10 WARNING SIGNS OF A SOCIOPATH

THE 10 DANGER SIGNS

Sociopath expert Dr Robert Hare has devised the following checklist to help people recognise sociopathic traits.  

1. SUPERFICIAL charm. Smooth, engaging and charming, a sociopath will never become tongue-tied or embarrassed.  

•Often compose poetry and fictitious stories where the lead character (assigned the sex of the writer) is the complete package.

2. OVER-INFLATED sense of self-worth. Sociopaths believe they are superior human beings.

•Feel they do no wrong. Often assigns blame for the negative aspects of their life on others. 

•They are easily paranoid and possessive if they believe they are in a relationship (belief could stem from simply chatting with the opposite sex on Facebook).

3. PRONE to boredom. They feel the need to be stimulated constantly.

•Leads to alcohol and drug abuse which takes a prominent place in their actual life and fictitious compositions. (Alcoholism runs hand in hand with ASPD).

4. PATHOLOGICAL liars. Sociopaths will be deceptive and dishonest.

• They will lie about all aspects of their life to become the individual they feel the person they are interested in using is looking for.  

• Social Networking sites such as Facebook are their main tool to perpetuate their schemes.

• They often look up past acquaintances and completely disregard their marital/relationship status (see #2).  They find it easier to re-initiate a friendship than to establish a new one.

5. MANIPULATIVE. They will say and do anything to deceive and cheat others. 

6. LACK of remorse. No sense of the suffering of their victims.

7. LIMITED range of feelings. Don’t expect them to express anything other than happiness or sadness. 

• Most frequently anger and arousal..  

8. CALLOUS. Cold, contemptuous, inconsiderate and tactless are apt words to describe them.

9. THEY live a parasitic lifestyle. Sociopaths are often financially dependent on others.

• The most severe has a history of numerous psychiatric hospitalizations.

• Unable to maintain gainful employment thus live of of the system- mental disability checks.

• They bounce between few friends and family be it siblings or aunts sponging their way through while wasting their disability payments on cigarettes, alcohol and drugs while spending most of their time cultivating their life if deceit.

10. THEY can’t control their behaviour. When challenged, sociopaths will appear irritable, annoyed and impatient.

• Due to their paranoia they are easily irritated when someone else figures them out or when someone refuses to provide what they demand.  

• This behavior leads to legal issues and incarceration due to stalking, assault/battery and resisting arrest. 

The signs are simple and easily discerned if the time is taken to look past their initial attempts to manipulate and deceive. In this day and age it is best to perform a background check to get an unbiased snap shot of the true life they live.  It doesn't cost much... in the end it will save you from a great deal of emotional and physical abuse as well as protect your finances and good name.  

Sociopath = Coward

You can enter a room and find ways to entertain the guests even though you rather avoid crowds. People are attracted to your sense of humor and charm. You are the life of the party and appear to have your act together. People would never guess that you are very insecure and fearful of rejection. You experience difficulties managing your strong feelings of frustration and anger. You enter relationships with persons that easily submit to your viewpoints and demonstrate blind allegiance. Isn’t a relationship where someone hangs to your every word, deed, a sustainable one? How long can a person demonstrate unconditional acceptance to each of your thoughts, feelings, and behaviors? Many with this personality type grew up in environments where emotional, physical, or sexual abuse was present. They were made to feel unworthy of the love of a parent and many times turned to drugs or alcohol to cope with feelings of rejection and insecurity. Like the nurturer/sabotager, the charmer/attacker attempted to find acceptance through peace-making behavior. Many times, he was not successful and found solace from friends, drugs, music, and other moral relative themes. He learned his social presentation from the media and social functions with peers. He found that drug usage helped to alleviate his feelings of insecurity and fear when with others.
Persons addicted to drugs or alcohol can possess many of the personality traits of the charmer/attacker. The charmer/attacker gains a sense of control by keeping relationships with others that unconditionally accepting his behavior. Many times, a nurturer/sabotager is attracted to this personality type due to charmer’s ability to utilize humor, and charm to present to the nurturer that he or she is needed and valued. This is not to say that the charmer/attacker does not need the nurturer. He is very compatible with someone that will avoid conflict and ensure harmony in the relationship. The charmer/attacker usually does not remain committed to one partner in a relationship. Due to drug abuse and/or the lack of substance in his relationship, he is easily lured to one-night stands and other high-risk activities. When these or any of his activities are challenged, he will become aggressive and threatening in attempts to regain control of the relationship. His feelings of insecurity and fear of rejection will be tapped, which will contribute to his pathological responses of projecting blame and making empty promises. His years of hurt and anger will surface in verbal, and physical attacks. He will use intimidation and abusive tactics to deal with relationship problems and force his partner to submit to his will. Initially, he may use his charm and make promises to change his behavior. As his credibility declines, he will revert to psychological and physical tactics to control the relationship. Domestic violence is a common theme in this relationship.
The charmer/attacker is a person that takes from the world to gratify his needs without considering the consequences of his actions. Many anti-social (sociopath) characteristics can be found in this personality type. The charmer wants to world to yield to his needs and performs contrived acts of love and respect to attract others to give him what he wants. He has not internalized the concepts of love, respect, and honesty due to his egocentric views and constant pursuit of self-gratification. Remember, as a child this person was rejected and had turned to other outlets for his needs. He never developed the concept of morality other than what he learned from morally relative themes. His destructive behavior usually continues until he suffers severe life consequences such as incarceration, or near death experiences. The charmer/attacker can be very skilled at presenting a caring and loving message to others but only does so to get what he wants. He may initially reciprocate positive virtuous behavior, but he will perform these virtues less and less as the relationship goes forward.
In relation to challenging his behaviors, once he realizes that he no longer intimidates and his antics such as creative writing attempts are no longer effective or being scrutinized and experiences the negative consequences to physical altercations, he will disappear altogether.  Many instances will find him sinking into a depression because he no longer has "complete" control over situations specifically those that bring the eye of public scrutiny on him.  Further implosion will follow in that close family relationships that he was fortunate to maintain such as with a sister (enabler) will be damaged and communication cut off.  He will remain in the background until such time he feels that the attention that his actions have brought has subsided.    He creates the issues and consequences and in some cases the individuals that are caught and hurt in his deceit, delusions and drive to satisfy only himself stand ready to once again expose him for who he actually is for the remainder of his life.  That is necessary when dealing with a sociopath and is his biggest fear.  The only way to safeguard others is to inform.  Backing down and "forgetting" is what he expects and anticipates so remove those words from your vocabulary while remembering that he is a coward that is dealing with childhood abuse by abusing and disregarding boundaries as an adult.  One reaps what one sows. 

SOCIOPATHS AND STALKING.

Paradoxically, sociopaths are egomaniacs without pride. Their shamelessness, lack of boundaries and hunger for control often leads them to relentlessly pursue individuals who don’t want them, and who repeatedly reject them. Normal human beings not only don’t desire to stalk others because they have boundaries, but also they would feel too deeply embarrassed and humiliated to continue pursuing individuals who have rejected them over and over again.

This common sense logic does NOT apply to sociopaths. In fact, like in the movie Fatal Attraction and many other films about disordered creepy individuals, sociopaths ESPECIALLY pursue those who don’t want them. Not only directly, through stalking and cyberstalking, but also indirectly, by manipulating other individuals under their control to stalk and harass the targets who have rejected them.

Being social predators driven by the need for power and control, sociopaths can’t take rejection. Like with any predatory behavior, observing, following and stalking the prey is part and parcel of what sociopaths do. Sometimes their harmful behavior is opportunistic, as is the case with serial killers who seize the moment–and their victims–without observing them for an extended period of time in advance. But very often sociopaths plan their actions cold-heartedly and methodically in advance: and not only as they pertain to violent crimes, but also as they pertain to getting anything they want: your money, your body, your heart and/or your life.

At the beginning of the relationship stalking behavior may seem romantic. It’s presented under the guise of not being able to be away from you; needing you all the time, wanting you. However, this constant attention masks the predator’s main intent: to control you and isolate you from others. Consequently, even in the most pleasant and blinding phase of a relationship with a sociopath–the honeymoon phase–dangerous individuals exhibit predatory behavior and traits.

After the victim ends a relationship with a sociopath, this behavior is likely to escalate into downright stalking. This happens for the reasons I have explained in previous articles:

1) sociopaths, being control-driven individuals, can’t take rejection

2) sociopaths, being control-driven, also don’t like to relinquish control over their targets

3) sociopaths, being control-driven, want to WIN. To them, winning means catching their targets into their spider’s nets and destroying them

4) sociopaths, being control-driven, want to exact vengeance and intimidate those who no longer worship them, want them, or obey them blindly.

Notice that the common denominator that explains sociopath behavior is the fact that sociopaths need to be IN CONTROL. They are principally motivated by the need to exercise power over others. Stalking behavior is a common strategy that sociopaths use to intimidate their non-compliant victims and an effort to punish them and regain control. For their victims, this is particularly difficult to deal with because stalking laws vary from state to state and because stalking–particularly cyberstalking–is very difficult to establish under the current laws. Generally speaking, one must establish a pattern of stalking as well as harmful intent and threat to safety: all from the same source/stalker. Since stalkers can be very stealthy and know how to erase their traces, reroute their IP address and easily get new email addresses, it’s not easy to take legal action against a sociopathic (cyber)stalker.

However, I’d advise victims to keep all the emails, texts, Facebook messages and wall posts, phone bills as evidence of (cyber)stalking and share it immediately with the authorities, their therapist, their friends and others. The more evidence is out there which pertains to the harassment, the better your chances become for taking effective legal action against the sociopath and even putting him in jail for his crime. Also I recommend exposing the sociopath by posting scans of the email and message transcripts along with their picture and outcome of criminal background searches with arrest history particularly that involve trespassing, cyberstalking, assault and battery(especially perpetrated on a female), resisting arrest, DWI's on appropriate web sites(cheaterville, playerblock, Jayden Hills) and forums as a warning to others. Any single or combination of the above offenses especially if they occur more than once indicates the sociopaths lack of respect for existing boundaries (legal and personal) plus the assault and resisting arrest is indicative of the "win at all costs mentality". Pay attention as well to any civil judgments, bankruptcy and employment history because the sociopath feels that everything is owed to them and most live a life proclaiming that they are the "victims" and will look to welfare system or disability as primary means of income while they live a nomadic lifestyle- moving from place to place.
As its been said, "the best defense is a good offense!" Expose the sociopath for what he is and utilize the legal system to put him in his place which is a nobody that will never have anything but a miserable life.