroad at
the age of 21, I quickly realized that I was, like most Americans,
abysmally ignorant with regard to politics. I discovered - to my
great dismay - that in my host country, most of the average people
around me - shopkeepers, hairdressers, taxi-drivers - knew more about
what was going on in the USA and the rest of the world than I did; a LOT
more!
I
had no IDEA of the things that were going on that were common knowledge
to other peoples in the world. And here, it wasn't simply a matter of
having a different opinion than others.
It was a matter of an almost complete lack of INFORMATION within
the very country that promotes democracy as the rule of an "informed
citizenry."
I
realized with striking clarity exactly how ignorant I was at that point,
and I admitted it to myself. Further, I was embarrassed for myself and
other Americans who were seen (rightly so) as equally ignorant and "in
the dark" politically and culturally speaking. BUT, due to this
embarrassment and realization of the extraordinary extent of my
ignorance, I determined to do something about it.
But there are
so many Americans who - when faced with similar situations, faced with
their own ignorance - deny it aggressively. And generally, the "last
word" for them is:
"Oh, he/she doesn't know what the hell they are talking about!
They're 'foreigners'."
And that's the key: "foreigners."
"Foreigners" can't
possibly know anything because they aren't American. And Americans, by
default of having the most bombs on the planet, always "know" what's up.
Or, at the very least, their leaders do and we just don't have to think
about such things. That's what we elect our leaders for, isn't it? So
they will handle all that boring and tedious political stuff and leave
us alone to watch "Survivor" and the Super Bowl and wash our new SUV so
that the Joneses can be green with envy!
And they leave it at
that. It's the preferred way to handle all such questions. Forget the
entire issue of an "informed citizenry" and any possible outrage that
citizens of the US are not only NOT informed, they are being
deliberately DIS-informed!
They don't even realize that
"Survivor" is programming them to the very attitudes that are being
displayed by their leaders - normalizing it, so to say - and at the
present moment these attitude are being manifested in their own lives in
a direct and terrifying way.
For many in the US, their future is that there won't be any more
Super Bowls, and the SUV certainly doesn't get enough gas mileage to get
them far enough away from the terror that will confront them when they
are "voted off the island" in the global game of "Survivor."
-
Why does this condition exist?
-
Why are so many people so susceptible to the "official culture"
and the mass media propaganda?
-
Why are so many people willing slaves to it?
-
And why do some others - once the questions have been raised -
begin to seek the knowledge that reveals the man behind the
curtain?
Perhaps it is more than simply a matter of very clever and
intense programming.
Perhaps it is also a matter of the nature of a person?
LKJ (Laura Knight-Jadczyk) - In recent times, I
have considered many ideas in an attempt to answer this question. The
members of the Quantum Future School have been engaged in
studying psychopathy and pseudo-psychopathy for about two years now.
This has certainly prepared most of us to be able to see the man behind
the curtain, or, in this case, behind the "mask of sanity."
But it still doesn't answer the question as to why psychopathic
behavior seems to be so widespread in the US. (That is not to say that
it doesn't exist everywhere - that's a given.)
Linda
Mealey of the Department of Psychology at the College of St.
Benedict in St. Joseph, Minnesota, has recently proposed certain ideas
in her paper: The Sociobiology of Sociopathy: An Integrated
Evolutionary Model. These ideas address the increase in psychopathy
in American culture by suggesting that in a competitive society -
capitalism, for example - psychopathy is adaptive and likely to
increase.
She writes:
I have thus far argued that some individuals seem to have a
genotype that disposes them to [psychopathy].
[Psychopathy
describes] frequency-dependent, genetically based, individual
differences in employment of life strategies. [Psychopaths] always
appear in every culture, no matter what the socio-cultural conditions.
[...]
Competition increases the use of antisocial and
Machiavellian strategies and can counteract pro-social behavior…
Some cultures encourage competitiveness more than others and
these differences in social values vary both temporally and
cross-culturally. [...] Across both dimensions, high levels of
competitiveness are associated with high crime rates and
Machiavellianism.
High population density, an indirect form of
competition, is also associated with reduced pro-social behavior and
increased anti-social behavior. [...]
[Mealey, op. cit.]
The conclusion is that the American way of life has optimized the
survival of psychopaths with the consequence that it is an adaptive
"life strategy" that is extremely successful in American society, and
thus has increased in the population in strictly genetic terms. What is
more, as a consequence of a society that is adaptive for psychopathy,
many individuals who are NOT genetic psychopaths have similarly adapted,
becoming "effective" psychopaths, or "secondary sociopaths."
(Many experts differentiate between primary and secondary
sociopaths. The first is a sociopath because they have the "genes" and
the second is more or less "created" by their environment of
victimization. Other experts refer to these two categories as
"psychopaths" for the genetic variety and "sociopaths" for the reactive
variety. We prefer this latter distinction.)
Of course, because they are not intellectually handicapped,
these individuals [psychopaths] will progress normally in terms of
cognitive development and will acquire a theory of mind. Their
theories, however, will be formulated purely in instrumental terms
[what can claiming this or that GET for me?], without access to the
empathic understanding that most of us rely on so much of the time.
They may become excellent predictors of others' behavior,
unhandicapped by the "intrusiveness" of emotion, acting, as do
professional gamblers, solely on nomothetic laws and actuarial data
rather than on hunches and feelings.
In determining how to
"play" in the social encounters of everyday life, they will use a pure
cost-benefit approach based on immediate personal outcomes, with no
"accounting" for the emotional reactions of the others with whom they
are dealing.
Without any real love to "commit" them to
cooperation, without any anxiety to prevent fear of "defection,"
without guilt to inspire repentance, they are free to continually play
for the short-term benefit.
At the same time, because changes
in gene frequencies in the population would not be able to keep pace
with the fast-changing parameters of social interactions, an
additional fluctuating proportion of sociopathy should result because,
in a society of [psychopathy], the environmental circumstances make an
antisocial strategy of life more profitable than a pro-social one.
[Mealey]
In other words, in a world of psychopaths, those who are not
genetic psychopaths, are induced to behave like psychopaths simply to
survive. When the rules are set up to make a society "adaptive" to
psychopathy, it makes psychopaths of everyone.
Now, do not be
fooled by the word "psychopath."
Many individuals equate this term with mass murderers or "foaming
at the mouth" madmen. By any name, this dangerous personality disorder
presents three unsettling realities: Its prevalence seems to be
increasing, it is far more common than previously thought, and there is
no cure.
What makes the psychopath so frightening and dangerous
is that he or she wears a completely convincing "Mask of Sanity". This
may at first make such a person utterly persuasive and compellingly
healthy, according to psychiatrist Harvey Cleckley. Dr. Cleckey
was first to describe the key symptoms of the disorder.
Psychopaths can be very sociable, even though they are
antisocial behind their "mask" in the sense that their "emotions" are
completely fake. They are masters at manipulating others for their
personal gain.
Their charm, in fact, is legendary.
"As a therapist, you run across this all of the time, where a
man is mysteriously controlled by a sociopath," explains psychologist
Melvin Sinder, co-author of Smart Men Bad Choices.
Psychopaths are experts at using people. They can ask anything of
anyone without embarrassment and because of their outgoing seducing
friendliness, their use of "poor innocent me! I am such a GOOD person
and I have been treated so BADLY!" the victim invariably gets sucked
into giving the psychopath what they ask for - no matter how
outrageous.
Psychopaths are masters at faking emotions in order
to manipulate others. One psychologist reported that if you actually
catch them in the act of committing a crime, or telling a lie, "they
will immediately justify their actions by self pity and blaming another,
by creating a heart-rending scene of faked emotional feelings." These
fake emotions are only for effect, as the careful observer will note.
The Psychopath considers getting their way or getting out of
trouble using faked emotions as a victory over another person.
Psychopaths are incapable of feeling concern or remorse for the
consequences of their actions. They can calmly rationalize their
insensitive and bizarre behavior all the while attributing malice to
everyone but themselves. When caught in a lie, they will manipulate
others or stories to their own advantage without any fear of being found
out - even if it is obvious to everyone around them that they WILL be
found out.
Psychopaths cannot feel fear for themselves, much
less empathy for others. Most normal people, when they are about to do
something dangerous, illegal, or immoral, feel a rush of worry,
nervousness, or fear. Guilt may overwhelm them and prevent them from
even committing the deed.
The psychopath feels little or
nothing.
As a result, the threat of punishment, even painful
punishment is a laughing matter for the psychopath. They can repeat the
same destructive acts without skipping a heartbeat, as well as seek
thrills and dangers without regard for possible risks. This is called
"hypoarousal." That is, very little - if anything - really arouses them;
they are more machine-like than human-like.
The psychopath seems
to be full of something akin to deep greed. They manifest this inner
state in many ways. One of the most common ways is to steal something of
value to their victim (valuables), or to hurt/slander the victim or
something or someone the victim loves. In the psychopath's mind, this is
justified because the victim crossed him, did not give him what he
wanted, or rejected him (or her).
Psychopaths lie for the sake
of lying. They can convey the deepest hear- felt message without meaning
a word of it. They can also tell the most outrageous stories simply in
order to be at the center of attention and to get what they
want.
An example is told by a researcher in psychopathy: Melissa
was a girl that was very attractive and very outgoing. She met with an
attorney regarding getting a divorce from her husband and convinced the
attorney that her husband was ruining her life.
The attorney
felt sorry for her as she carried on about the abuse she had suffered.
She was so convincing, that the attorney wanted to help her personally.
With her seductive charisma, he became hopelessly infatuated and began
to date Melissa. At a certain point, the attorney refused to take
illegal and immoral actions against her estranged husband that Melissa
requested.
At this point, she filed sexual harassment charges
against the attorney to try to force him to do what she wanted. She
didn't realize that, by doing this, she had exposed herself for what she
was and there was no possibility that the attorney was going to bow to
her blackmail pressures. After much pain and heart break all around,
Melissa dropped the law suit and moved to another state. The attorney
commented that he had never been so emotionally overwhelmed in his
entire life.
Indeed, using their "emotional performances," these
individuals can be truly overwhelming. Their charisma can be so
inspiring - their emotion so deep and sincere-seeming - that people just
want to be around them, want to help them, want to give all and support
such a noble, suffering being. What is generally not seen by the victim
is that they are feeding an endless internal hunger for control,
excitement and ego-recognition.
The psychopath is obsessed with
control even if they give the impression of being helpless. Their
pretense to emotional sensitivity is really part of their control
function: The higher the level of belief in the psychopath that can be
induced in their victim through their dramas, the more "control" the
psychopath believes they have. And in fact, this is true.
They DO have control when others believe their lies. Sadly, the
degree of belief, the degree of "submission" to this control via false
representation, generally produces so much pain when the truth is
glimpsed that the victim would prefer to continue in the lie than face
the fact that they have been duped. The psychopath counts on this. It is
part of their "actuarial calculations."
It gives them a feeling of power.
It is all too
easy to fall under the spell of the charismatic psychopath. There are
many who do the psychopath's bidding without realizing that they have
been subtly and cleverly controlled. They can even be manipulated to
perform criminal acts, or acts of sabotage against another - innocent -
person on behalf of the psychopath. Very often, when this is realized by
the victim, that they have caused suffering in innocent people at the
behest of a liar, again they prefer to deny this than to face up to the
truth of their own perfidy and gullibility.
Psychopathic
behavior seems to be on the rise because of the very nature of
American capitalistic society. The great hustlers, charmers, and
self-promoters in the sales fields are perfect examples of where the
psychopath can thrive. The entertainment industry, the sports industry,
the corporate world in a Capitalistic system, are all areas where
psychopaths naturally rise to the top.
Some observers believe that there is a psychological continuum
between psychopaths (who tend to be professionally unsuccessful) and
narcissistic entrepreneurs (who are successful), because these two
groups share the highly developed skill of manipulating others for their
own gain. It is now being thought that they are actually the "same" but
that the "unsuccessful" psychopath is merely flawed in their calculating
abilities.
They are unable to recalculate based on new actuarial data.
Successful Narcissists might seem to be perfectly able to add to their
actuarial database and "recalculate" and shift course and develop new
subroutines based on ongoing input.
In general, the successful
psychopath "computes" how much they can get away with in a cost-benefit
ratio of the alternatives. Among the factors that they consider as most
important are money, power, and gratification of negative desires. They
are not motivated by such social reinforcement as praise or future
benefits. Studies have been done that show locking up a psychopath has
absolutely no effect on them in terms of modifying their life
strategies. In fact, in is shown to make them worse. Effectively, when
locked up, psychopaths just simply learn how to be better
psychopaths.
Since the psychopath bases their activities designed
to get what they want on their particular "theory of mind," it is
instructive to have a look at this issue. Having a "theory of mind"
allows an individual to impute mental states (thoughts, perceptions, and
feelings) not only to oneself, but also to other individuals.
It is, in effect, a tool that helps us predict the behavior of
others. The most successful individuals are those who most accurately
predict what another person will do given a certain set of
circumstances. In the present day, we have Game Theory which is
being used to model many social problems including
psychopathy.
When two individuals interact with each other, each
must decide what to do without knowledge of what the other is doing.
Imagine that the two players are the government and the public. In the
following model, each of the players faces only a binary choice: to
behave ethically either in making laws or in obeying them.
The
assumption is that both players are informed about everything except the
level of ethical behavior of the other. They know what it means to act
ethically, and they know the consequences of being exposed as
unethical.
There are three elements to the game.
-
the players
-
the strategies available to either of them
-
the payoff each player receives for each possible combination
of strategies
In a legal regime, one party is obliged to compensate the other
for damages under certain conditions but not under others. We are going
to imagine a regime wherein the government is never liable for losses
suffered by the public because of its unethical behavior - instead, the
public has to pay for the damages inflicted by the government due to
unethical behavior.
The way the payoffs are represented is
generally in terms of money. That is, how much investment does each
player have to make in ethical behavior and how much payoff does each
player receive for his investment.
In this model, behaving
ethically, according to standards of social values that are considered
the "norm," costs each player $10.00. When law detrimental to the public
is passed, it costs the public $100.00. We take it as a given that such
laws will be passed unless both players behave ethically.
Next,
we assume that the likelihood of a detrimental law being passed in the
event that both the public and the government are behaving ethically is
a one-in-ten chance.
In a legal regime in which the government is
never held responsible for its unethical behavior, and if neither the
government nor the public behave ethically, the government enjoys a
payoff of $0. and the public is out $100 when a law detrimental to the
public is passed.
If both "invest" in ethical behavior, the
government has a payoff of minus $10. (the cost of behaving ethically)
and the public is out minus $20. which is the $10. invested in being
ethical PLUS the $10. of the one-in-ten chance of a $100. loss incurred
if a detrimental law is passed.
If the government behaves
ethically and the public does not, resulting in the passing of a law
detrimental to the populace, the government is out the $10. invested in
being ethical and the public is out $100.
If the government does
not behave ethically, and the public does, the government has a payoff
of $0. and the public is out $110 which is the "cost of being ethical"
added to the losses suffered when the government passes detrimental
laws.
Modeled in a Game Theory Bi-matrix, it looks like this,
with the two numbers representing the "payoff" to the people - the left
number in each pair - and government - the right number in each
pair.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
No Ethics |
|
Ethical |
|
|
No Ethics |
-100, 0 |
|
-100, -10 |
|
Society/People |
|
|
Ethical |
-110, 0 |
|
-20, -10 |
In short, in this game, the government always does better by
not being ethical and we can predict the government's choice of strategy
because there is a single strategy - no ethics - that is better for the
government no matter what choice the public makes. This is a "strictly
dominant strategy," or a strategy that is the best choice for the player
no matter what choices are made by the other player.
What is even
worse is the fact that the public is PENALIZED for behaving ethically.
Since we know that the government, in the above regime, will never
behave ethically because it is the dominant strategy, we find that
ethical behavior on the part of the public actually costs MORE than
unethical behavior.
In short, psychopathic behavior is
actually a POSITIVE ADAPTATION in such a regime.
The public,
as you see, cannot even minimize their losses by behaving ethically. It
costs them $110. to be ethical, and only $100. to not be
ethical.
Now, just substitute "psychopath" in the place of the
government and non-psychopath in the place of the public, and you begin
to understand why the psychopath will always be a psychopath.
If the "payoff" is emotional pain of being hurt, or shame for
being exposed, in the world of the psychopath, that consequence simply
does not exist just as in the legal regime created above, the
government is never responsible for unethical behavior.
The psychopath lives in a world in which it is like a government
that is never held responsible for behavior that is detrimental to
others. It's that simple. And the form game above will tell you why
psychopaths in the population, as well as in government, are able to
induce the public to accept laws that are detrimental.
It simply isn't worth it to be ethical. If you go along with the
psychopath, you lose. If you resist the psychopath, you lose even
more.
The [psychopath] is unfamiliar with the primary facts or data
of what might be called personal values and is altogether incapable of
understanding such matters. It is impossible for him to take even a
slight interest in the tragedy or joy or the striving of humanity as
presented in serious literature or art. He is also indifferent to all
these matters in life itself. Beauty and ugliness, except in a very
superficial sense, goodness, evil, love, horror, and humor have no
actual meaning, no power to move him.
He is, furthermore, lacking in the ability to see that others
are moved. It is as though he were color-blind, despite his sharp
intelligence, to this aspect of human existence. It cannot be
explained to him because there is nothing in his orbit of awareness
that can bridge the gap with comparison. He can repeat the words and
say glibly that he understands, and there is no way for him to realize
that he does not understand.
[Cleckley, H.M. (1941). The mask of sanity: An attempt to
reinterpret the so-called psychopathic personality. St. Louis: The C.
V. Mosby Company]
It also means that such a person is free to choose to do things
that are potentially self-destructive without giving a single indication
to another "player" that his or her choice is based entirely on a
delusion. Very often, they "win" because of the sheer boldness of their
actions which is unrestricted by conscience which is a construct of
emotions.
It's like a poker player who has absolutely nothing in
his hand, but because he is so intent on winning, and is so unmoved by
the possibility of losing because lying produces absolutely no internal,
emotional reaction of fear of being discovered or the potential shame or
disaster inherent in such an event, is able to bluff so convincingly
that the other players - any of whom might have a winning hand, fold and
walk away because they are convinced by the psychopath's confidence that
he must have the winning hand of all time.
Only he doesn't.
And this means that the psychopath's strength is also his
Achilles heel.
Once he has been spotted, identified, understood, he no longer
has the power to bluff. Once knowledge enters the game, the
psychopath is exposed, and has no more ability to "con" the other
players. The sad part is: he also has no ability to learn from this
experience anything other than how to make his bluff better and more
convincing next time. The psychopath never gets mad because he is caught
in a lie; he is only concerned with "damage control" in terms of his
ability to continue to con others.
Societies can be considered as
"players" in the psychopath's game model.
The past behavior of a
society will be used by the psychopath to predict the future behavior of
that society. Like an individual player, a society will have a certain
probability of detecting deception and a more or less accurate memory of
who has cheated on them in the past, as well as a developed or not
developed proclivity to retaliate against a liar and cheater.
Since the psychopath is using an actuarial approach to assess the
costs and benefits of different behaviors (just how much can he get away
with), it is the actual past behavior of the society which will go into
his calculations rather than any risk assessments based on any "fears or
anxieties" of being caught and punished that empathic people would feel
in anticipation of doing something illegal.
Thus, in order to
reduce psychopathic behavior in society and in government, a society
MUST establish and enforce a reputation for high rates of detection of
deception and identification of liars, and a willingness to retaliate.
In other words, it must establish a successful strategy of
deterrence.
Since the psychopath is particularly unable to make
decisions based on future consequences, and is able only to focus
attention on immediate gratification - short term goals - it is possible
that such individuals can be dealt with by establishing a history of
dealing out swift social retaliation. That is, identifying and punishing
liars and cheaters must be both immediate and predictable that it will
be immediate.
And here we come to the issue: concerning the
real-world, human social interactions on a large scale, reducing
psychopathy in our leaders depends upon expanding society's
collective memory of individual players' past behavior.
Any
reasonable scan of the news will reveal that lies and cheating are not
"covered up" as thoroughly as American apologists would like to
think.
Even the less well-informed Americans have some idea that
there was certainly something fishy about the investigation into the
assassination of JFK. In recent years, the man in charge of the
Warren Commission, Gerald Ford, also a former president,
admitted to "cheating" on the report.
Then, there was
Watergate followed by the Iran-Contra affair, not to
mention "Monica-gate." And here we are just hitting some
highlights familiar to all Americans.
What consequences did the
cheaters of society suffer?
None to speak of. In fact, in
nearly every case, they were rewarded handsomely with those things of
value to the psychopath: money and material goods. If anyone thinks they
were shamed by public exposure, think again!
But what is of
CRUCIAL interest here is the fact that the American people have simply
NOT responded to the revelations of lies in government with any outrage
that could be considered more than token. At the present time, there
isn't even "token outrage."
Don't you find that odd?
But
we have already noted the reason:
the American way of life has optimized the survival of
psychopathy and in a world of psychopaths, those who are not genetic
psychopaths, are induced to behave like psychopaths simply to survive.
When the rules are set up to make a society "adaptive" to
psychopathy, it makes psychopaths of everyone. As a consequence, a very
large number of Americans are effective sociopaths. (Here we use
"sociopath" as a designation of those individuals who are not genetic
psychopaths.)
And so, we have George Bush and the Third Reich calculating how much they
can get away with by looking at the history of the reactions of the
American People to cheating.
There aren't any because the system
is adaptive to psychopathy. In other words, Americans support Bush
and his agenda because most of them are LIKE him.
But that is
not because they are ALL born that way. It is because psychopathy is
almost required to survive in Competitive, Capitalistic
America.
As a society gets larger and more competitive,
individuals become more anonymous and more Machiavellian. Social
stratification and segregation leads to feelings of inferiority,
pessimism and depression among the have-nots, and this promotes the use
of "cheating strategies" in life which then makes the environment more
adaptive for psychopathy in general.
Psychopathic behavior among
non-genetic psychopaths could be viewed as a functional method of
obtaining desirable resources, increasing an individual's status in a
local group, and even a means of providing stimulation that socially and
financially successful people find in acceptable physical and
intellectual challenges. In other words, the psychopath is a bored and
frustrated sensation-seeker who "does not have the intellectual capacity
to amuse and occupy himself" internally.
Such individuals may begin their lives in the lower
socio-economic levels, but they often rise to the top.
In
America, a great many households are affected by the fact that work,
divorce, or both, have removed one or both parents from interaction with
their children for much of the day. This is a consequence of
Capitalistic economics.
When the parents are absent, or even
when one is present but not in possession of sufficient knowledge or
information, children are left to the mercies of their peers, a culture
shaped by the media. Armed with joysticks and TV remotes, children are
guided from South Park and Jerry Springer to Mortal
Kombat on Nintendo.
Normal kids become desensitized to violence. More-susceptible
kids - children with a genetic inheritance of psychopathy - are pushed
toward a dangerous mental precipice. Meanwhile, the government is
regularly passing laws, on the demand of parents and the psychological
community, designed to avoid imposing consequences on junior's violent
behavior.
As for media violence, few researchers continue to try
to dispute that bloodshed on TV and in the movies has an effect on the
kids who witness it. Added to the mix now are video games structured
around models of hunting and killing. Engaged by graphics, children
learn to associate spurts of "blood" with the primal gratification of
scoring a "win."
Again, economics controls the
reality.
While everyone will readily admit that there is probably
too much violence on television and that the ads are probably pure
balderdash, very few people have a real conception of the precise nature
and extent of the hypnotic influence of the media. Still fewer have any
idea of the purposes behind this inducement.
Wallace and Wallechinsky write in The People's
Almanac:
"After World War II, television flourished... Psychologists and
sociologists were brought in to study human nature in relation to
selling; in other words, to figure out how to manipulate people
without their feeling manipulated. Dr. Ernest Dichter,
President of the Institute for Motivational Research made a statement
in 1941... 'the successful ad agency manipulates human motivations and
desires and develops a need for goods with which the public has at one
time been unfamiliar -- perhaps even undesirous of
purchasing.
"Discussing the influence of television, Daniel
Boorstin wrote:
'Here at last is a supermarket of surrogate experience.
Successful programming offers entertainment -- under the guise of
instruction; instruction -- under the guise of entertainment;
political persuasion -- with the appeal of advertising; and
advertising -- with the appeal of drama.'
"Programmed television serves not only to spread acquiescence
and conformity, but it represents a deliberate industry approach."
[quoted by Wallace, Wallechinsky]
Aside from the fact that television has been conjectured to be
extremely detrimental to children and that it is now thought that most
of the deteriorating aspects of society can be attributed to the
decaying values portrayed on television, there is a deeper and more
insidious effect upon the human psyche. As quoted, it is a planned and
deliberate manipulation to spread acquiescence and conformity and to
hypnotize the masses to submit to the authority of the masters of
economics through their false prophet, the television.
Allen
Funt, host of a popular show, Candid Camera, was once asked
what was the most disturbing thing he had learned about people in his
years of dealing with them through the media.
His response was chilling in its ramifications:
"The worst thing, and I see it over and over, is how easily
people can be led by any kind of authority figure, or even the most
minimal kinds of authority. A well dressed man walks up the down
escalator and most people will turn around and try desperately to go
up also... We put up a sign on the road, 'Delaware Closed Today'.
Motorists didn't even question it. Instead they asked: 'Is Jersey
open?'"
[quoted by Wallace, Wallechinsky]
A
picture is forming of a deliberately contrived society of televised
conformity, literate and creative inadequacy, and social unrest and
decadence. It is apparent that the media is in charge of propagating
these conditions, and the media is controlled by what?
Capitalistic, competitive Economics.
It would seem that
the motivation masters would, in the interests of their industrial
clients, plan programming to bring about beneficial societal conditions
- which they could, in fact, do. It is apparent that the final authority
on televised programming is in the hands of the advertisers, backed by
the industries whose products are being sold. With all the psychological
input to which they have access, it would seem that they utilize
programming to correct societal conditions which cost them money.
Over 25 billion dollars a year is spent to teach workers to read
and write, after graduating from the combined effects of a public school
system and the television. It is accepted that the burgeoning crime
rate, which also costs these industrial giants vast sums of money, is
mostly attributable to the frustrations and dissatisfactions engendered
by the false view of reality presented over the television.
Why
don't they use their financial resources to back the motivation masters
to figure out how to present programming which could effect positive
changes?
Can it be that the conditions of society, including the
programmed response to "minimal signs of authority" are planned? Would
anyone care to suggest that the figures and studies relating to the
detrimental influence of programming is not available to them and that
they don't realize that it is costing them money? If that is the case,
then they are too stupid to be arbiters of our values and we should
disregard them entirely in any event. If it is not the case, then we
must assume that there is an object to this manipulation.
There
is much evidence to support the idea that this purpose, or the object of
this manipulation, is to create psychological and social disunity -
social psychopathy - sufficient to permit the instituting of a
totalitarian government at the behest of the people. It is further
theorized that the "wealthy elite" seek to control the entire world from
behind the scenes and it is to this end that they mastermind and fund
the various actions which appear to the masses as political and
international "accidents".
Franklin D. Roosevelt said:
"Nothing in politics ever happens by accident; if it happens,
you can bet it was planned!"
And he was in a position to know.
There is much evidence
to support the notion that wars are fomented and fought to redistribute
these balances of financial power behind the scenes and that, though our
fathers, brother, grandfathers, uncles, cousins and sons die in these
actions, they are merely games of "International Relations" played by
those whose money and position give them absolute power to shape our
reality to some nefarious end.
The psychic stresses of our world
are right in the home. There they can easily act on any kid who believes
that "the world has wronged me" - a sentiment spoken from the reality of
existence - a reality created by economic pressures instituted via Game
Theory.
Is there a solution?
The obvious solution would be
a world in which, at the very least, the psychopath - in government or
in society - would be forced to be responsible for unethical behavior.
But game-theory modeling demonstrates that selfishness is always the
most profitable strategy possible for replicating units.
Could
it ever be an evolutionarily stable strategy for people to be innately
unselfish?
On the whole, a capacity to cheat, to compete and to
lie has proven to be a stupendously successful adaptation. Thus the idea
that selection pressure could ever cause saintliness to spread in a
society looks implausible in practice.
It doesn't seem feasible to outcompete genes which promote
competitiveness.
"Nice guys" get eaten or outbred.
Happy people who are unaware get eaten or outbred. Happiness and
niceness today is vanishingly rare, and the misery and suffering of
those who are able to truly feel, who are empathic toward other human
beings, who have a conscience, is all too common. And the
psychopathic manipulations are designed to make psychopaths of us
all.
Nevertheless, a predisposition to, conscience, ethics,
can prevail if and when it is also able to implement the deepest level
of altruism: making the object of its empathy the higher ideal of
enhancing free will in the abstract sense, for the sake of others,
including our descendants.
In short, our "self-interest" ought
to be vested in collectively ensuring that all others are happy and
well-disposed too; and in ensuring that children we bring into the world
have the option of being constitutionally happy and benevolent toward
one another.
This means that if psychopathy threatens the
well-being of the group future, then it can be only be dealt with by
refusing to allow the self to be dominated by it on an individual,
personal basis. Preserving free will for the self in the practical
sense, ultimately preserves free will for others. Protection of our own
rights AS the rights of others, underwrites the free will position and
potential for happiness of all. If mutant psychopaths pose a potential
danger then true empathy, true ethics, true conscience, dictates using
prophylactic therapy against psychopaths.
And so it is that
identifying the psychopath, ceasing our interaction with them, cutting
them off from our society, making ourselves unavailable to them as
"food" or objects to be conned and used, is the single most effective
strategy that we can play.
It seems certain from the evidence
that a positive transformation of human nature isn't going to come about
through a great spiritual awakening, socio-economic reforms, or a
spontaneous desire among the peoples of the world to be nice to each
other.
But it's quite possible that, in the long run, the psychopathic
program of suffering will lose out because misery is not a stable
strategy.
In a state of increasing misery, victims will seek to escape it;
and this seeking will ultimately lead them to inquire into the true
state of their misery, and that may lead to a society of intelligent
people who will have the collective capacity to do
so.
