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 humour 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 colour-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.