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Same when somebody is bullied at school, or is the targed of lame jokes. Nobody usually does anything, since "survival" is to laugh of the poor guy who is being beaten by the thug (And sigh in relief for not being him).

I was bullied heavily at school.  And when I was getting beaten up, I certainly didn't have any respect for the standers by who laughed and egged the bullies on... I wouldn't call these standers by sociopaths though... but the bullies themselves could be.  I know at least two of my former bullies have gone on to become herion addicts and pretty much fit the description of a Sociopath... Good luck to the lawless cunts, I hope Santa brings them an overdose for Christmas.

On the very rare occasion, somebody would step in, tell a teacher or even try to stand up to the bullies on my behalf...  I would like to reserve a place further up the 'Goodness scale' for my helpers than for the people who stood there and laughed.

So it isn't realla a matter of bad and good... it's a sliding scale.  And I would suggest that as a general trend* the closer somebody is to the "bad" end of the spectrum, the more likely he or she is to be a sociopath...

*I selected the word 'trend' carefully, because that is by no means a solid rule.

I never ever understood those people who stand by and watch other kids get bullied. It's sooo wrong. And some of them laugh or egg it on!?? It's insane.

I agree those people are not necessarily suffering from mental disorders and are probably the closest to an entirely mentally healthy cowardly little shite. I think in most cases like that, the people egging on the bullies are just really stupid. Like actually stupid, with a low IQ, and I guess they follow the lead of the bully because it makes them feel accepted in some kind of social circle, and they think it's cool. Like stupid chavs who break stuff or push bins over because they aren't clever enough to realise it's not brave or funny or anything other than utterly retarded.

Vict0r - sorry to get all dark but I was nettled by hauntedhamburger people like that aren't worth being "taken care" of though. Why risk tainting your own conscience or risking time in prison just for some worthless arse? I don't think he's likely to keep another animal again in his life, but if he did I would immediately report him to the RSPCA... other than that he's not worth thinking about.

One question from someone who knows 0 about psychology... Does a bad person necesarilly have to be "something"? (Being a sociopath, had a difficult childhood, having "less hormon of whatever glandula", etc...)

Can' t bad people just be bad people?

***I admit it's totally off topic, and I am not refering at all to Meowster' s case...***

I think this is an interesting question.

It is hard to be "bad" in a sense of being wicked to other people. Since most people do have empathy for others, it is difficult to be cruel to an animal let alone another human being, when you can understand the pain and humiliation that they are feeling. Ironically, one reason I have never attempted to have any kind of "revenge" on my dad by telling his acquantainces the truth about him (besides that I am not a mean or vengeful person of course!) is that as a sociopath he can feel only for himself - and I understand and empathise with the humilation and sorrow he would feel if I destroyed his few connections in life. I couldn't even do that to my dad who is actually pretty deserving of such a thing!

I think we can all think of those moments when we've either felt extreme guilt for hurting someone, or put ourselves in the shoes of others and felt overwhelming sorrow for them.

So it seems VERY unnatural to me that anybody with a fully healthy mental state would WILLINGLY and GUILTLESSLY hurt others, without there being some other psychological factor behind it.

I don't think I've ever met anyone who is truly "bad" without believing there is some underlying psychological factor to it, be it a difficulty to emphathise properly or whatever. I think that we try make a label for any kind of deviance from what we consider normal, healthy social behaviour, and as Mills says, this is so we can avoid, treat or eradicate  those with such labels. 'Cos it's destructive behaviour and ultimately benefits nobody. My dad will never be truly happy and neither will anybody involves with him, it's a lose-lose situation.

Oh man, here is a rubbish story: I had a boss who was obsessed with spreading rumours about me and other people. She eventually got sacked for it (we all made a joint complaint, and amonst the complaints raised with her when she was being sacked was that she had told everyone that I had been sleeping around with people in the office!). Even 7 months after this (she's moved away and hasn't even seen me since) she's still obsessed with me! People keep telling me that they've heard I'm pregnant and don't know who the father is, they heard I have incurable STDs, they heard I got fired from my job, they heard a bunch of insane stuff, because she's still obsessed with trying to "get revenge" (revenge is not the correct word though since I never did anything wrong...). I don't think this displays what anybody would consider normal or healthy social behaviour, ie., her obsession with having revenge and her point blank refusal to accept that her behaviour was cruel and unwarranted. In fact instead of assuming responsibility or showing guilt, her reaction to retribution for all of this is anger that she got caught and blaming the victims for telling on her! I'm sure that nobody in a fully healthy state of mind would have even started rumours in the first place, let alone had this reaction when caught.

I didn't even choose to associate myself closely with this woman, we were thrown together in a work environment, yet my brief interaction with her has caused me months and months of stress and misery trying to rebuke all these ridiculous rumours that she's spreading about me. Even the briefest initial encounter with "bad" people can cause bloody months or years of trouble for the "victims". My dad once got obsessed with friend of a friend he met once at a party who he thought he'd seen "laughing" at him. They didn't even speak, but my dad imagined that she'd been having this conversation with her mate about him and snickering and laughing snidely. Maybe she was, I have no idea but it seems unlikely (knowing my dad's paranoia over such things). Nonetheless, they never spoke and never had any contact prior to that or even really after it. Despite this my dad became something of a stalker, found out where she lived and for the next three years tried to do things like break her house windows or pour paintstripper on her car. Every so often something nasty would happen to her and I don't even know if she knew it was on purpose half the time.

So yeah as Mills says,

We have terms like sociopath because of our need to quantify and qualify everything around us. We need to know what causes such destructive behavior in hopes of eventually eradicating it from society.

And the reason is because they are the kind of people who do the crap described above

I don't think any good or nice person like you or I would do that stuff.

Man here is a show siamese... it's just so wrong looking...

My brother with whom I live has decided to get a cat. I'm not going to object, I love them, I'm just concerned it might eat one of the many electrical cables in the house.

Anyhow, he's useless at coming up with names, and since he's soon to become a mother, I've been making suggestions myself - Chairman Meow, Garkov, Jess (what can I say, I liked Postman Pat!), and other things. What would *you* fine folk call a cat? What have you called yours?

Chairman Meow is great! On that note: Kitler, or Mousewitz?

My cats never ate a cable in their life either. They do scratch up my PC chair though, and they love digging up the carpets.

He should look into getting/rescuing a burmese. They are such great cats, they live for cuddles and attention and warmth. My little Raz climbs under the duvet with me at night, and goes to great lengths to obtain cuddles. He also tries to climb under my clothes for warmth, which looks kinda perverse but is actually sweet.

He's a great big softy and thick as a plank

Also Siamese are great, though if you do get one I'd recommend buying one from a breeder and not a rescue cat. I've heard lots of people tell me that Siamese are highly strung, aloof cats, but most of these people have met or heard of cats that were rescued and therefore had been abused or abandoned at some point in their lives. My Siamese was bought from a very loving breeder who pampered her kittens, and she is just theee best cat. She follows me around the house quietly, sitting close by me wherever I am. Sometimes she'll have a little meow-conversation with me. She loves cuddles, and she loves playing. She very clever - she has a favourite toy that she's had for two years now, since she was a kitten. It's all beaten up and smelly but it's the only toy she likes to play fetch with (she plays fetch like a dog!)

Another common misperception is that they're ALL skinny little things with funny faces and huge ears. The thin ones are bred for showing and I'm kinda opposed to the idea of breeding cats for physical features like that. But the "traditional" Siamese cats are quite normal looking (except for their beautiful blue eyes, potentially long faces and beautiful colourings).

Here is my Lili cat



Okay I'm going to stop spooging about cats now. Except for one more thing - they have "favourite people". I'm Lili's favourite, so she'll always sit on my lap or wash my face, or cuddle up next to me in bed. It's a very rewarding relationship, one that can be quite rare for cat owners. She has also learned to tap my leg when she wants attention, which is supercute

[question I'm asking is whether or not there is a point in trying to make peace with a sociopath]

Ah but some people here have been of help! People who have experienced similar situations - the only question I'm asking is whether or not there is a point in trying to make peace with a sociopath, and I've found some of the replies from people who have experienced similar situations to be very helpful. I don't know anybody personally who has experienced this kind of thing, and that is why the internet is a great tool for asking this particular question.

The fact it is the internet made me exclude most of the 'gorey' detail from my first post, however, for hauntedhamburger to make quite an offensive judgement based on so little evidence is pretty irritating, so if he wants to he can read just a little of the terrible shit my dad did and then think again about whether his reply is appropriate.

Yes it's the internet and nobody can be sure that someone else isn't exaggerating, but giving such opinionated and offensive advice (saying I'm no better than my dad if I don't "make up" with him!) based on the assumption that I am exaggerating is a bit much for me to take, without at least showing hauntedhamburger how bloody wrong he is!

Also, this kind of domestic violence is not all that uncommon. It irritates me when I meet people who deny such things happen. I really do meet people sometimes who think that cases like that are exaggerated, because they don't understand why the wife didn't leave the husband or the children didn't stop the father or whatever. Or people who have lived with one parent who was a "bit shite" but they managed to deal with it, and then assume that all people could do the same in their situation - which is exactly what hauntedhamburger seems to think. It's an attitude that I absolutely hate.

I'm gonna probably receive some hate and flake for saying this but I feel feel this needs to be said. Meowster, your entire story seems incredibly one sided and exaggerated. No one is perfect. Most of us all have parents that did stuff while they were raising us that they later. It used to be perfectly socially acceptable to beat your kids as long as no permanent damage occurred (not that its a good thing fuck no). I also question why in his 20 year stint you never attempted to arrange a intervention. My dad got hooked on cocaine and heroine from when I turned 10 to when I turned 19. After a family intervention he went into rehab and he's been clean ever since. It seems to me your dad's been crying out for help for a long time but he didn't know how to say it. I know it may seem like he deserves his situation but that attitude makes you no better than your dad. You can still make it right.


Also, your dad isn't a sociopath. I just brought this to my brother who is a psychiatrist and he confirmed that.

My story isn't incredibly one sided and exaggerated at all. I'm not sure which part made you think that, could you specify? I didn't actually go into detail over most of what he's done because it wasn't a rant at how much I hate my dad. It was a question as to whether there was any chance that his imminent death could give him a kick up the arse and try to make up for everything he's done wrong, or whether as a sociopath, which he certainly is given his absolute lack of any empathy towards animals or other humans and the lack of empathy he has ever shown (even going back as far as his childhood), there was no point.

Permanent damage DID occur to me and my sisters, and to my mum, both mentally and physically. From throwing kettles of boiling water at us to grabbing my hair and smashing my face into my mum's face, and pretty much every nasty thing you could think of inbetween. He picked up my baby sisters and threw them at walls if they didn't stop crying. He told my little brothers to hit my mother if she tried to tell them what to do. He threw my little brother into a patch of nettles when he was just a baby. Man, it even extends to outside the family circle - my main memory of keeping dogs was of him torturing them in some way (putting them in plastic bags and spinning them over his head for 'fun', trying to break one dog's neck in the door because he was in a bad mood, locking them in a dark windowless shed for a week with no food or water).

Why in his 20 year stint I never attempted to arrange an intervention? You think we didn't ask him to stop? When we did say something that offended his idea that he was the cleverest and best man in the world or that his ideas weren't unarguably the best, he would go into dark rages. Let me give you an example of these rages. He took us out of school and forbade us to ever leave our "property" or speak to other children. By the age of about 13 I was desperate to interact with other children and to go to school, so I asked if I could start school. He asked if I really wanted to, and I said yes. So he started screaming about how I was disrespecting his brilliant idea of home education. For the record, we were never taught anything at home, had no lessons or structure - he just didn't want us going to school. This rage spiralled into him throwing parrafin everywhere in the house and threatening to set fire to everything. Then he dragged me outside, covered me in parrafin and held a match to my head, threatening to set me on fire and make my mother watch me burn. When my mother locked him outside he tried to ax the door down, screaming that he was going to kill all of us. He cut the phone lines and turned out the electricity (the box was on the side of the house). My mum called the police on her mobile phone and it was the only thing that stopped him from continuing (because they turned up).

Does that sound like perfectly acceptable social behaviour?

This is the kind of event that met any attempt to ask him to see psychiatrists, or to stop taking drugs, or to stop drinking.

My dad is also obsessed with getting "revenge" on people and trying to maintain an aura of superiority over them. For instance, he phones my mother regularly even now that they are separated, to tell her that he's making loads of money, or he's got a new shiny car, or he's got this "great job... don't want to tell you what it is though because I know you're struggling at university and you've worked all your life, I don't want to make you jealous that I could just step into this great job when you've been struggling all your life to get where you are! But just to let you know, I'm doing REALLY well for myself!" and yes, that is pretty much a word for word quote. He is that obvious when he attempts to gloat! But the worst/funniest part is that it's also really obvious that all these things he says are fabrications and lies to try and make himself seem better than he is. In reality he's never had a job and still doesn't, he lives in a tiny council house in a poor area of town and lives off benefits.

When I was a child, whenever I met new people (which was incredibly rare), I was instructed, pretty much given a script of things to say when asked. My dad would get extremely angry if I didn't learn my "lines" and messed up. When I was as young as 6, I was being told exactly what to say to my Grandma when she asked certain questions. Every aspect of my interaction with people was rehearsed, even ridiculous things like "when she comes in to the room say, "Grandma, I wasn't expecting you to visit today!" or "If she asks what I do for a living, tell her I'm a graphic designer" (in truth he never had a job).

Furthermore he uses the children left at home to try and blackmail my mother. Never does he visit them, or send them birthday cards, or speak to them on the phone... EXCEPT for times when he wants to ask questions like "does mummy have a new boyfriend?". Because of the nature of these interrogations, he'll only ever speak to my youngest sister because he believes, I guess, that she will give away information more easily. This is actually how these conversations unfold: he will call, ask to speak to her, and then I guess not realising it's on speakerphone will say, "Hi honey. How are you doing at school? Listen, does mummy have a new boyfriend? No? Because I saw her in town with a guy today. Does she often go out with guys? No? What about girls? Do you think mummy is a lesbian? Does she have very close female friends?" etc etc. The only other time he seems to remember they exist is when he gets into black rages and calls my mum threatening to have the kids taken away from her if she doesn't lend him money or whatever.

Why didn't my mother leave him? Because like so many sociopaths, my dad was brilliant at manipulation. Everything, from fully convincing my terrified mother that he would gain custody of the children or kill her parents by setting fire to their house, to having "good spells" where he'd lavish my mother in love and attention and empty promises. Like so many sociopaths, he was a master of manipulation. He knew exactly how to use a suicide threat to keep my mother under control.

Wow, I could go on and on and on. I'm quite offended by your post, it is the kind of thing I would actually expect my dad to say in defence of himself or something. Also taking this to your "psychiatrist brother"? There is no way I offered enough information in my first posts for any psychiatrist to judge anything other than that he's a dick. Suggesting that I'm no better than my dad if I choose not to indulge his attempts to manipulate people is a real offensive thing to say, too.

Sorry for the long post everyone but honestly I had to set this guy straight. One sided and exaggerated? Jesus christ.

Hahahaha Rharpe

I've done a bit more reading about sociopaths and apparently there's really no point in trying to get back into contact with him so I won't. It doesn't bother me at all, and the only thing that will bother him about it is that I'm one less person he has any influence over.

I'm amazed that sociopaths are as common as they seem to be...

My dad's brother behaved in the same sociopathic way as my father when he was younger, but "mellowed" with age. I suspect this is more to do with the fact that as he got older he was no longer able to hit his children as they were stronger than him, and if his wife left him he wouldn't be able to replace her so easily, etc. I'm sure that really bad sociopaths probably only "mellow out" because they get to an age where they can no longer replace what they lose...

And yeah Stupot it winds me up so much that I share some of my dads facial features, jeez

So, the new question is: Sociopaths, a product of nature or nurture? Or both?

I don't think I need the closure personally. I guess that, 'cause he's my dad I kinda hope he would come around and realise what a jerk he's been, but I don't really expect it or need it, and I won't be sad if it doesn't happen. I just wonder if it could happen... though from everything I've read about sociopaths, it is unlikely. Ironically, I would be sad for my dad if he was dying because I'd empathise with the extreme sadness and fear he would feel for himself but that's it really.

Do you guys think sociopathy is a nature or nurture thing? I've read different opinions on the cause of sociopathy. None of my sisters are sociopaths, and my mum isn't, but my little brother definitely is (it's really sad seeing this in a sibling). I also discovered that one of my dad's sons (who my dad had never met in his life, he left his mother before the child was born) is a complete violent sociopath, though my half sister (who my dad also had nothing to do with) isn't a sociopath. Apparently it's more likely to be seen in males than females.

So it makes me wonder how likely this is to be passed on to my future children. I'd like to think that good nurturing would prevent a child from becoming a sociopath... maybe only a genetic weakness towards it is passed on? But I'm very worried that perhaps it is unpreventable... my half-brother (who has never met my father) is an extreme violent sociopath, and I'm hoping this is more to do with his upbringing by a bizarrely religious strict woman and a violent step-father, than my dad's genes. And as I said, my brother is a sociopath, but was raised in a family where his male role model was very violent.

Perhaps the significantly lower statistics for female sociopaths is because women are far less likely to be in a position where they can abuse their partner/family physically and mentally, and so their female children who look to them as a role model are not so likely to become sociopaths by learning their behaviour. Whereas men are more likely to be in a position where they can both physically and mentally abuse their partner and family, and the male children, who look to their fathers as role models, then learn/adopt this behaviour and pass it on through generations in this way?

I have read various accounts of women who claim their child's sociopathy was genetically acquired from the father, yet in all these accounts I read, the women only left the sociopath when the child was 2 and a half or more years old. That may seem young, but early sociopathic behaviour is seen around this age so surely it's not too young to have learned it...?

Do you think though, that even though he is a sociopath, actually having to face death might jerk some sense into him? Or would he just feel sorry for himself :/ ?

This might make for an interesting discussion.

My dad is a sociopath (read more about sociopaths here http://www.mcafee.cc/Bin/sb.html).

He'd fathered and subsequently abandoned numerous children from other relationships, before meeting my mother (ten years his senior and very naive), who he strung along and abused for over 20 years (he didn't tell her about these children). He never held a job, he made my mother work full time, yet despite this he never helped in the house and expected her to bring him breakfast, lunch and dinner. He did lots of drugs. He was hideously violent towards all of his children and my mum. He was controlling and manipulative. I thought I was going to die a number of times throughout my childhood.

My mother has been separated from him for many years now, and as a result his health has gone downhill (his sociopathy means he is unable to take good care of himself, he destroys his body with ridiculous amounts of poor quality drugs such as speed, he smokes copiously, he lives on the barest amount of social welfare as he cannot keep a job, which means he has to survive on the poorest quality food and rarely exercises).

Recently my mum has found out that he might well be dying as he's in extremely poor health and can't even walk. Knowing the state of my Dad's health and his age, it's actually quite likely that he won't see more than a few more years. Now here's the question:

Do I make up with my Dad before he dies, or is this completely pointless given that he's a serious sociopath? I haven't seen him in four years and all I have heard about him is from my brother (who sees him occasionally)... apparently my dad was obsessional over his hatred for me because I once threatened to call the police if he continued to abuse anyone in my family. But maybe dying will make him open his eyes up, or perhaps he will feel something for the people he will lose when he dies? Although I have mostly overwhelmingly bad memories of my dad, there were of course the good times too... though that is not unusual for a sociopath. Is there a point in trying to "reconcile" with him, or will it just be a completely pointless exercise that will give him an inflated sense of self-worth and smugness before he passes away? Might he feel something?

What do you think? Discuss

Yeah, I agree those applications are bloody horrible. The thing is though that none of my friends nor I had any of them installed. I had those apps, I hate joining stupid groups with no purpose, I hate poking people, I don't send ridiculous amounts of messages nor do I upload stupid amounts of photos. I'm actually a pretty inoffensive user... as were all my friends who got banned.

But I've deleted people from my friends list before for being absolute terrors on facebook, for constant pointless poking, group invites, app invites etc... and yet those people still have their accounts...

'Lo all,

Strange thing happened two days ago - tried to log into my facebook account and was told that it had been deactivated by a moderator for breaching of the TOS. I was not aware of having broken the TOS and after reading them through I decided that I definitely had not.

After a bit of moaning over MSN I also discovered that five of my friends had had their accounts deactivated in exactly the same manner at exactly the same time, without warning and for no apparent reason (other than the vaguely stated 'TOS breach' which we're all certain we didn't do).

We are all very careful with security and giving out our passwords, my facebook account has a different password to every other account that I have and so it's fairly impossible that something got a hold of my password and spammed using my account (I also don't click dumb links and all that basic stuff).

One of my friends also received an email warning saying that they would ban her if she didn't stop spamming... she doesn't even post that much, so she definitely wasn't guilty of that crime! And again, her account had not been compromised by spam bots or anything.

I emailed Facebook when it happened, explaining that I thought it was a mistake and could they reinstate my account? My friends all did the same, but two days later have not received any reply back at all.

A quick google search shows that people have been banned before for no reason, or for ridiculous reasons such as having "fake sounding" names, pictures of cats as their avatar etc. It's certainly not a new thing, it just hasn't happened to my group of friends before. How on earth do they moderate, do they examine social graphs or peruse networks of people actively looking for stuff to ban people for???

Has this happened to anyone else recently?

Hi all,

My friend was recently burgled and ALL of his stuff taken from his apartment while he was at work. He has been told that there is a high chance the burglar will return after he's claimed on his insurance and take his NEW stuff too, as it is a common tactic of this type of crime around the area. He feels helpless and vulnerable and unable to replace anything in the house as he's sure it will be taken.

Unfortunately he's stuck in his contract with the letting agent until May 2009.

I'm wondering if he'd be able to get out of this contract. The apartment was not broken into but accessed with a key, which somehow the burglar got hold of or a copy of. This guy lives alone and is 100% certain nobody could have got a copy of the key from him - it must have been from the letting agents or the apartment owner.

The gate that leads into the communal area shared by the apartments (and not otherwise accessible to anyone else) was supposed to be locked at all times, however it had been broken for many weeks leading up to the burglary.

Additionally there was no CCTV or other measures of security, and the police have advised him to move out ASAP as otherwise he will almost certainly suffer a second burglary.

I'm going to get this guy to leave work now and go home to read his contract to check if there's anything in there that can help him. However, in the meantime can any of you offer help or advice? Otherwise he's going to have to spend the next seven months sitting in an empty house in fear

Hey all,

Just wondering if anybody would be able to help me. Long story short, a lot of people in my company recently go made redundant due to restructuring. However, there was a number of cases of people being made redundant whose positions were not actually redundant - they were just using it as an excuse to remove these people from the company. In these cases the company quietly paid out extra to those people.

In my case, I was made redundant along with another girl from my department, leaving only one other person there. It seemed a little ridiculous to me that they left only one girl in this department when clearly the workload is far greater than one person can handle. In my job description, although my primary focus was recruitment, it also said that I should help out in day to day running of the HR department, but nonetheless I was made redundant.

I've now learned that they've hired a temp to help in the day to day running of HR, which seems to imply to me that my job wasn't in fact redundant but it was another case of the company quietly removing people that they didn't want/removing dead wood.

Can anybody give me advice on this situation? Do you know what my rights are? much appreciated all!

Ah, you win so much! Thank you! You have won allllll the prizes

"I am not a baby you butt!"

I'm trying to find this video I saw on the internet a few months back, it's of a little girl reading in front of her english class. She's about 5 or so, and some kid says "You can't read cos you're just a baby!" to which the little girl replied, " I am NOT a baby! I'm a woman!" and then proceeds to call him an asshole... IIRC... anybody know how I can find that video? I've tried searching for everything, it seems... anybody remember it?

Went to Glastonbury this year, it was absoluteellyyyy amazing. I wasn't expecting it to be as good as it was. It was my first music festival too... win!

Wondering what other music festivals in the UK are like it? It's gonna be hard to match up to glasto, but I'd like to go to another festival by the end of the year if possible... one with the same awesome hippy vibe...

And SnowBo: