What makes you the expert in dealing with psychopaths?
After millions of years of evolving defenses against psychopaths, I think we are all experts. Some of us are better at expressing it. This book is based on my own life experience, and practice. When I realized there was a pattern to the damagingly eccentric people I’d come across, I could decode it, and explain it. I needed this book for myself.
Was this a hard book to write?
All my books take years to write. This one took less than some, and was easy to put together. Often, the material wrote itself. A solid theoretical model provides answers to questions. Once I had the "predator" model, questions like "how does Mallory hunt?" or "what emotions does Mallory feel?" were just a matter of working through the equations, so to speak.
Why the name "Mallory?"
I apologize to everyone called "Mallory." It’s a name used in computer security for an attacker. If someone breaks into your PC, that’s Mallory. If someone steals your on-line identity, that’s Mallory. The name works for male and female psychopaths.
The term is difficult… are there better terms?
All medical and criminal labels are loaded with the biases of their origins. "Psychopath" is the cleanest term yet it’s so strong that I can imagine being taken to court for calling someone this. I’ve used that term in the book title and text. Yet it often leads to rabbit hole discussions like "why not sociopath" or "such a diagnosis must come from a medical professional."
The French-Canadian author Isabelle Nazare-Aga[87] coined the term "manipulator," and writes in her 1997 book Les manipulateurs sont parmis nous:
Sympathetic, seductive, reserved, and yet tyrannic, manipulators use various means to get what they want. Moving softly, our closest — parents, partners, acquaintances, colleagues — manage to make us feel guilty, inadequate, and full of doubt. Who are these manipulators? How do they keep us in their grip? Are they aware of what they are doing? Are their victims responsible, in some measure? How do we protect ourselves from these emotional terrorists?
The French also use the term pervers narcissiques (narcissistic perversion), invented by Paul-Claude Racamier in 1986 or so. I’m not sure the "perversion" works as a model, it seems rooted in a moralistic notion of normality, where there are "good decent" people, and then there are "perverts" of different flavors.
I’ve used "bad actor" as a euphemism. That’s my way of identifying someone as a psychopath without invoking the arguments over terminology and qualifications. There are other terms we can plausibly use depending on context: "predator," "tyrant," "narcissist," "parasite," "cheat," "abuser," "bully," "professional liar," "con artist," and so on. However, my advice is to use "psychopath" consistently, unless you want to lighten the mood a little.
A lot of the material feels personal. Was this therapy?
It’s a story of therapy. I’d discovered a way to deal constructively with the specific psychopaths in my life, and wanted to teach this to others. The tools and advice I’d found online were a good start, yet not enough. I felt we were mostly blind to the real story. OK, so there is clinical data, lots of it. Yet the only answer I’d get for my question of "how do I deal with Mallory?" was "leave, now!" It is a frustrating and patronizing answer.
Why is the advice to leave not helpful?
Anyone in an abusive relationship is already trying to leave. It’s not through lack of will. The abusive bond has deep hooks into your psyche, and you can’t just rip them out. If you try, it causes real damage. I explain this in detail in Escape from Jonestown. You must extract those hooks one by one. That takes time and insight.
So can you summarize your approach in a few words?
Don’t run away. Stop reacting. Learn your enemy, then stand and fight. Remove those hooks, get your power back, and end the relationship on your own terms. It can be terrifying, yet the alternative is to carry long term damage with you.
It is like escaping a rip current, which is when the sea tries to drag you out and drown you. Rip currents aren’t large. Obviously the entire ocean isn’t moving, only little threads and swirls. However if you try to swim back to shore, you will die from exhaustion. Catch your breath, swim sideways, and in five minutes you’re safe on land.
It is the same when a psychopath attacks you, whether it’s early in the game, or late and the mask is long gone. Psychopaths start young, and work hard to improve their hunting technique. We social humans, we’re like mice, scurrying through the tiny corridors of our lives. We barely have time to react when the fangs and claws hit us. We get dragged out into the wild ocean. No-one can jump in to save us, even if they’re paying attention, which most people aren’t.
The hardest part is preventing panic, and avoiding an instinctive response. Instead, take a moment to tread water and think things through. Avoid the direct fight, and move sideways. Over time this becomes easier. The fight-or-flight adrenalin response does not go away, so you try to learn how to ignore it.
Can you fight a psychopath head-on? Or do you drown?
When a psychopath is trying to drag you down, the usual instinct is to not fight. We try to normalize the situation, to make it good again, and that is what makes it worse. That is the "swimming back to shore" behavior, and that’s how we drown. Fighting back is the "swimming sideways" behavior. It takes deliberate and conscious effort, yet it seems to be the safest way out.
This is hard. The predator behaviors evolved specifically to push our mental buttons. So it takes conscious effort, practice, and above all, working with other people. That’s our superpower: other people. Do not forget that, and do not make your life a personal struggle. Share your problems and answers, you’ll be surprised how much support you get, and how much you can learn.
When you fight back, doesn’t it make the psychopath act worse?
Sometimes, yet not always. Psychopaths operate outside the law, if not in deed then in spirit. They respect no higher authorities, only force. Remember the Ben Franklin effect, where you ask people for small favors and then they like you more. The flip side is that when we (including psychopaths) mistreat people, and they don’t fight back, we treat them even worse afterwards.
There is the risk of escalation and violence. This can be terrifying. I’m sure in some cases it can be fatally dangerous. Mostly though, the psychopath risks more than you do through escalation. A public fight attracts other people. It attracts authorities and investigations. All predators are vulnerable in similar ways: injury or exposure means they can’t hunt. In human terms, this means psychopaths have to stay hidden.
So psychopaths are afraid of being exposed?
Yes. All vampires have their fears. I’d say exposure is a psychopath’s greatest worry: "what proof do they have?" A solid file showing their history of breaking the rules and bullying people: this is sunlight and garlic. Psychopaths need secrecy and privacy to misbehave and get away with it, decade after decade.
When you realize you’re facing one or more psychopaths, collect evidence, slowly and carefully. This applies to all cases where psychopaths operate, from death squads and genocide to domestic abuse. Collect incontestable proof. Use such material cautiously, only when you need to and when you know it will have an effect. Exposure is a card you can play only once.