Mandel is every frustrating person to me. No, Howie, no. Everyone isn't like that.
I know what he's doing (Mandel doesn't know what he's doing, though, as such people usually don't). He doesn't want reality to be real. He's *not* going to hear Billy, no matter what.
Though he doesn't mean to, it's the Mandels of the world that pave the way for the psychopaths. He's an unwitting enabler.
Once in medical school I was studying in the public library (very nice, bright, crowded, middle of the day) when a man walked in with absurdly short shorts and sat down at a table near the table my study group was sitting at. A classmate wnd I shared a look and raised eyebrows at how weird it was and returned to our books.
A few minutes later I happened to look over at the man again and see him masturbating under the table. Penis fully visible.
I gasped after a moment of complete shock at realizing what I had seen. The pervert tucked himself away as I, without control of my voice yet, scribbled on a piece of paper to my classmate what I had seen. Of course the man is now pretending to be deep into his kinesiology book.
This classmate smirks at me and begins to explain to me that sometimes guys just have to adjust things, and he is sure I didn't see what I knew I had seen. Despite knowing exactly what I had seen, I was twice shaken by the bizarre display and my classmate's response, and I didn't report it at the time. Demerits for me!
I subsequently ejected this classmate from my life because nothing good can come from having a person like this in your life. They are either clueless about evil (explaining obviously anti social, pyschopathic behavior away) around them or complicit in it. Regardless of the reason, their counsel is worse than useless — it's often actively harmful.
The pervert? A few weeks later I saw his face (thankfully only that body part) in the local newspaper with the accompanying article about his arrest for indecent exposure.
You should be proud of yourself for ejecting her from your life. Once I realized my complicity, I evicted people from my life. If someone is tolerant of evil, they are going to create a zone of unreality around you and others. A gaslit zone where unacceptable, abusive behavior is somehow acceptable. My serenity is worth more than that.
It should be noted that just about all people are like this. They have zero moral compunction to falling in line with evil, whatever they might say otherwise. So one must exercise extreme care with interpersonal relations to avoid this situation. When people tell you who they are, believe them.
Can vouch for the assertion that psychopaths can be found in every demographic. A few years ago I had to struggle against a full-blown clinical psychopath who was an ordained monk in a religious sect. One of the hardest things I had to do. Had to endure years of gaslighting, psychological games, and being completely isolated in my community, which is to say, I came a hair's breadth from losing the battle.
Normal people like Howie Mandel can hardly conceive of how psychopaths operate. They're almost like a different species from another planet. Every assumption we make as humans to empathize with each other and predict why and how we will react in ethical situations is 100% non-applicable.
The fact that psychopaths go unrecognized, even after revealing themselves through their actions, simply from the denial and disbelief normies have because the truth is unimaginable, is a major advantage for psychopaths and gives them impunity and freedom.
Yes psychpaths and narcissism attract both condemnation and idealisation, and these can often appear to cancel each other out. I have written about a third face of narcissism, in addition to its perpetrator face and its performance face: its rescuer face. I wonder if this relates to your specific experience in the monastic community.
I didn't know him well, at least his past history or inner value system. And if I did, I would never trust the veracity of it anyway. I do know that he presented the abbot with some secret grave childhood trauma (real, invented or exaggerated I have no idea), which I understand is classic psychopath which self-justifies all their harmful actions, and the pitiful face he consistently presented to the abbot gave him an umbrella of protection and impunity, as if he were the weak, timorous victim in any conflict that arose from his abuses. I also know that he has a sister who appears to be a full-blown psychopath as well, so some family history. I did not see much "rescuer" behavior in the way he presented to other monks or laypeople. It seemed to be more purely machiavellian power based, presenting an angelic or pathetic face to those he perceived had power above him, and playing sadistic psychological games with anybody that he perceived vulnerable. He was very crafty in that all his behavior was well hidden so that every victim of his abuse thought they were the only target. He also always kept his sadistic games just under the limit of what might have been a reportable offense. It was only after years that other monks started to compare notes and realized he was doing the same thing to almost everybody. When I confronted him, he looked me right in the eye and lied (a grave offense for a monk) with an ease and facility for 20 minutes straight. It was chilling. When he saw I didn't buy a word of it, he boiled red with a rage I don't think I've ever seen in another person. Fortunately, that day the abbot finally realized what was what, and when the psycho saw that his protective umbrella vanished, he left the same day never to return.
Yes, 4 or 5 years. Because of the particular dynamics of the situation, especially that he appeared to have duped the abbot, it was very difficult to navigate. One thing that was incredibly impressive was how consistent he was. Never took a day off with his psychological warfare or the false faces he would present, and how alert he was to situational dynamics. He seemed hyper aware of who might be watching and never slipped up or let his mask drop, day after day, for years. That's why I'm somewhat forgiving of the abbot being duped, because if you're not aware of psychopaths or prepared for the possibility that they can switch on and maintain a false face so consistently and effortlessly to an inhuman degree that you think there's no way it can be false.
Yes they often target the most powerful person and work hard to get them onside. I yesterday posted an article on ‘splitting’ with an account similar to yours in a hospital situation which had tragic consequences.
Reading Mandel's denialist comments was excruciating. He's completely assimilated into the Hollywood bubble and wouldn't ever be able to objectively critique the system that has absolutely benefited him. He got expelled from my high school (before I went there) by pretending to be an industry official and made his break in Toronto comedy by playing someone who was kind of psychotic. These performers seem to embody some of the questionable characteristics of their roles while living under the protection of the Hollywood bubble. I can see how that life can recalibrates their moral compass to normalise the psychopathic behaviours that help them succeed.
Corgon seems to be an outlier in the industry who has his eyes wide open.
The other problem with psychopaths making it to "the top" is that they then attract the corresponding alphas, breed and continue to expand the dominance of psychopathy. When we hold up the typical achievements of the successful psychopaths as "good", when they are invariably all about the accumulation of power and wealth, then we contribute to the destruction of a properly functioning society. It is a dangerous and destructive feedback loop and when I look around at all the "successful" people I generally don't like what I see.
He was talking to one of those sociopaths, the type that is on the rise. They have enough money and popularity to remake/rebrand themselves as "authentic". However, they will rarely if ever tear into the rot, that is the industry they still belong to.
They are apologists, that have moved to a perceived "middle ground" in order to sway and capture the public on the right.
How many have you heard saying "oh look they're waking up, their getting it...XYZ star came out and said they're for Trump"?
Great, but they aren't saying that the system they belong to, is rotted and perverse to the core and should be ripped apart. They never will. This is akin to having a known tumor in your lungs, but the oncologist not talking about that, and they instead focus on the melanoma you have, on your hand.
Unless they've broken with the establishment entertainment machine, you shouldn't trust or support them. One over arching reason is the dollars you throw at them go into the larger machine, that is trying to destroy you.
And as an artist you are already somewhat on a psychopathic track. Being obsessive about one thing is unnatural. I'm like that a bit, plenty of people have called me a narcissist. Maybe I am. But I am not a psychopath because I have zero desire to control others and wish only the best for everyone. I think that's the difference. Corgan is a perfectionist in the studio he knows what it takes to get there and he's met those that also want to make it but lack empathy... he knows the difference.
I've definitely seen the narcissism in the music world. Still not sure if psychopaths are overrepresented among actual musicians, though. Both Dabrowski and Lobaczewski thought psychopaths lacked that kind of creative talent, usually.
Yes - but if we widen to include a narcissism-psychopathy spectrum, then we find a clear place for performance and creativity which is even represented in the dsm criteria for npd.
A woman I know tells me her husband is a controlling narcissist. He comes across as a very nice and helpful guy and involved parent. It’s so hard to wrap my brain around the guy I see and the guy she tells me about, but I believe her. I guess that’s the deal with psychopaths?
That's why Mitchell labeled that attribute group "the truth is hard to discern." They can present a perfectly normal persona to everyone they want to. I think it probably takes feedback from many people in order to be sure for oneself about someone, though. As V. wrote below, we also have to take into account that psychopaths will try to demonize someone completely normal.
We were socially engineered not to discern evil. Between relativism and taking the word evil out of the modern Bibles, we were forced to turn a blind eye, while also being engineered toward a culture of psychopathy. What do you think rewarding criminals and putting heroes behind bars does to a society trying to raise responsible children?
I would like to suggest that this section in your post could be reworded to make it less ambiguous.
“As Mitchell puts it, regular people may engage in some of the behaviors that psychopaths do, but the extent to which they do so and the quality of such actions are enough to push predatory attributes and tactics into a qualitatively different level.”
The ambiguity arises because of their is ambiguity of ‘pronoun reference’. I suggest you reword so it reads:
“As Mitchell puts it, regular people may engage in some of the behaviors that psychopaths do. But the extent to which psychopaths engage in those behaviours, and the quality of their actions, are enough to push predatory attributes and tactics into a qualitatively different level.”
Very engrossing interview. Couldn't take my eyes off the exchange...And anybody working in Mental Health knows it's as common among their own colleagues as it is in general society. Further, MOST people do not recognize the dynamics, nor do they have the experience or knowledge to define it when they do identify it instinctively.
Many times, in group settings, people respond to a concept, word or idea with puzzlement...As though truly vexed. Most times in situations as presented here in this interaction, people will pretend to understand with distortion or pretense. Rarely, some wish to understand and when seeking clarification to what is heard or observed, are met with a return to obscurity or a return to the mask; a persona used to hide behind by the pathological.
Quite fascinating about how so many pathological have become instinctively astute and present as charming, charismatic, witty and talented when in fact it's all a facade and the perpetrators are lost to such an extent they're clueless to know themselves even as well as Howey Mandel.
I don't think naivete is quite the right word...you were closer earlier talking about existing on different planes. As much as we all may be aware of Ted Bundy and his ilk, there is something inherent in us that stubbornly refuses to assimilate (absent personal experience). Pinpoint that trait, find a way to overcome it, and maybe we could get somewhere.
Given that successful people tend to be more on the psychopathic or sociopathic spectrum, they will naturally work their way to the top over people with less of the killer instinct. When that happens for years you will end up with only those types at the top of every business.
Thus, the prevalence of such darkness now running the planet as it did throughout millennia. It's not necessarily the cream rising to the top and if it is cream; it's gooey, rotted-fat Sour Cream.
Where can I read about how to deal with these kinds of people. I suspect a particular person of being a psychopath. Luckily in my life I have somehow avoided direct confrontation with these types. Probably because I am very aloof and in my own world? Maybe because I have kept to myself, anyway the point being I recently ended up in an environment where I swear this person picked up on a perceived weakness of mine and decided they wanted to attack every thing I said.
Any of my professional opinions, philosophical any opinion that I might have, they made a point to try and discredit to a ridiculous degree. I was shocked that someone would spend any kind of energy trying to harm someone who wasn’t a threat at all to their positional power.
Not until I read a few of your articles did I realize, this person is attacking me just because they are a predator and Im a prey and it isn’t anymore complex than that.
I try avoidance but my only concern is that if I directly engage, they might get irrational and hit the power button mid game. There are no saves in this game. Are all of these people at risk of terminating people who oppose them or is that uncommon? From what Im reading from you they don’t really stop and they are dedicated to the long game. I don’t really have time to be conducting war games given I work for a living and have to provide for dependents.
How do ordinary people successfully keep these people either defanged or away? I dont know if I can totally keep them away but how can I mitigate their destruction to me and by extension my family?
Mandel is every frustrating person to me. No, Howie, no. Everyone isn't like that.
I know what he's doing (Mandel doesn't know what he's doing, though, as such people usually don't). He doesn't want reality to be real. He's *not* going to hear Billy, no matter what.
Though he doesn't mean to, it's the Mandels of the world that pave the way for the psychopaths. He's an unwitting enabler.
Exactly!
Once in medical school I was studying in the public library (very nice, bright, crowded, middle of the day) when a man walked in with absurdly short shorts and sat down at a table near the table my study group was sitting at. A classmate wnd I shared a look and raised eyebrows at how weird it was and returned to our books.
A few minutes later I happened to look over at the man again and see him masturbating under the table. Penis fully visible.
I gasped after a moment of complete shock at realizing what I had seen. The pervert tucked himself away as I, without control of my voice yet, scribbled on a piece of paper to my classmate what I had seen. Of course the man is now pretending to be deep into his kinesiology book.
This classmate smirks at me and begins to explain to me that sometimes guys just have to adjust things, and he is sure I didn't see what I knew I had seen. Despite knowing exactly what I had seen, I was twice shaken by the bizarre display and my classmate's response, and I didn't report it at the time. Demerits for me!
I subsequently ejected this classmate from my life because nothing good can come from having a person like this in your life. They are either clueless about evil (explaining obviously anti social, pyschopathic behavior away) around them or complicit in it. Regardless of the reason, their counsel is worse than useless — it's often actively harmful.
The pervert? A few weeks later I saw his face (thankfully only that body part) in the local newspaper with the accompanying article about his arrest for indecent exposure.
You should be proud of yourself for ejecting her from your life. Once I realized my complicity, I evicted people from my life. If someone is tolerant of evil, they are going to create a zone of unreality around you and others. A gaslit zone where unacceptable, abusive behavior is somehow acceptable. My serenity is worth more than that.
Reminds me of the scamdemic. No one could believe anything other than that the authorities were so caring. Like Blair with Iraq.
Good Germans
https://open.substack.com/pub/thumbnailgreen/p/good-germans?r=nv8me&utm_medium=ios
It should be noted that just about all people are like this. They have zero moral compunction to falling in line with evil, whatever they might say otherwise. So one must exercise extreme care with interpersonal relations to avoid this situation. When people tell you who they are, believe them.
The chapter in RFK Jrs. new book about the history of bioweapons is a stark reminder of this.
He's jewish. He is projecting jewish behavior on to everyone.
Can vouch for the assertion that psychopaths can be found in every demographic. A few years ago I had to struggle against a full-blown clinical psychopath who was an ordained monk in a religious sect. One of the hardest things I had to do. Had to endure years of gaslighting, psychological games, and being completely isolated in my community, which is to say, I came a hair's breadth from losing the battle.
Normal people like Howie Mandel can hardly conceive of how psychopaths operate. They're almost like a different species from another planet. Every assumption we make as humans to empathize with each other and predict why and how we will react in ethical situations is 100% non-applicable.
The fact that psychopaths go unrecognized, even after revealing themselves through their actions, simply from the denial and disbelief normies have because the truth is unimaginable, is a major advantage for psychopaths and gives them impunity and freedom.
Yes psychpaths and narcissism attract both condemnation and idealisation, and these can often appear to cancel each other out. I have written about a third face of narcissism, in addition to its perpetrator face and its performance face: its rescuer face. I wonder if this relates to your specific experience in the monastic community.
I didn't know him well, at least his past history or inner value system. And if I did, I would never trust the veracity of it anyway. I do know that he presented the abbot with some secret grave childhood trauma (real, invented or exaggerated I have no idea), which I understand is classic psychopath which self-justifies all their harmful actions, and the pitiful face he consistently presented to the abbot gave him an umbrella of protection and impunity, as if he were the weak, timorous victim in any conflict that arose from his abuses. I also know that he has a sister who appears to be a full-blown psychopath as well, so some family history. I did not see much "rescuer" behavior in the way he presented to other monks or laypeople. It seemed to be more purely machiavellian power based, presenting an angelic or pathetic face to those he perceived had power above him, and playing sadistic psychological games with anybody that he perceived vulnerable. He was very crafty in that all his behavior was well hidden so that every victim of his abuse thought they were the only target. He also always kept his sadistic games just under the limit of what might have been a reportable offense. It was only after years that other monks started to compare notes and realized he was doing the same thing to almost everybody. When I confronted him, he looked me right in the eye and lied (a grave offense for a monk) with an ease and facility for 20 minutes straight. It was chilling. When he saw I didn't buy a word of it, he boiled red with a rage I don't think I've ever seen in another person. Fortunately, that day the abbot finally realized what was what, and when the psycho saw that his protective umbrella vanished, he left the same day never to return.
Wow - sounds like a nighmare that lasted a long time.
Yes, 4 or 5 years. Because of the particular dynamics of the situation, especially that he appeared to have duped the abbot, it was very difficult to navigate. One thing that was incredibly impressive was how consistent he was. Never took a day off with his psychological warfare or the false faces he would present, and how alert he was to situational dynamics. He seemed hyper aware of who might be watching and never slipped up or let his mask drop, day after day, for years. That's why I'm somewhat forgiving of the abbot being duped, because if you're not aware of psychopaths or prepared for the possibility that they can switch on and maintain a false face so consistently and effortlessly to an inhuman degree that you think there's no way it can be false.
Yes they often target the most powerful person and work hard to get them onside. I yesterday posted an article on ‘splitting’ with an account similar to yours in a hospital situation which had tragic consequences.
Reading Mandel's denialist comments was excruciating. He's completely assimilated into the Hollywood bubble and wouldn't ever be able to objectively critique the system that has absolutely benefited him. He got expelled from my high school (before I went there) by pretending to be an industry official and made his break in Toronto comedy by playing someone who was kind of psychotic. These performers seem to embody some of the questionable characteristics of their roles while living under the protection of the Hollywood bubble. I can see how that life can recalibrates their moral compass to normalise the psychopathic behaviours that help them succeed.
Corgon seems to be an outlier in the industry who has his eyes wide open.
The other problem with psychopaths making it to "the top" is that they then attract the corresponding alphas, breed and continue to expand the dominance of psychopathy. When we hold up the typical achievements of the successful psychopaths as "good", when they are invariably all about the accumulation of power and wealth, then we contribute to the destruction of a properly functioning society. It is a dangerous and destructive feedback loop and when I look around at all the "successful" people I generally don't like what I see.
“Flattening of reality” is a good term.
Another term is “sin leveling”.
As a Christian I have no problem with the word ‘sin’ — it’s biblical language, and it conveys the reality of evil in this fallen world.
These are so, so good. Thanks, Harrison. I'm going to adopt them with credit to you if that's OK. They should be in wider circulation.
Just a note that "sin leveling" is Barbara's (or wherever she might have gotten it).
Fine with me!
Well done to Corgan.
He was talking to one of those sociopaths, the type that is on the rise. They have enough money and popularity to remake/rebrand themselves as "authentic". However, they will rarely if ever tear into the rot, that is the industry they still belong to.
They are apologists, that have moved to a perceived "middle ground" in order to sway and capture the public on the right.
How many have you heard saying "oh look they're waking up, their getting it...XYZ star came out and said they're for Trump"?
Great, but they aren't saying that the system they belong to, is rotted and perverse to the core and should be ripped apart. They never will. This is akin to having a known tumor in your lungs, but the oncologist not talking about that, and they instead focus on the melanoma you have, on your hand.
Unless they've broken with the establishment entertainment machine, you shouldn't trust or support them. One over arching reason is the dollars you throw at them go into the larger machine, that is trying to destroy you.
And as an artist you are already somewhat on a psychopathic track. Being obsessive about one thing is unnatural. I'm like that a bit, plenty of people have called me a narcissist. Maybe I am. But I am not a psychopath because I have zero desire to control others and wish only the best for everyone. I think that's the difference. Corgan is a perfectionist in the studio he knows what it takes to get there and he's met those that also want to make it but lack empathy... he knows the difference.
I've definitely seen the narcissism in the music world. Still not sure if psychopaths are overrepresented among actual musicians, though. Both Dabrowski and Lobaczewski thought psychopaths lacked that kind of creative talent, usually.
Yes - but if we widen to include a narcissism-psychopathy spectrum, then we find a clear place for performance and creativity which is even represented in the dsm criteria for npd.
A woman I know tells me her husband is a controlling narcissist. He comes across as a very nice and helpful guy and involved parent. It’s so hard to wrap my brain around the guy I see and the guy she tells me about, but I believe her. I guess that’s the deal with psychopaths?
That's why Mitchell labeled that attribute group "the truth is hard to discern." They can present a perfectly normal persona to everyone they want to. I think it probably takes feedback from many people in order to be sure for oneself about someone, though. As V. wrote below, we also have to take into account that psychopaths will try to demonize someone completely normal.
Or she is a psychopath who is projecting.
I’ve considered that too. I keep them all at arms length. What is obvious to everyone is that the family is a mess.
She needs to get herself and her children away from him asap!
So stay on the sidelines and hope nobody gets killed, good strategy🙄
We were socially engineered not to discern evil. Between relativism and taking the word evil out of the modern Bibles, we were forced to turn a blind eye, while also being engineered toward a culture of psychopathy. What do you think rewarding criminals and putting heroes behind bars does to a society trying to raise responsible children?
Billy is a god amongst mere men.
Love live b0lly!
I would like to suggest that this section in your post could be reworded to make it less ambiguous.
“As Mitchell puts it, regular people may engage in some of the behaviors that psychopaths do, but the extent to which they do so and the quality of such actions are enough to push predatory attributes and tactics into a qualitatively different level.”
The ambiguity arises because of their is ambiguity of ‘pronoun reference’. I suggest you reword so it reads:
“As Mitchell puts it, regular people may engage in some of the behaviors that psychopaths do. But the extent to which psychopaths engage in those behaviours, and the quality of their actions, are enough to push predatory attributes and tactics into a qualitatively different level.”
Nice catch. Fixing now.
The ambiguity arises because of their is ambiguity of ‘pronoun reference’. I suggest you reword
Very engrossing interview. Couldn't take my eyes off the exchange...And anybody working in Mental Health knows it's as common among their own colleagues as it is in general society. Further, MOST people do not recognize the dynamics, nor do they have the experience or knowledge to define it when they do identify it instinctively.
Many times, in group settings, people respond to a concept, word or idea with puzzlement...As though truly vexed. Most times in situations as presented here in this interaction, people will pretend to understand with distortion or pretense. Rarely, some wish to understand and when seeking clarification to what is heard or observed, are met with a return to obscurity or a return to the mask; a persona used to hide behind by the pathological.
Quite fascinating about how so many pathological have become instinctively astute and present as charming, charismatic, witty and talented when in fact it's all a facade and the perpetrators are lost to such an extent they're clueless to know themselves even as well as Howey Mandel.
I don't think naivete is quite the right word...you were closer earlier talking about existing on different planes. As much as we all may be aware of Ted Bundy and his ilk, there is something inherent in us that stubbornly refuses to assimilate (absent personal experience). Pinpoint that trait, find a way to overcome it, and maybe we could get somewhere.
Given that successful people tend to be more on the psychopathic or sociopathic spectrum, they will naturally work their way to the top over people with less of the killer instinct. When that happens for years you will end up with only those types at the top of every business.
Thus, the prevalence of such darkness now running the planet as it did throughout millennia. It's not necessarily the cream rising to the top and if it is cream; it's gooey, rotted-fat Sour Cream.
I always say, the scum rises to the top rather than the cream.
Sure, you can tell who's who by the shoe prints on their heads. Metaphorically speaking of course, or maybe not.
It seems to me that we are talking about Bill Gat€s, €lon Musk, Klaus Schwab and the rest of the gang
Are we there yet? Ha, ha.
The World is a Vampire...
Perfection.
Where can I read about how to deal with these kinds of people. I suspect a particular person of being a psychopath. Luckily in my life I have somehow avoided direct confrontation with these types. Probably because I am very aloof and in my own world? Maybe because I have kept to myself, anyway the point being I recently ended up in an environment where I swear this person picked up on a perceived weakness of mine and decided they wanted to attack every thing I said.
Any of my professional opinions, philosophical any opinion that I might have, they made a point to try and discredit to a ridiculous degree. I was shocked that someone would spend any kind of energy trying to harm someone who wasn’t a threat at all to their positional power.
Not until I read a few of your articles did I realize, this person is attacking me just because they are a predator and Im a prey and it isn’t anymore complex than that.
I try avoidance but my only concern is that if I directly engage, they might get irrational and hit the power button mid game. There are no saves in this game. Are all of these people at risk of terminating people who oppose them or is that uncommon? From what Im reading from you they don’t really stop and they are dedicated to the long game. I don’t really have time to be conducting war games given I work for a living and have to provide for dependents.
How do ordinary people successfully keep these people either defanged or away? I dont know if I can totally keep them away but how can I mitigate their destruction to me and by extension my family?
Very well said. No, Howie: everyone's not the same.
The book "Snakes in Suits" takes apart the psychopaths you find in business.
Another useful phrase is Daniel Moynihan's "Defining deviancy down."