How psychopaths manipulate their victims
PDF Snakes in Suits—When Psychopaths Go to Work is a new book published by Dr. Robert Hare, the international expert on psychopaths, and Dr. Paul Babiak, an industrial-organizational psychologist. Although the book is primarily about psychopaths in the corporate world, it contains important information for anyone who is dealing with one of these predators.
Chapters 3 and 4 explain how psychopaths manipulate their victims, and it’s absolutely chilling.
Hare and Babiak describe a three-phase process psychopaths use in their parasitic approach to life. This isn’t a process psychopaths have to plan, they do it naturally. Here’s how it goes, according to the authors:
- First, they assess the value of individuals to their needs, and identify their psychological strengths and weaknesses.
- Second, they manipulate the individuals (now potential victims) by feeding them carefully crafted messages, while constantly using feedback from them to build and maintain control. Not only is this an effective approach to take with most people, it also allows psychopaths to talk their way around and out of any difficulty quickly and effectively if confronted or challenged.
- Third, they leave the drained and bewildered victims when they are bored or otherwise through with them.
Psychological game
As a result of the manipulation, the psychopath establishes a “psychopathic bond” with the victim. Here’s how Hare and Babiak summarize the manipulation:
The psychopath’s psychological game involves analyzing the individual’s expectations and desires, and then reflecting them in a psychological mask that is so convincing the person bonds with him or her. This bonding can take place very quickly, even during the space of one cross-country airplane ride. There are two payoffs: the psychopath wins the immediate game by gaining the person’s trust, and the victim, now in the grip of the psychopath’s power, will soon give up whatever the psychopath requests or demands.
If you’ve been victimized by a psychopath, you’re probably trying to figure out how it happened. Read Snakes in Suits, especially chapters 3 and 4.You’ll find your answers.
Lovefraud mention
Snakes in Suits includes a sidebar about Lovefraud.com in the chapter about personal self-defense. I greatly appreciate the reference.
Another note—although I draw on the work of Dr. Robert Hare in Lovefraud.com, I’ve chosen to use the term “sociopath” in place of his use of the word “psychopath.” The reason is that most people assume a psychopath is a deranged serial killer, which may prevent them from realizing that the spouse, relative or coworker who is making them miserable may have the personality disorder. My purpose is simply to enhance communication.
written by Donna Andersen • Permalink •
eb92044 says:
Yeah, let’s face it…THEY are evil, but we had to have some part in it…there is some flaw in us to have allowed them to manipulate us. We are all flawed; we are human, but we enabled them for a reason.
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Eva says:
eb, they manipulated us because they’re good at manipulation and because nobody is born knowing, are experiences in life which give us knowledge. If the experience really gave us a lesson and we lean it, the psychopathic experience is a positive one that teaches to be deeper in our reasoning (not to stop it in the appearances no matter how good they can appear) and to be good observers of human behaviours.
And they’re not evil, they’re unconscious people.
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eb92044 says:
Eva:
I did learn a big lesson; no doubt. It was a lesson I needed to learn and I think I am almost at a point where I am glad it happened.
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FightAnotherDay says:
In a recent e-mail. Jerkface is asking that he have EVEN more parenting time with Jr. due to the fact that summer vacation is coming, I will be getting more time (I am a teacher), and he is STILL unemployed.
He is also concerned that Jr. is not adjusting well to day care and doesn’t think it’s “fair” that Jr. gets to stay with me all summer, when I am on vacation, but Jr. has to stay in Day Care part time, while he has been unemployed for 6 months.
Please critique my response before I send it.
“Jerkface,
Adhering to the agreement is in Jr’s best interest. It is best that his schedule has consistency.
Additionally, it has been my experience that Jr. would rather stay home with me. This is clear from the way he cries and latches on to me during recent exchanges.
In addition, Jr. is benefiting from preschool. He is adjusting well and seems happy to be there. He is making friends and learning a lot.
FAD”
Thanks.
FAD
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candy says:
Enabling- urrrrrrrrm interesting. Yes I can say I enabled him. How? I trusted him, gave him money, a roof, car, job infact EVERYTHING because when he came to me he had nothing.
But I thought he’d fallen on hard times and I was trying to give him a ‘leg up’. I wanted to share what I had. I was brought up to share with those less fortunate and I get a lot of pleasure in helping those who need help. I really do not need anything in return, it just gives me a fuzzy feeling to help others.
Maybe I think that if ever I was on rock bottom someone would help me out of the well.
Problem with spath is that no matter how much we help them – it’s never enough. It’s all take, take, take and after a while our head wakes up to the fact that we have this huge haemorrhage of our finances and emotions which has to be stemmed before we ‘bleed’ to death.
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moveingon says:
Trimana, absolutely correct I enabled my spath by taking responsibility for everything, in the main because I couldn’t trust him even to post a letter (I found unposted mail in the garage). By taking responsibility for everything, (what did he have to worry about), the house and the children and when he got in a financial mess I stepped in and sorted it all out, while ‘he found himself’.
He is now in another huge financial mess and the new ‘current wife’ as he refers to her has provided him with a roof over his head, remortgaged a property etc, he just hides the rest. So she is now the enabler and she believes the most ridiculous lies because she wants to!!
Spaths do not like to be exposed, then the trouble really starts vindictive is their middle name. So I don’t do anything other than via the courts. I even sent bailiffs into the current wife’s property, no sign of the spath, he then claimed ‘harassment’ as a judge told him 5 times ‘No Mr X, its called enforcement’.
Despite owing tens of thousands of pounds he recently put a bank statement into court to prove he had paid child maintenance (first since July 2009), the bank statement showed he had spent £1,400 on rubbish in 1 day ..head in sand. I believe he spends vast sums of money to make himself feel better, play the ‘big I am’, whatever, his problem now.
I was an enabler, no longer, his problems are no longer mine (violent when confronted), the pity me ploys continue (no one cares, certainly not the courts). Its the ‘entitlement’, arrogance and sheer delusions that they ‘can’ and stuff everyone else.
The spath tries to rile me to get a reaction, that is when grey rock comes into play, also he has no control over my children or me and he does not like that. When the sh*t hits the fan, he’ll just move on again and find another ‘current OW’ to lie to. He cares for no one but himself, I care for my family and what few friends i have left and that is what I concentrate on, healing the mess and havoc he has caused.
FAD – my opinion, take out any ‘emotional stuff’ in emails, i.e. remove sentence 3&4, just facts, don’t give in any ins. A spath reading your email will then say ‘what proof do you have he cries at handover’, sucking you back in, further exchanges then follow.
Hope all are safe with the tornadoes and flooding, take care.
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candy says:
FAD – I agree with moveingon. The emotional stuff just give him ammunition to come back at you with. How about …..
‘Adhering to the (court) agreement is in Jr’s best interest.’
He really does not care about Jr (sorry) this is all about making YOU pay. He’s unemployed and bored so it gives him some drama to wind you up.
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moveingon says:
Eb – ignorance is bliss as they say. We are no longer ignorant, the spaths have opened our eyes to a whole different game which we didn’t even know existed.
We are less happy but hopefully not forever, certainly less trusting, but changed.
Our innocence of faith in our fellow man has diminished and the spath has left a stain which cannot be removed, we just live with it.
My take on this experience anyway. Hope all is well.
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eb92044 says:
moveingon:
All is well here. Getting ready to watch the big soccer match between Man U and Barcelona.
I know I am forever changed even if in a small way. I don’t want him to have that much power over me, but you put it in a good way when you said our innocence of faith in our fellow man has diminished. That without a doubt is true.
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skylar says:
Movingon and Candy,
you are so right about enabling. More than any other bad behavior, spath behavior literally REQUIRES an enabler.
An alcoholic or drug addict might be able to continue using without an enabler, but a spath can’t spath without being enabled. It’s almost the definition of spath: to be a parasite, which requires a host.
They look for the most responsible person they can find and that’s who they latch on to. Then they proceed to take away your power to do anything else BUT enable them.
It’s an interesting behavior because they could actually get more out of us by allowing us to keep our self worth, or continue to make our own lives better. Being the kind and empathetic people that we are, we would continue to share whatever we gain. But spaths don’t want that. They want us to focus ONLY on them and giving THEM what they need. They know that they are a bottomless, black hole that can never be filled and that can’t give back, which means that eventually we will run out of money, self-esteem, love, will to live – EVERYTHING and then they will detach themselves and go find a new host.
The will keep an eye on our broken corpse though, just in case there is still some life left in it. If they see it wiggle a bit, struggling to come back to life, they’ll jump right back to suck that last little bit of goody out of us.
FAD,
You need to put up a sign above your desk. It should say,
“”NO” is a complete sentence!” And call it your words to live by. Use the shortest possible reply to jerkspath.
“Adhering to the agreement is in Jr’s best interest.”
No emotion or explanation is required.
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candy says:
Wow Sky – Your third/forth paragraph is a novel/film in the making!
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moveingon says:
FAD – also remove ‘Jerkface’ from your email start (LOL), it is another in. If he cared about Jr he would make an application to court for additional access, listen to Candy, he is just winding you up, using Jr as the hook ..he will never stop until you stop responding. Spaths know every button to push, and yours is Jr.
He is a loser, lose him, he’ll move on to his next victim soon enough.
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skylar says:
Candy, LOL!
You mean a horror film right?
The title:
Return of the Parasite!
Actually parasite isn’t the proper word, there’s another word but I can’t remember it right now. It differentiates between a parasite that sucks and one that kills. Spaths are the latter type.
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moveingon says:
Too right Skylar, Candy we were too nice for our own good and it backfired on us spectacularly.
How spaths like a ‘drama’ especially if they can wade in and play the hero, in their deluded head anyway. My spath claimed in court in January that he was looking for the body of his nephew who had allegedly jumped off the Menaii bridge on December 28th 2010 and was therefore unable to pay child maintenance because he was distracted.
Judge to idiot ‘what has that got to do with this case’ ..pity me ploy ..I hasten to add he has never seen this 19 year old since he was a baby! Talk about any excuse …tried the same pity ploy 2 months later ..judge rolled her eyes ..and rather sarcastically said ‘Mr X, unfortunate, but irrelevant’! Any drama, to latch on to. I’m sure he was flying the helicopter with Prince William …who is stationed in Anglesey ..total t*sser as they all are!!
You have to laugh at our own stupidity sometimes, the stories we believed …cos we loved them and thought they cared!! Bunch of thieving, lying, bas*t**ds ..I have somewhat moved on ..I hope!
All the best.
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eb92044 says:
Of course we were too nice for them. That’s why they liked us. We gave them everything they wanted until they grew tired of us.
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superkid10 says:
i feel bad.
After 6 weeks NC, and starting to feel so much stronger, today for some unknown reason I called my SPATH.
We talked for 15 minutes. He said he was depressed because he lost his job. Talked about his job loss for 15 minutes. He said he realized he was stupid for sleeping with his bartender. Then he had to go, said he’d call me back. Six hours later he hasn’t called back.
This hurts.
It shouldn’t matter to me if he is a spath, a schizoid, a paranoid, or whatever. The truth is, he doesn’t love me back the way I need to be loved, and I’m only hurting myself by reaching out to him and wishing for something different.
Tears.
SK
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darwinsmom says:
Hmmm, I refuse to take all the blame of the enabling onto myself. I also refuse to think of myself as “too nice”. I want to be caring, loyal, supportive and helpful.
The only real mistake I made in my opinion was be caring, loyal, supportive and helpful based on a
- sudden glamouring of “poor clumsy guy with a golden heart” about someone I did not know (he did the glamouring, and the response was so strong I threw all caution in the wind)
- by letting him be his own reference, verbally and in body language
The belief in me that he was a good, but unfortunate guy was so strong in me at a too early stage that caused me to actively want to help him up again. Once that happened, I enabled him, but I cannot see how I could have stopped that. He was too skilled in manipulation to stop it from happening.
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eb92044 says:
Superkid:
Oh, SK…I know this feeling all too well. Six weeks is good; you were on a good path, but sometimes we need to get knocked down just one more time to realize they are just not into us. I did it over and over again. It would be the same type of exchange you just mentioned…I would contact him and he would be cordial and it may even turn into sexting or something, but then he would just drop out again. Or I would text and ask if he wanted to meet for a drink and he would say yes, but when the time came, he would say he couldn’t make it
It was all soooo disheartening. The last time we had contact over two months ago, he was the one to actually make contact, but it still never amounted to anything and then poof…nothing for two months. I refuse to contact him. It is obvious I am NOT a priority in his life. Did you ever hear that saying…stop making people a priority in your life when you are only an option in their life?
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darwinsmom says:
(((((((((((((superkid)))))))))))))))
I’m sorry you put yourself out there again to be hurt. I think you do know why you called him, but rather not say to yourself, because it went against your reasoning capacities.
You just had a high need for the illusion, you are addicted to… to hear his voice, to share life, to feel loved as he once faked convincingly.
Remember, you are addicted to the lovebombing bond, to the ocytocine cuddly feeling. And isn’t it perfectly human to want to feel loved and cuddly? You were only a human trying to reach out for a cuddle. Next time, please for your own sake, give yourself a good hug, or call a very good friend and meet up and give them a big hug. My best friend and I always hug intensely, even placing each other’s hands on our hearts to share human warmth.
Right now, that is what I’m doing with you…. holding you in my arms. It’s alright, you can cry on my shoulder. And then I lay my hand on your heart to ease its pain.
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eb92044 says:
That’s what it is…we so longingly want to recreate that bond we THINK we had, but we never really had anything. It was all fake, all a lie, but boy did it feel good. I still want it all very badly…that beautiful English accent, soft voice, his wonderful hugs, luscious kisses. I know they are spaths, but how can they fake it that well?? How? It always (falsely) made me want to believe there was SOMETHING there. I mean, how could he fake that? Then I realized it’s because he’s almost not human. Some demon that was just sent here to earth to hurt me.
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skylar says:
(((SuperKid)))
It DOES matter that he is a spath. I’ll tell you why: a spath does what he does with the specific intent to hurt you.
A normal person might not be in love with you, or might forget to call you, but they don’t gleefully plot and plan for your pain.
You know this already, but you forgot and you anthropomorphized him. You thought of him as human and treated him as such.
Find a way SK, to remind yourself that he is evil when you feel weak. Find a picture or a youtube video that you can play.
I like this one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vgQalXaIxs
Edit:
I’ve actually seen all those expressions on my spath brother’s face. It’s uncanny!
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moveingon says:
Darwinsmom – of course you are not to blame, 95% of the population or whatever it is, are not like this. Most people are caring, loyal and supportive, spaths suck you in, they spot us at a mile away. They play with our empathy, manipulate, how were any of us to know ..I have never met anyone so manipulative in my life and I married it!! I believed everything he told me, did not question for a moment, then I learnt and it took me years.
I did though enable, because once I have spoken my mind and he agreed to help, be truthful blah, blah, I expected change, it never happened. But still I persevered over and over again and let him get away with cr*p, until the point of no return.
All the best.
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eb92044 says:
skylar:
Love that video!
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moveingon says:
Superkid, you are a fish on a hook, he plays a while, reeling you in, gets bored, gives you slack, you get off the hook you swim away. Then you choose to go back, same bait, same hook, you bite, he reels you in again just to make sure you are still available.
You did so well at NC, Skylar is right.
Sorry if I sound harsh, he is not real, he said he’d phone he didn’t because he knew you would be sat there waiting, he is simply cruel.
All the best
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Notyours Anymore says:
Is it possible the spath said he’d call back, but actually forgot, because his priority list consists only of himself and thus anything else goes right in one ear and out the other?
I have several chronic health conditions. Toward the end of my hideous marriage to my spath, I would ask him to pick up prescription refills for me at the shopping center only a few blocks away (but too far for me to walk). He would agree, and then totally, completely forget, because anything other than getting through his work day, gaining status among his peers, and then getting drunk or high was simply nothing he could process. At least this taught me to call in my refills well in advance!
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darwinsmom says:
no, he didn’t forget… he just doesn’t care
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Hens says:
When I changed all my phone numbers it wasnt just to keep him from calling me, it was also to prevent me from waitng on a call that may or may not ever come.
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Eva says:
It is very probable he forgot it as they forget everything that doesn’t report them benefits. I think most of spaths are not evil incarnated, except few exceptions like Skylar’s spath for example, but unconscious, unempathetic people.
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Hens says:
He didnt forget. Not returning the call makes him feel powerful and in control.
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nolarn2bcop says:
Eva-I do think that some of them are evil too. Mine is just as evil as Sky’s I think. I call mine The Dark Triad. I’m sure that if he’d ever consider therapy, that would be a likely diagnosis for him.
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Eva says:
Ok Hens~
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Eva says:
Yes, they bad. They always do something bad even if it is to make a decapitation in order to kidnap the body.
By the way, i’m receiving a lot of spam selling me viagra, virus emails from an online shop that sells jewelry and invitations of girls that are viruses. Now i don’t know if the responsible of this is the burglar of bodies or the psychopathic T.
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superkid10 says:
You are all right.
I wanted to feel loved, noticed, matter to somebody. Bad choice.
He answered, reeled me in, and shit on me again.
The good news is I didn’t sleep with him. So, a small slip all things considered, I’m not going to beat myself up, just make better choices in the future. I should have come to LF first.
SK
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superkid10 says:
Sky I listen to that “thank you” song nearly every day. I will watch that video when other ears aren’t in the room. THX.
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superkid10 says:
EB,
Are you sure you don’t live in XXXX? I swear we’re sharing the same spath.
I would NEVER do to anybody what he does to me. It’s cruel.
Thank you, sister.
SK
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Hens says:
eva – do you know the generic name for viagra?
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Eva says:
Hens- nop, i don’t. But i can say the burglar of bodies due to his size dick + the years that don’t forgive….started needing a bit and i told him so…. Could be i traumatized him?
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Hens says:
MYCOXAFLOPIN
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Eva says:
Mi cosa fracasó/cayó/se chuchurrió?
La tengo floja.
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nolarn2bcop says:
Hens-that is freakin awesome!
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candy says:
(((((((((((((hens))))))))) how about ‘hyscoxadanglin’?
This made me think of something else that’s funny from my nursing days.
I was in a clinic and the doctor diagnosed this woman with the Andon Syndrome. Not wishing to appear dim I waited til she left the clinic and then I asked the doctor what it meant as I’d never heard of this condition.
He said nurse it’s called the Andon Sydrome cos she goes ON and On and On!!!
I still laugh about it to this day.
We had a German surgeon and one day in theatre he was performing surgery on a man’s penis and he needed tape ( I was a naive 18 year old) I passed him the 2 inch tape and he yelled (good God nurse, do you think that his man has a penis the size of a donkey?” OMG I still blush at the thought!
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nolarn2bcop says:
Candy-that O.R. surgery is hilarious!!! LOL
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candy says:
It sure was Nolarn:)
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Hens says:
oh my….
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moveingon says:
They forgot to call …hey ..they do it on purpose, they are manipulative, and care for no one other than themselves. They are a spath, could not careless, how anyone could conceive the ‘notion’ they forgot is totally deluded, all part of the game.
All the best
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trimama says:
Superkid? If it gives you any comfort, your having reached out to your spath prevented me from reaching out to mine.
Also…after six weeks of NC.
I wanted to text him, to pick him up, have wild sex and forget all the pain.
I wouldn’t be looking for anything more. There is no more.
I sat outside on the stoop and drank coffee and sobbed.
I had the phone in my hand.
And at one point, I scrolled through the numbers. But then stopped myself before I got to his.
If I had gotten that far, it would have been nothing to text.
And then the descent would have been rapid.
I feel your hurt for having reached out and offered him comfort…and his not even bothering to call you back.
It was huge for you to break NC. And then to have to hear of his having sex with yet another other woman.
I am so sorry.
He had no idea of the impact of your calling him.
He could not appreciate it. But we do.
We know how you struggled to keep NC. And how humiliated you now feel for having broken that only to hear more nutshit and to be treated so offhandedly.
We are here, SK.
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trimama says:
And MovingOn?
Yes, there is so much cruelty to these people. There is so much more than self-absorbed, manipulator operating here.
At one point, my ex was supposed to pay his half of the rent. And disappeared.
I had suspected there was another woman.
When I called him, it was her voice on his outgoing voice mail greeting.
I was devastated nonetheless.
I left a message asking how could he. And I was sobbing.
Do you know he played that message to her for entertainment?
There is so much more.
But that just confirms your point about the way they go out of their way to rub in the pain. It is not enough to cause hurt….they need to remind you of it.
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eb92044 says:
trimama:
I have thought that…I’ll just hook up with him and have the sex with no emotions that he had with me telling myself that I could do that now that I know there is nothing there anyway. I don’t think I could pull it off without the emotion at least in the long run.
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eb92044 says:
trimama:
I know that was devastating and he is CRUEL!
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trimama says:
I tried that, EB, the hooking up for the sex part.
It didn’t work for exactly the reasons you noted. There is just too much history and emotions there for it to be easy for us, as women.
Piece of cake for them.
And we are just not wired that way, at least in regard to them.
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