# What to do with psychopaths? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 26, 2006, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373 "2006-05-26T21:17:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/41 "2006-05-29T02:33:00Z")
> [@don't ask](#): > > I realise that. The point I was making is that the three behaviours associated with serial killers are, as far as I know, only associated with serial killers not all sociopaths. The connection may not be sociopathy but related to sexual abuse as most serial killers have been victims of abuse. At a minimum serial killers have profound sexual identity problems which may not be true of all sociopaths. True. I guess one could say that serial killing is sociopathy taken to extremes. ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/42 "2006-05-29T03:00:38Z")
Yes, the Serial Killer Trifecta is bedwetting, fire starting, and cruelty to animals. Those people you never meet, the ones who kill person after person, tend to have met these three criteria during childhood. Bedwetting, starting fires, and torturing animals. Yup, that’s the big three. OH HOLY CRAP! I just realized that I grew up with someone like that! Wet the bed until he was at least 12? Check. As a young teen, he burned down a wooded lot inside the city limits, and as a pre-teen, he actually started a fire IN HIS MOTHER’S CLOSET? Check. Beat dogs and cats mercilessly for no real reason? Check. And, I just connected that with when his teenaged son died awhile back… nothing. Maybe he was in shock. Maybe he was being strong for his remaining family. But man, when we walked out of the hospital that night, you wouldn’t have known there was anything wrong. So, should I keep these nuggets to myself? Inform the local cops that hey, this guy seems to fit a pretty gnarly profile? Should I just forget about it and move to Iceland? Yeah, psychopaths – what to do? ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/43 "2006-05-29T04:35:52Z")
> [@Ducktail](#): > > The problem is, since this is a psychological problem, it is impossible to accurately predict a person’s actions. Therefore, locking them up on the basis of what they might do in the future is immoral. > > The best solution I could think of (in the time it took for this screen to load) is to only incarcerate people with psychopathic symptoms after they’ve committed a crime. It’s risky, yes, but it’s hard for me to imagine a worse fate than being locked up on the basis of circumstantial guesswork. This reply isn’t just to you, **Ducktail** , but to all of the posters who seem to share this view. I certainly strongly agree that locking someone up on the basis of what they _might_ do (with a low or medium probability, however one might figure such a thing) is horribly immoral and unjust. But what about when someone shows extremely strong inclinations to cause harm or even kill someone? Is there really **NO** way possible that we could find a moral or just (even if just legally “just”) way to physically restrain such a person in advance of their probable criminal action? At least in the case of mental illness? There certainly _should_ be! Let me provide context for my question: A couple of years ago, the mother of a friend of mine was horribly butchered (with an axe) by her own son (my friend’s brother). He was mentally ill (with schizophrenia but also possibly other mental illness co-factors). He had been hospitalized repeatedly for, among other reasons, threats of physical harm to others. However, these hospitalizations were brief, in part because there was insufficient insurance to pay for it but mostly because while incarcerated he was **forced** to take his medications and thereby improved significantly. Like too many other mentally ill people, however, when he got out of the hospital he stopped taking his meds and his dangerous illness came back to the fore. His mother was very frightened but neither the police nor the doctors had any legal or financial ability to forcibly return him to the hospital. And then he viciously murdered his mother! I contend that the immorality of letting this man loose was far greater than the immorality of incarcerating him (in a hospital setting, at least) in advance of the actual murder. What say you all? ---
**Author:** ![ambushed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@ambushed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ambushed)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/44 "2006-05-29T04:48:26Z")
> [@even sven](#): > > Madness doesn’t exist objectively- the difference between a psychological problem and normal behavoir is 100% defined by culture. So it’s hard to think of psychopaths as 100% pure evil, but rather as very poorly adapted for our culture. I just can’t accept that. At least a few forms of mental illness can be observed on fMRI devices, for example. And what about delusions, in which a person holds beliefs that are demonstrably, empirically false? Your position seems to be based on the (IMO discredited) notion of cultural relativism; cultural relativism on steroids, in fact. Have I misunderstood you? ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/45 "2006-05-29T06:02:05Z")
> [@ambushed](#): > > I just can’t accept that. At least a few forms of mental illness can be observed on fMRI devices, for example. And what about delusions, in which a person holds beliefs that are demonstrably, empirically false? > > Your position seems to be based on the (IMO discredited) notion of cultural relativism; cultural relativism on steroids, in fact. Have I misunderstood you? Mental differences can be observed, but not mental diseases. Everyone has their own set of quirks- a few compulsions here, a little depression there, a few unshakable but irrational beliefs. But these things arn’t considered problems until they interfere with you living a normal life- many symptoms in the DSM-IV are annotated with “to the point that it is disruptive”. And of course, what is disruptive varies from society to society. It’s not just mental issues, either. In the middle ages you could be signifigantly blind and it wouldn’t matter one whit- you don’t need to be able to see fine print to farm. Nowdays that same thing would render you pretty much unemployable and seriously hamper your ability to live independently. Conversely, in America today it’s not such a big deal to not be able to walk farther than a few blocks without difficulty. But in a culture where you have to walk a mile and back to fetch water several times daily, you would severely disabled. In a hunter gatherer culture, it wouldn’t matter what delusions you have as long as you can get food. Even in our own culture many valued members hold what some would call delusions. Some cultures consider people with certain disorders- like epilepsy- to have religious powers and these people live quite well as valued members. Modern society values the art of manic-depressives. Not much different. Note that I’m not talking about morality. It’s a common trope that people with thoughts like mine don’t see a difference between good and evil. That’s just not true. Obviously butchering people with axes is bad. I’m having trouble thinking of a society where being a psychopath is neautral. But it may be possible. And that makes me uncomfortable with the whole thing…I keep wondering what would happen if the chemicals running through my brain were declared inherently harmful and jail-worthy. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/46 "2006-05-29T08:07:36Z")
Is anyone else here mentally envisioning a kind of Voight-Kampff Test for Psychopathic Behaviour? I have this vision of people wanting groups of Blade Runners chasing Psychopaths all over the country, and… “retiring” them. I’m not sure I like that idea, but I like the idea of dangerous psychopaths in the community even less… ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/47 "2006-05-29T14:13:58Z")
A good book is “The Stranger Beside Me” by Ann Rule. To set the misconception straight, Ms. Rule got the contract to write this book BEFORE anyone was a suspect in the disappearances and murders of several young codes. She talks about how Ted Bundy fooled her into believing he was “normal.” She later saw the red flags, the biggest being that he never talked about his personal life and avoided all conversations about sex, girlfriends, etc. If someone is proven to be a serial killer, if they have killed more than once, if they are hiding bodies in the basement or in secluded areas to revisit them for sexual acts, there is only one solution: death. Serial killers do not stop killing; they are addicted to it. When Bundy escaped prison and went to Florida, he went on a killing spree, and fortunately was caught, jailed and executed. Even life without parole doesn’t stop a person from escaping and killing, or killing while in prison. We have to face facts: Some bodies just don’t deserve to live. ---
**Author:** ![Minotaurus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ee59a6/32.png) [@Minotaurus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Minotaurus)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/48 "2006-05-29T16:55:10Z")
smart psychopaths usually terrorizes their surroundings for years and they often have high positions in society the dumb one usually end up in prison ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2006, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/49 "2006-05-29T19:04:11Z")
> [@Malienation](#): > > Sociopathy is the newer, more preferred term for what used to be called psychopathy. Its full name is “sociopathic personality disorder”. Personality disorders are not like the other two classes of mental disorders, neurosis and psychosis (neurotics are unhappy, psychotics are delusional, in a nutshell). Sociopaths can be smart, but don’t have to be; they can be impulsive, but don’t have to be. They can understand the consequences of their actions, they just don’t care; rather, their unquenchable thirst for domination causes them to be very distructive in ways the average person finds baffling, e.g. torturing animals. Ones that are smart and not impulsive can be _very_ dangerous. They can also seem perfectly normal, even decent people because some are cunning enough to fake what they know society expects of them. Finally, they can be very good actors, largely because they have no emotions of their own “getting in the way.” For further reference, read **The Sociopath Next Door** , by **Martha Stout**. I _think_ you may describing my oh-so-lovely grandpa. He’s very good at reading people, can be incredibly charming, loves using his knowledge of human nature to hurt anybody at hand, knows perfectly well who and how to do it without dire consequences. Is there such a thing as “mild cases”? ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2006, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/50 "2006-05-30T12:26:01Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > I _think_ you may describing my oh-so-lovely grandpa. He’s very good at reading people, can be incredibly charming, loves using his knowledge of human nature to hurt anybody at hand, knows perfectly well who and how to do it without dire consequences. > > Is there such a thing as “mild cases”? Like all diseases, mental illness does have “mild cases.” I have bad ups and downs and mood swings, but not enough to qualify as bipolar. You write your grandpa knows “how to do it without dire consequences.” The worst type of sociopath thinks that he is too good to get caught and/or doesn’t care if he doesn’t get caught. [Robert Ressler](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=books&field-author-exact=Robert%20K.%20Ressler&rank=-relevance%2C%2Bavailability%2C-daterank/102-4852352-5969733), who started the FBI serial killers unit, has written two good books on the subject: “Whoever Fights Monsters” and “I Have Lived in the Monster.” He describes a first hand incident while interviewing serial killer Emil Kemp in prison that will make your head spin. Ressler grew up in the same neighborhood as serial killer John Wayne Gacy. He didn’t remember Gacy at all, but Gacy remembered him and described his house and some events in the neighborhood. ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2006, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/51 "2006-05-30T14:53:10Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > If someone is proven to be a serial killer, if they have killed more than once, if they are hiding bodies in the basement or in secluded areas to revisit them for sexual acts, there is only one solution: death. Serial killers do not stop killing; they are addicted to it. When Bundy escaped prison and went to Florida, he went on a killing spree, and fortunately was caught, jailed and executed. Even life without parole doesn’t stop a person from escaping and killing, or killing while in prison. We have to face facts: Some bodies just don’t deserve to live. The prison in which my husband works hasn’t had a murder in more than 25 years. They had an escape a couple of years ago, the first in more than a decade. Escapes are extremely rare, and the escapee is usually caught very quickly. The guy that escaped a few years ago walked away from a work detail and actually ended up calling the prison to come get him because he had nowhere to go. (None of his friends were willing to come pick him up.) The correction system has very careful classification systems which keep violent and dangerous offenders in tighter security (a serial killer will never be put out on a work detail outside the gates, for example.) If someone is uncontrollable or violent toward others while in prison, he can be put into SuperMax. My husband used to work in one of them, and I can state with confidence that it is 99.999% impossible to escape from one of those. That an inmate will kill in prison or escape is a statistically insignificant risk, and not, in my opinion, justification for executing them. Secondly, murderers are not always the most dangerous people in prison. Plenty of guys who are in for assault or theft are much more violent and unstable. Lastly, serial killers usually have a “victim type” that they target, such as prostitutes. They’re not likely to switch to another victim type (e.g adult males) simply because of scarcity. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2006, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/52 "2006-05-30T15:04:57Z")
It’s also been thirty years or more since Bundy’s killing spree, and almost thirty since his escape. A lot has changed since then, I would imagine. ---
**Author:** ![DysFUNKtional\_Duck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/53a042/32.png) [@DysFUNKtional\_Duck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DysFUNKtional_Duck)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2011, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/53 "2011-01-28T10:06:23Z")
Wow. This thread has got to be the most comical compilation of utter ignorance, since the ballots were collected and Bush was declared the president of the United States. ---
**Author:** ![fuzzypickles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/9d8465/32.png) [@fuzzypickles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fuzzypickles)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2011, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/54 "2011-01-28T14:54:55Z")
Psychopaths = very bad people. Zombie psychopaths = a clear sign of the End Times. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2011, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373/55 "2011-01-29T01:15:15Z")
While we have become more tolerant of zombie threads in recent months, opening an ancient thread simply to make a stupid and insulting comment is hardly going to promote a good debate, so I am closing this one. [/Modding] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-psychopaths/358373.md?page=2)