You're exactly right. And your post made me think of something else I noticed. Labeling people as mentally ill when people disagree with them or when they behave in a way that doesn't make sense to them. For instance, Putin must be mentally ill or have cancer in order to act this way. Someone who declares a war must be mentally ill because sane people don't kill. I recently brought a complaint against management. I received a link to the Employee Assistance Program (counseling) in response. I must be mentally ill or experiencing some emotional distress if I have a problem with management's actions. I'm not sure if this is done intentionally to discredit one's enemies or if they truly believe it. I find it fascinating though.
That sort of thing always fascinates me. Recently, I watched one of the last George Carlin specials that he did before he died, and he spoke about the true nature of humans. I hadn't seen this particular routine of his, but he said many of the things that I have stated about human nature. There is this need to pathologize everything, instead of seeing humans for what they are. People fool themselves into believing that they are somehow different or special. That they are just as terrified and murderous as they are calm and collected.
People do not like this reality at all, so they will do whatever they need to in order to distance themselves from that reality, and place any reminders of it into the "others" category.
I agree, to an extend it could be said that even the ancient greek philosopher Platon shares this dislike for this reality as in his sight of the world there is a ideal world (with undiluted ideas) and an non ideal world (holding a shadowy resemblance of the ideas) the latter being our world.
I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for your writings. They have given me a whole new perspective on psychopathy. I've learned that it's not what the news, movies, etc portray it as, and if I ever meet someone who is a psychopath, I probably wouldn't even know it unless they told me. There is no reason to be frightened. I've passed along the link to your posts to several people, who were also happy to learn more about it. I appreciate the effort you put into this!
Looking back, I think I may have known one. This person was pretty much always calm, never had strong reactions to things -- including when the person's dog went missing (ie, no sign of particular distress or grief) -- what psychologists call "flat affect". I'm guessing, from what Athena has described about her own interactions with neurotypicals, that this person didn't have much of what Athena calls a mask.
Maybe weak mask, maybe other conditions. Flat affect is a thing also for cluster A. But those also often tend towards oddities. And schizoids have their own coverts who perform for people around them while internally disowning that performance, but the mechanism is different. They have thinner skin that psychopaths.
I really appreciated this publication that talked both about psychological make-up of schizoids and therapeutic process with them and its hurdles - Treatment of schizoid personality: an analytic psychotherapy handbook by Zachary Wheeler
But psychopath is definitely a possibility and since you saw you know what other cues you picked on that I cannot gleam from what you shared here.
It's in line with the stats showing that people in general have a higher level of narcissism these days due to social media. People are tremendously important to themselves, and they don't realize that their attachments are so particularly obvious to some neurodivergent people that it makes them predictable, and kind of boring.
I'm so glad you wrote on this!! Thank you for covering this topic, you nailed it. I go on TikTok occasionally for wildlife rehab videos, art tutorials, etc (I realize I'm outing myself here), and the random videos I've had pop up on my 'for you page' a few times about YOUNG people with DID is shocking to me? AFAIK, you can't be diagnosed when you're young. Ofc they're all complete with background music and catchy costume changes of 'meet my alters.' But it's absolutely not trendy. It was cool to see you mention TS as well. I've been diagnosed and dealt with Tourette's since I was 6 (much longer than TikTok's been around lmao), and I was glad to see you point out the difference of tics because it's very true - I don't know why these things spread like wildfire, or why they think it's so cool (when tics make my life miserable a lot of the time), but I feel like the trend of it should be studied too.
I know there's genuine people on there (maybe not so much with DID, though that's hard to say; I'm more-so talking about TS here), though they get pretty lost in the mix of teenagers trying to look edgy with their darker-sided or animal alters (I've seen it, it's a little...shocking). It's honestly more than a little frustrating. It's a really good point you make about it being only a matter of time before TikTok gets ahold of psychopathy (tick tock, I guess). I guess I wish people knew that if they're going to make a "quirky", viral video about how cool it is (#psychopath #fyp), they're probably not a psychopath and probably way more like the confirmation-seeking young people in your inbox (which sounds really annoying).
I think that it is important to have different facets of the human condition talked about. This includes things like TS, BPD, autism, psychopathy, but it seems that as soon as one is decided on to put focus towards, it becomes a competition to see who it most affected.
Completely agree on the competition aspect. It's so very strange to me too. All I can come up with in my finite range of trying to understand such a bizarre method of clamoring for center stage is that perhaps because these illness-claiming people don't have a true understanding of how difficult it actually is to go through life on the daily with these conditions, maybe all they can see is the spotlight. But even that doesn't seem accurate at times. It's a perplexing puzzle, 100%.
I think that it is also because there is a distinct lack of identity. A lot of kids are not participating in things that allows them to see what they are capable of, to learn how to get through failure and learn how to utilize the lessons it has to teach, and what interests them. Without that they are going to be searching for who they are, and instead of doing the work, they adopt these things, and it provides them an ego stroke.
I believe it is creating a very different form of mental illness, and I don't think that it is being investigated well enough to pull them back out of it.
I agree with the lack of identity aspect. But separate from kids not participating in things as much, I think there was already a misaprehension that it's possible to know and to find out who you are in a vacuum. Now, introspection is great, some self knowledge can exist alone, but some people truly, bewilderingly, don't seem to realise that the more limited their life and experience, the less they will ever learn about who they are. The old snide remark of someone, say, 'going to India to find themselves' is just shorthand for a very real phenomenon that includes many kinds of experiences.
You might be right about this being a new mental illness. Or at the least a form of youthful cringe that people may choose to avoid once it has been spotlighted.
Well this claim to be special game is imho coming from a need to individualize and second attention seeking. Both are socio economical values in our day and age.
This is a bit of an eye opener. I'm not on Tic Toc so I had no idea. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised as it's just the latest version of glamourising mental illness here in our current culture of overdiagnosis. I can only hope it will run its course and settle, but I'm not that optimistic as I see the potential for social media to do a lot more harm in manifold ways before we collectively get a handle on it.
Thanks for linking the documentary, it was excellent despite its age. I had not seen such utterly authentic looking alter behaviours before, the first woman particularly. I do believe that DID is real because there are precedents in the less dramatic forms of dissociation that people experience in intense situations: an automatic ideal response to an emergency, hearing yourself moaning in pain or keening in grief as though it were somebody else, really 'losing it' and 'regressing' in your behaviour when badly pushed, intentionally adopting a stronger persona to deal with difficulties, it's not a stretch to see how this could become a pathology. The amnesia aspect after an alter has gone away is surprising but perhaps shouldn't be, as many of us have experienced hospital procedure medications that cause amnesia, so that someone's brain can create a similar temporary inability to lay down memories is understandable.
The teenage edgelords though, I dunno. They'll grow up I guess!
This world is a scary place for NTs. We are divided in many ways as a nation, there is a war in Europe that could possibly turn into the nuclear war we’ve been told about, the economy, etc, etc.
The teens posing on TikTok with their imagined disorders are just scared partially because they are believing everyone else’s bullshit. It is all posturing to look more intimidating than they really are. A vicious cycle.
It's scary alright and life is more complicated than it has ever been and if some of us adults are struggling no wonder the teenagers are heading off in loopy directions.
Humour me , Athena. NT children are severely affected if they happen to experience abuse in childhood. But how would psychopathic children deal with this? They won't be traumatized, sure. But will there be no negative effects on their well being?
“This is another diagnosis that is not common, and the most common presentations of it, such as fiddling with hair, eye blinking, nose twitching, eye darting, among many others.”
Hi Athena, I (F24) have a background in neuroscience and I find your writing fascinating. You seem to be one of the few individuals who describes psychopathy in a way that's scientifically tenable.
If you don't mind, I have an eclectic mix of questions. I'd really value your insights. I'll touch on relationship experience, but not from a self-indulgent, vitriolic headspace... I'm impartial now but genuinely love to know the truth/analyse human behaviour.
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1). We know that intelligent psychopaths use emotional language to get what they want. However, it still blows my mind that someone who experiences none of the 'nuanced, whimsical' emotions that neurotypicals do can even INTERPRET such language, let alone decide to use it all day in the absence of immediate goals.
I dated a (later diagnosed) psychopathic guy with an infallible mask (until it slipped) - he didn't just use evocative words when defending himself, but would say things like "I just think it's magical when...", "Hey, you - I feel like you just aren't connecting with me like before...", "the way this music resonates is just gorgeous, it sounds like exquisite..."... to the effect that he came across as far more emotionally aware than anyone I'd met. He didn't just reflect who I was back at myself, he actively tried to permeate my every pore with talk about 'our connection', how it made him feel, how I made him feel when I neglected him a little etc. Which, paired with his utter fearlessness, interior of steel and general magnetism, stood out as very appealing.
Unsurprisingly, I ended up going through utter hell with him and seeing his astounding lack of empathy/remorse/emotion. But, would you say it's common for a young psychopath whose goals involve social climbing, access to interesting partners etc. to get so good at speaking evocatively?
I'm normally great at reading people, but it took me months to see the eerie obvious - he could feel NONE of the emotional shades that he so skilfully described. Shattered my world view. It'd be like me actively placing myself amongst high-testosterone guys and speaking about competitiveness/pride/'the game' (emotions I'm aware of but don't really *feel*), pretending to be one of them.
But, I suspect maintaining a façade all day isn't taxing for psychopaths, just fun and natural... is this the case?
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2). Now, for a question about how psychopaths view people they do genuinely 'value' (albeit temporarily). In hindsight, I now see that this guy wasn't lying when he said I was his dream life partner/the most interesting girl he'd met. I think I stood out to him as a very rare, 'free' neurotypical, and *saved him from boredom* - I'm scientific, entrepreneurial, and see life as a game.
I see he 'loved' me in his own way, but in a way that I could never relate to - he never bonded in any way, so was able to just DETACH from me in the most nonchalant way possible. I'm wired to find special partners, connect with them and secure a future with them (common female biological urge). So, his ability to genuinely feel that I was 'incredibly rare' yet respond so neutrally to never seeing me again is mind-blowing to me.
I no longer care, but want to ensure I'm understanding psychopathy correctly. I assume that he viewed me like I'd view a beautiful gold sculpture that I needed to decorate a mansion. I could say words like "it's stunning, I've never seen anything like it", but if the mansion was suddenly seized from me (and the statue no longer useful/relevant), I'd forget about it and *not feel ANY emotion"*.
Is this how unaffected psychopaths are by the people they value the most?
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3). I've been reflecting a lot on the cognitive basis of anxiety/recurring panic. I assume you can't relate to it, but when neurotypicals fall into 'panic disorder', most of their problem is their recursive, inward-focused thinking concerning their own state. They feel panicky once (and experience weird anxiety symptoms such as scary dizziness), think something awful might be wrong with them, fear experiencing the same symptoms again, and *provoke them*.
Essentially, anxiety disorders are vicious cycles that emerge when you double-down on self-focused, fearful thinking. The fear of fear sustains them. I'm logical and self-aware, but I have to consciously 'avoid' hammering down on such unhelpful thinking to keep panic out of my life.
I assume you feel entirely immune to this sort of 'self-intensifying' catastrophic thinking concerning your own health?
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If you decide to answer these, thank you so much. I devour your content and share your worldview to an uncanny degree. What resonates with me the most about your character is how you actively 'create' net-positive social interactions to improve your life and others'. This is something that very few neurotypicals do, because they get wrapped up in the 'feeling' between them and whoever they're with and don't think to favourably 'mould' the situation. I'm a rare neurotypical ;)
When it comes to emotional language, we have been in the world of neurotypicals our entire lives, and understanding the appearance of different emotions becomes something that we must be skilled at. Once we can recognize the subtle nuances of each one. So long as the individual is eloquent in speech or prose, describing emotions or using them in conversation is not difficult for us. We will often use emotional language in speech with people as well. For instance, I might say:
"I love that".
or:
"That's my favorite"
Of course, there is no love as it isn't something that we can experience, and psychopaths don't have favorites. The choice of words is a blending technique that we utilize to fit into society. It is considered very strange to not have a favorite food, color, person, etc, so these are things that we will do.
As to the second question, I have actually written in detail about relationships with psychopaths. If you haven't read them, I will provide you with the links to them.
We enjoy people when they are present, we don't miss them when they are gone. You do not lack value, but when things are over there is nothing there for us to have any interest in interacting with that individual.
You are correct. Psychopaths are immune to the experiences that you describe. If there is a problem with my health, I will handle it to the best of my ability and not worry about it. If it is something that nothing can be done for, it is what it is. There is no reason to focus on anything other than the necessary steps to complete.
Thanks for the reply, Athena - this is all fascinating to me, coming from a neurotypical perspective. A lot of people are put off by these topics because there's an 'uncanny valley' phenomenon at play. It blows our minds to process the reality that psychopaths say these words - which stir up so much complex emotion in us - without feeling them.
But, it makes sense that it'd be possible. If I did not feel negative affect and had to 'blend in' with people interested in combat sports, I could quickly learn to say things like "the most euphoric part is when...", "I feel dejected when...". However, I still feel that this example falls short of being analogous, because I am able to experience a strong gamut of emotions (albeit not related to such pursuits). I know what 'dejected' feels like for me, so I can actually imagine someone gaining a similar feeling. So, the idea of a high-functioning psychopath gliding through life, glibly describing the most capricious of emotions that they will never feel in any context, is ... disconcerting and stunning.
And thank you. I've actually read all of your relationship-related posts. They're the best out there on the topic, showcasing the reality that a lot of the cruelty committed by psychopaths is merely driven by a lack of feeling, not any form of emotional sadism.
I have two more afterthoughts:
1). We know that *a degree* of neurodiversity enriches the group, and typically consider psychopathy as being very beneficial to the individual in terms of amassing resources etc. However, we also know that the psychopathic brain develops far more readily in individuals with male sex steroids, with the ratio of males to females being about 15:1.
In my opinion, being psychopathic is definitely beneficial to the male in the classic, Darwinian sense of the word. Getting access to premium food/shelter, being respected by others, gaining access to a large number of women... all fantastic for male genetic fitness.
However, the female has different interests - if a women is to have several children, it's beneficial for her to find a high-value male partner and settle down, bonding with him enough to feel incentivised to cater to him a bit and preserve her family unit. Do you feel that, in this sense, psychopathy may be beneficial to men but mainly disadvantageous to women (of course, speaking from this purely Darwinian perspective)?
I feel like even an intelligent psychopathic female would be more likely to end up fending for herself in 'the wild' - even if she benefitted from a lot of her traits (high status, feared by some males, access to food), she'd probably ultimately be in a poor position to raise her children well/propagate her genes. She'd be seen as competition by the strong males she went for, and not protected by them. And, this isn't taking into consideration the fact that she might outright leave her kids to fend for themselves.
I'd never go around promoting the theory that 'psychopathy is *evolutionarily* good for men and bad for women', as there are so many nuances. However, it seems like this may be an overarching truth... which is interesting, as the same can't be said for many other phenotypes.
2). As you'll be all too aware, lots of neurotypicals try to 'play games' with psychopaths, only to find that they can never 'make them stay/fall in love' because the psychopath doesn't care. I grasp that they're immune to petty emotional influence, and have a strikingly abundant mentality - even if someone is their perfect partner, they know they can move continent and find something similar within weeks (since they're looking to feel primitive reward, not the specific bittersweet emotions we neurotypicals seek from others and find so rarely).
But, this makes me curious - I feel like I have a fuzzy understanding of when (intelligent) psychopaths consider it in their interests to live normal lives versus chasing highs. I know quite a few high-functioning female psychopaths choose to be monogamous and settle down, but suspect that females' relatively lower obsession with sex plays a huge part in this.
Would you say it's reasonable to assume that a high-functioning male psychopath could think similarly 'realistically', finding a woman who provides him with enough mental stimulation and choosing to settle down with her (deciding to permanently stop sleeping around, just like he may have decided to *stop stealing as a kid*)? Or, would he be very likely to eventually cheat and abandon his family unit - considering his inherent biological interest in younger partners/diversity?
I suspect yes, because promiscuity is more ingrained than other impulsive behaviours that psychopaths do genuinely seem to leave behind (like stealing, reckless driving). I guess what I'm asking is, if you felt that sex with a range of different partners was the most 'interesting' experience possible for you, would you live the monogamous life you currently live?
Feel free to ignore these if they're too personal - thanks again for all your work!
No, psychopathy is quite beneficial for women. The ratio of male to female is unknown because psychopathy is not readily assessed in women, the notion of what it looks like in females is laughable, and ASPD is hugely overdiagnosed in men. Frankly, they have no idea what the ratio is because the researchers can't seem to critically think, and only research psychopathy in the prison population.
A female psychopath would just take a male psychopath as a mate. When we are dealing in the dominance hierarchy, women select their mates from the top of the heap. I have no trouble getting and retaining high value mates. Males do not see female psychopaths as competition. They see us as a preferential mate selection. The strong likes the strong, and see them as the best choice for passing along genes.
I know a male psychopath, and I have spoken to several that had good reason to suspect that they were. None of them found a bit of interest in sleeping around either. As self centered as this sounds, we see no point. We have already seen that anyone is within our reach.
It's much like having a ton of money. For a psychopath that is boring. There are no challenges in having a lot of money. Same thing for mate selection. Once you know there is no challenge, there is not a great deal of interest either. Sex is sex. It doesn't get more interesting just because the person is new. Anything that could be done with them, just as easily can be done with the top tier selected mate.
The idea of psychopaths being sexually promiscuous comes from Robert Hare. As he has done his level best to deliberately misunderstand and misrepresent psychopathy, that doesn't surprise me. The better version of the PCL-R (not a good version mind you, a better one than the slow moving train wreck that the PCL-R is) does not list this as a trait. Instead it says:
"An impersonal, trivial, and poorly integrated sex life."
This idea relies on the idea that a neurotypical sex life is "normal" and "healthy", and this is the measurement that he is using to compare. That doesn't make sense. I wouldn't use our version of a "healthy" or "normal" sex life and say that neurotypicals sex lives are clingy, obsessive, and codependent. You wouldn't measure apples against razor blades, and yet measuring us against NTs is standard operating procedure. We do not have the emotional noise when it comes to intimacy, the need to be touched, the oxytocin bonding, all of the things that are considered normal to you guys, we don't have. If you are looking at it through the perspective that those things have value, it is easy to use such negative words.
Instead of saying that there is a difference, instead we are pathologized, and assumptions are applied to us. The male psychopath that I know has been married for years, and has no interest in other people.
As I said, sex is sex. It does not magically improve because the person is new. Rather it is just work to be done when the person inevitably won't go away. Some psychopaths sleep around, but I don't think it is noteworthy compared to the hookup culture that is so prevalent now.
That is so interesting. I am not someone who even considers dominance hierarchy or choosing from the top of the heap, or that lower heap which is on my own level. I recognise it as a trend but it hasn't played out in my own life. What you say about sex is extraordinary, and yet so rational. That there is nothing you could do with X that you couldn't do with Y. Its all about the 'activities' and if they could be pleasurable in the moment. Remove the emotions and that's what's left. And yet, for NTs in the throes, the particularity of X would make similar activities with Y irrelevant and unwanted. The activities are secondary. The particularity and the desire for the person is all.
This is such a great way of describing it. When I find one of the rare people I can fall for (someone with a rare, abundant, logical view of life), I get swept up in a wild emergent experience that renders all other options boring.
But, I can see that for the psychopath - who will never experience this full-blown, all-encompassing experience of love - sex/doing anything with anyone is just another 'activity', as you describe.
This is mind-blowing for neurotypicals to imagine, and most will never understand it and call the psychopath 'callous' for his or her lack of interest in continuity/enmeshment. But it makes perfect sense to me. Dating people with psychopathic traits is not for the faint-of-heart, if you're neurotypical... but if you decide the cost-benefit ratio is worth it for you personally, I feel like you have to simply learn to view their 'quirks' impartially.
I always like to see reality as it is, and I consider understanding these interesting people as just another psychological challenge for myself!
I'm not sure that neurotypicals can't understand the psycopathic take on this, because the 'falling for and being swept up' etc is not the only type of NT sex and some of it IS just about the activities. Someone may have a kink that is most simply satisfied by paying a sex worker, say. And there is plenty of casual sex, hook ups, going out to 'pull', where the only requirements are finding the partner reasonably attractive (and sometimes not even that) and that some type of sex will occur. I think it would be more accurate to say that many NTs would find it hard to understand when that is someone's ONLY possible way of experiencing sex.
I can see dating someone with psycopathic traits working out if the partner is armed with all this information that we now have from Athena and from the few legit researchers. But without this information, well, here comes trouble. My own partner lacks some basic emotions entirely and is on the spectrum, and it took many years of misunderstanding each other terribly and lots of conflict, and a lot of reading and learning, before we were able to sort through it all and make it work.
Very interesting replies, thank you. I can see that a female psychopath could end up with a high-value mate if she plays her cards right and looks good too, for sure. Particularly if she finds a psychopathic male (which I'll elaborate on...)
However, I don't agree that strong men look for strong women in general. Such guys do look for *equivalently coveted female traits*, of course, but in the neurotypical world, these nearly always translate to things like attentiveness, agreeableness, etc... since these traits signal to him that she'll be a diligent mother and raise/educate his kids well. Top-of-the-hierarchy guys also tend to like other 'feminine' traits like spontaneity, playfulness... things that entertain him in a sensual way and distract him from his 'life mission'. Of course, he'll want her to be intelligent (since many genes pertaining to intellect are passed on from the mother), but he won't want a CEO or a high-profile scientist.
This is because the principle of comparative advantage is very apparent, when it comes to mate selection - think intelligent corporate guys... how many of them have wives with similar jobs (or who even had similar jobs before having kids)? A few, but probably around 10% of the large number that I know. Neurotypical guys very rarely want a woman who's truly intellectually matched to them.
They may say they do, but they don't like the reality...they don't want her to be busy, 'selfish' and in 'masculine mode' like him - which she inevitably will be, after the honeymoon phase. They virtually always prefer a woman who's a bit less intelligent than them, but still passionate about something ... and who will be a softer presence to come home to. Of course, the mimetic desire to have a woman who's 'their level of the hierarchy' can come into play, but they'll still prefer a committed teacher from a good family to a self-made, steel-disciplined female Elon Musk.
I'm just elaborating on this point because it's very prominent in the neurotypical world, and you might find it intriguing. Men who are neurotypical but very high-calibre/logical astoundingly rarely 'choose' a woman who is very driven and entrepreneurial/scientific/whatever *over* an equivalent (looks and general sense of humour etc.) who is going to be LESS focused on her mission and more on him/their family.
They want to bond with/protect a woman who they feel truly admires them, hence the differential needs to be present. This is why we neurotypicals have axioms like "you can't be cherished and respected at the same time", why countless ambitious women come to the supposed realisation that they need to "hone their feminine energy" to actually gain commitment from a worthy NT male.
I'm very open-minded, but life has confirmed this to me over and over again. Most NT guys see feisty, hyper-driven women as fun dating options - and probably 'respect' them more than the woman they eventually marry (in the same way they respect their male colleagues more) - but they'd never have their bonding instinct triggered by her. We NT females get a lot of bad rep for being more emotional than our male counterparts, but NT males are incredibly emotion driven too. Very few would make a 'logical decision' to marry a woman who didn't trigger that warm feeling/who they didn't feel respected them. Pride is a huge thing for them... an emotion I certainly can't say I feel.
However, I strongly suspect that what you are saying holds true for male psychopaths. The one I have had experience with was exactly as you describe - he wanted a genuinely strong, competent woman because he didn't have that 'urge' to protect or cherish a woman at all. So, in his mind, why not level up every possible trait... he actively wanted his 'life partner' to be level 10 in every way... level 10 beauty, but also level 10 intellect, level 10 ambition. This is why I fell so hard for this individual, as I'm naturally logical and will always prefer language, science and research to people (despite seeming like a normal woman in her 20s). He's the only case of an extremely intelligent, business-minded guy I've come across who's actively sought out a woman equal to him in all ways (not caring at all about softer feminine traits).
Very interesting indeed. And, thanks for clarifying that about promiscuity... I've always suspected that psychopaths can seem 'hypersexual' because sex is just another option for them and they don't tie their identity to their acts, but that they don't crave it more than the average person. That makes a lot of sense.
That's interesting about what you have found men to be attracted to. Of course, my experience is tainted by my experience. That is to say that what I see as normal to me is easily extrapolated to apply to the world at large. I am quite a strong individual, and tend to attract like minded people. However, as I consider that, I have to also acknowledge that I have attracted all types of mates, but the only ones that I give my time to are the strong ones. If I have a mate that does everything I want I get bored and annoyed with them quickly.
NeuroGirl is extremely perceptive and absolutely right in her judgement about 'what men want' and why. The experience of neurotypical women may be more representative than your particular experience and there is much to be learned from this.
Hope you dont mind my jumping in here. And I have no background in neuroscience. You are right that strong men don't necessarily look for strong women. I used to think that men who liked compliant, cowed women were weak, but then it turned out thay many apparently strong ones liked that too. It's a fantasy.
Yes men are emotionally driven, and pride is huge, often false pride.
My own partner used to look at movie characters of sexy strong women and say how much he liked that, and I just laughed and laughed.....yeah mate, sure.
I wish I had been as cluey as you in my own early 20s, and had such experience and wisdom.
Somehow I don't find it incomprehensible, I am not sure why. And yet I am similar to you, and am attracted to very few people, and it never happens quickly, I have to be around that person for a long time before it happens. But when it does, whether sexual or emotional, it's dreadfully intense and can be a problem.
It certainly makes for some interesting conversations with my partner. He has no conception of grief at all, and until a few years ago assumed it was a performance people put on to make themselves look good. The horror of losing a child by violence, which was topical recently, is not something he understands at all, just cognitively recognises it as a terrible injustice done to the child. His empathy is confined to the victim and he cannot understand the family feeling upset. Well!
The funny thing is that if those people really were psychopaths they'd not be so concerned with being psychopaths.
Quite true
You're exactly right. And your post made me think of something else I noticed. Labeling people as mentally ill when people disagree with them or when they behave in a way that doesn't make sense to them. For instance, Putin must be mentally ill or have cancer in order to act this way. Someone who declares a war must be mentally ill because sane people don't kill. I recently brought a complaint against management. I received a link to the Employee Assistance Program (counseling) in response. I must be mentally ill or experiencing some emotional distress if I have a problem with management's actions. I'm not sure if this is done intentionally to discredit one's enemies or if they truly believe it. I find it fascinating though.
That sort of thing always fascinates me. Recently, I watched one of the last George Carlin specials that he did before he died, and he spoke about the true nature of humans. I hadn't seen this particular routine of his, but he said many of the things that I have stated about human nature. There is this need to pathologize everything, instead of seeing humans for what they are. People fool themselves into believing that they are somehow different or special. That they are just as terrified and murderous as they are calm and collected.
People do not like this reality at all, so they will do whatever they need to in order to distance themselves from that reality, and place any reminders of it into the "others" category.
I agree, to an extend it could be said that even the ancient greek philosopher Platon shares this dislike for this reality as in his sight of the world there is a ideal world (with undiluted ideas) and an non ideal world (holding a shadowy resemblance of the ideas) the latter being our world.
Anyway thanks for your article.
Thank you for reading it, Lukas
I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for your writings. They have given me a whole new perspective on psychopathy. I've learned that it's not what the news, movies, etc portray it as, and if I ever meet someone who is a psychopath, I probably wouldn't even know it unless they told me. There is no reason to be frightened. I've passed along the link to your posts to several people, who were also happy to learn more about it. I appreciate the effort you put into this!
Thank you, Patty, I appreciate it.
Looking back, I think I may have known one. This person was pretty much always calm, never had strong reactions to things -- including when the person's dog went missing (ie, no sign of particular distress or grief) -- what psychologists call "flat affect". I'm guessing, from what Athena has described about her own interactions with neurotypicals, that this person didn't have much of what Athena calls a mask.
Quite true
Maybe weak mask, maybe other conditions. Flat affect is a thing also for cluster A. But those also often tend towards oddities. And schizoids have their own coverts who perform for people around them while internally disowning that performance, but the mechanism is different. They have thinner skin that psychopaths.
I really appreciated this publication that talked both about psychological make-up of schizoids and therapeutic process with them and its hurdles - Treatment of schizoid personality: an analytic psychotherapy handbook by Zachary Wheeler
But psychopath is definitely a possibility and since you saw you know what other cues you picked on that I cannot gleam from what you shared here.
It's in line with the stats showing that people in general have a higher level of narcissism these days due to social media. People are tremendously important to themselves, and they don't realize that their attachments are so particularly obvious to some neurodivergent people that it makes them predictable, and kind of boring.
Indeed true
I'm so glad you wrote on this!! Thank you for covering this topic, you nailed it. I go on TikTok occasionally for wildlife rehab videos, art tutorials, etc (I realize I'm outing myself here), and the random videos I've had pop up on my 'for you page' a few times about YOUNG people with DID is shocking to me? AFAIK, you can't be diagnosed when you're young. Ofc they're all complete with background music and catchy costume changes of 'meet my alters.' But it's absolutely not trendy. It was cool to see you mention TS as well. I've been diagnosed and dealt with Tourette's since I was 6 (much longer than TikTok's been around lmao), and I was glad to see you point out the difference of tics because it's very true - I don't know why these things spread like wildfire, or why they think it's so cool (when tics make my life miserable a lot of the time), but I feel like the trend of it should be studied too.
I know there's genuine people on there (maybe not so much with DID, though that's hard to say; I'm more-so talking about TS here), though they get pretty lost in the mix of teenagers trying to look edgy with their darker-sided or animal alters (I've seen it, it's a little...shocking). It's honestly more than a little frustrating. It's a really good point you make about it being only a matter of time before TikTok gets ahold of psychopathy (tick tock, I guess). I guess I wish people knew that if they're going to make a "quirky", viral video about how cool it is (#psychopath #fyp), they're probably not a psychopath and probably way more like the confirmation-seeking young people in your inbox (which sounds really annoying).
It is quite annoying for sure.
I think that it is important to have different facets of the human condition talked about. This includes things like TS, BPD, autism, psychopathy, but it seems that as soon as one is decided on to put focus towards, it becomes a competition to see who it most affected.
It's very strange to me.
Completely agree on the competition aspect. It's so very strange to me too. All I can come up with in my finite range of trying to understand such a bizarre method of clamoring for center stage is that perhaps because these illness-claiming people don't have a true understanding of how difficult it actually is to go through life on the daily with these conditions, maybe all they can see is the spotlight. But even that doesn't seem accurate at times. It's a perplexing puzzle, 100%.
I think that it is also because there is a distinct lack of identity. A lot of kids are not participating in things that allows them to see what they are capable of, to learn how to get through failure and learn how to utilize the lessons it has to teach, and what interests them. Without that they are going to be searching for who they are, and instead of doing the work, they adopt these things, and it provides them an ego stroke.
I believe it is creating a very different form of mental illness, and I don't think that it is being investigated well enough to pull them back out of it.
I agree with the lack of identity aspect. But separate from kids not participating in things as much, I think there was already a misaprehension that it's possible to know and to find out who you are in a vacuum. Now, introspection is great, some self knowledge can exist alone, but some people truly, bewilderingly, don't seem to realise that the more limited their life and experience, the less they will ever learn about who they are. The old snide remark of someone, say, 'going to India to find themselves' is just shorthand for a very real phenomenon that includes many kinds of experiences.
You might be right about this being a new mental illness. Or at the least a form of youthful cringe that people may choose to avoid once it has been spotlighted.
Agreed.
Good grief, music and costume changes? Too many years of everything being turned into 'entertainment'.
Well this claim to be special game is imho coming from a need to individualize and second attention seeking. Both are socio economical values in our day and age.
Yes, I agree
This is a bit of an eye opener. I'm not on Tic Toc so I had no idea. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised as it's just the latest version of glamourising mental illness here in our current culture of overdiagnosis. I can only hope it will run its course and settle, but I'm not that optimistic as I see the potential for social media to do a lot more harm in manifold ways before we collectively get a handle on it.
Thanks for linking the documentary, it was excellent despite its age. I had not seen such utterly authentic looking alter behaviours before, the first woman particularly. I do believe that DID is real because there are precedents in the less dramatic forms of dissociation that people experience in intense situations: an automatic ideal response to an emergency, hearing yourself moaning in pain or keening in grief as though it were somebody else, really 'losing it' and 'regressing' in your behaviour when badly pushed, intentionally adopting a stronger persona to deal with difficulties, it's not a stretch to see how this could become a pathology. The amnesia aspect after an alter has gone away is surprising but perhaps shouldn't be, as many of us have experienced hospital procedure medications that cause amnesia, so that someone's brain can create a similar temporary inability to lay down memories is understandable.
The teenage edgelords though, I dunno. They'll grow up I guess!
We can all certainly hope so.
This world is a scary place for NTs. We are divided in many ways as a nation, there is a war in Europe that could possibly turn into the nuclear war we’ve been told about, the economy, etc, etc.
The teens posing on TikTok with their imagined disorders are just scared partially because they are believing everyone else’s bullshit. It is all posturing to look more intimidating than they really are. A vicious cycle.
That is an interesting point.
It's scary alright and life is more complicated than it has ever been and if some of us adults are struggling no wonder the teenagers are heading off in loopy directions.
It will certainly have a long term impact on them I think.
Humour me , Athena. NT children are severely affected if they happen to experience abuse in childhood. But how would psychopathic children deal with this? They won't be traumatized, sure. But will there be no negative effects on their well being?
I actually plan on writing a piece about this. Would you mind waiting until I can write a more detailed explanation?
Take your time. I would love hearing a more detailed explanation.
Excellent
“This is another diagnosis that is not common, and the most common presentations of it, such as fiddling with hair, eye blinking, nose twitching, eye darting, among many others.”
- I don’t think this sentence makes sense.
I'm not sure how I could be more clear. Those are a list of common tics with Tourette's.
I mean grammatically.
Ah yes, I see what you mean. I will alter it.
Hi Athena, I (F24) have a background in neuroscience and I find your writing fascinating. You seem to be one of the few individuals who describes psychopathy in a way that's scientifically tenable.
If you don't mind, I have an eclectic mix of questions. I'd really value your insights. I'll touch on relationship experience, but not from a self-indulgent, vitriolic headspace... I'm impartial now but genuinely love to know the truth/analyse human behaviour.
---
1). We know that intelligent psychopaths use emotional language to get what they want. However, it still blows my mind that someone who experiences none of the 'nuanced, whimsical' emotions that neurotypicals do can even INTERPRET such language, let alone decide to use it all day in the absence of immediate goals.
I dated a (later diagnosed) psychopathic guy with an infallible mask (until it slipped) - he didn't just use evocative words when defending himself, but would say things like "I just think it's magical when...", "Hey, you - I feel like you just aren't connecting with me like before...", "the way this music resonates is just gorgeous, it sounds like exquisite..."... to the effect that he came across as far more emotionally aware than anyone I'd met. He didn't just reflect who I was back at myself, he actively tried to permeate my every pore with talk about 'our connection', how it made him feel, how I made him feel when I neglected him a little etc. Which, paired with his utter fearlessness, interior of steel and general magnetism, stood out as very appealing.
Unsurprisingly, I ended up going through utter hell with him and seeing his astounding lack of empathy/remorse/emotion. But, would you say it's common for a young psychopath whose goals involve social climbing, access to interesting partners etc. to get so good at speaking evocatively?
I'm normally great at reading people, but it took me months to see the eerie obvious - he could feel NONE of the emotional shades that he so skilfully described. Shattered my world view. It'd be like me actively placing myself amongst high-testosterone guys and speaking about competitiveness/pride/'the game' (emotions I'm aware of but don't really *feel*), pretending to be one of them.
But, I suspect maintaining a façade all day isn't taxing for psychopaths, just fun and natural... is this the case?
---
2). Now, for a question about how psychopaths view people they do genuinely 'value' (albeit temporarily). In hindsight, I now see that this guy wasn't lying when he said I was his dream life partner/the most interesting girl he'd met. I think I stood out to him as a very rare, 'free' neurotypical, and *saved him from boredom* - I'm scientific, entrepreneurial, and see life as a game.
I see he 'loved' me in his own way, but in a way that I could never relate to - he never bonded in any way, so was able to just DETACH from me in the most nonchalant way possible. I'm wired to find special partners, connect with them and secure a future with them (common female biological urge). So, his ability to genuinely feel that I was 'incredibly rare' yet respond so neutrally to never seeing me again is mind-blowing to me.
I no longer care, but want to ensure I'm understanding psychopathy correctly. I assume that he viewed me like I'd view a beautiful gold sculpture that I needed to decorate a mansion. I could say words like "it's stunning, I've never seen anything like it", but if the mansion was suddenly seized from me (and the statue no longer useful/relevant), I'd forget about it and *not feel ANY emotion"*.
Is this how unaffected psychopaths are by the people they value the most?
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3). I've been reflecting a lot on the cognitive basis of anxiety/recurring panic. I assume you can't relate to it, but when neurotypicals fall into 'panic disorder', most of their problem is their recursive, inward-focused thinking concerning their own state. They feel panicky once (and experience weird anxiety symptoms such as scary dizziness), think something awful might be wrong with them, fear experiencing the same symptoms again, and *provoke them*.
Essentially, anxiety disorders are vicious cycles that emerge when you double-down on self-focused, fearful thinking. The fear of fear sustains them. I'm logical and self-aware, but I have to consciously 'avoid' hammering down on such unhelpful thinking to keep panic out of my life.
I assume you feel entirely immune to this sort of 'self-intensifying' catastrophic thinking concerning your own health?
---
If you decide to answer these, thank you so much. I devour your content and share your worldview to an uncanny degree. What resonates with me the most about your character is how you actively 'create' net-positive social interactions to improve your life and others'. This is something that very few neurotypicals do, because they get wrapped up in the 'feeling' between them and whoever they're with and don't think to favourably 'mould' the situation. I'm a rare neurotypical ;)
Best wishes from the UK!
When it comes to emotional language, we have been in the world of neurotypicals our entire lives, and understanding the appearance of different emotions becomes something that we must be skilled at. Once we can recognize the subtle nuances of each one. So long as the individual is eloquent in speech or prose, describing emotions or using them in conversation is not difficult for us. We will often use emotional language in speech with people as well. For instance, I might say:
"I love that".
or:
"That's my favorite"
Of course, there is no love as it isn't something that we can experience, and psychopaths don't have favorites. The choice of words is a blending technique that we utilize to fit into society. It is considered very strange to not have a favorite food, color, person, etc, so these are things that we will do.
As to the second question, I have actually written in detail about relationships with psychopaths. If you haven't read them, I will provide you with the links to them.
Psychopaths and love:
https://athenawalker.substack.com/p/psychopathy-and-love
Also, a five part series speaking about what relationships are like for psychopaths:
Attraction:
https://athenawalker.substack.com/p/attraction
Psychopaths perspective:
https://athenawalker.substack.com/p/relationships-from-a-psychopathic
Living with a psychopath:
https://athenawalker.substack.com/p/living-with-a-psychopath
Sex:
https://athenawalker.substack.com/p/lets-talk-about-sex
The end of the relationship:
https://athenawalker.substack.com/p/its-over
We enjoy people when they are present, we don't miss them when they are gone. You do not lack value, but when things are over there is nothing there for us to have any interest in interacting with that individual.
You are correct. Psychopaths are immune to the experiences that you describe. If there is a problem with my health, I will handle it to the best of my ability and not worry about it. If it is something that nothing can be done for, it is what it is. There is no reason to focus on anything other than the necessary steps to complete.
Thanks for the reply, Athena - this is all fascinating to me, coming from a neurotypical perspective. A lot of people are put off by these topics because there's an 'uncanny valley' phenomenon at play. It blows our minds to process the reality that psychopaths say these words - which stir up so much complex emotion in us - without feeling them.
But, it makes sense that it'd be possible. If I did not feel negative affect and had to 'blend in' with people interested in combat sports, I could quickly learn to say things like "the most euphoric part is when...", "I feel dejected when...". However, I still feel that this example falls short of being analogous, because I am able to experience a strong gamut of emotions (albeit not related to such pursuits). I know what 'dejected' feels like for me, so I can actually imagine someone gaining a similar feeling. So, the idea of a high-functioning psychopath gliding through life, glibly describing the most capricious of emotions that they will never feel in any context, is ... disconcerting and stunning.
And thank you. I've actually read all of your relationship-related posts. They're the best out there on the topic, showcasing the reality that a lot of the cruelty committed by psychopaths is merely driven by a lack of feeling, not any form of emotional sadism.
I have two more afterthoughts:
1). We know that *a degree* of neurodiversity enriches the group, and typically consider psychopathy as being very beneficial to the individual in terms of amassing resources etc. However, we also know that the psychopathic brain develops far more readily in individuals with male sex steroids, with the ratio of males to females being about 15:1.
In my opinion, being psychopathic is definitely beneficial to the male in the classic, Darwinian sense of the word. Getting access to premium food/shelter, being respected by others, gaining access to a large number of women... all fantastic for male genetic fitness.
However, the female has different interests - if a women is to have several children, it's beneficial for her to find a high-value male partner and settle down, bonding with him enough to feel incentivised to cater to him a bit and preserve her family unit. Do you feel that, in this sense, psychopathy may be beneficial to men but mainly disadvantageous to women (of course, speaking from this purely Darwinian perspective)?
I feel like even an intelligent psychopathic female would be more likely to end up fending for herself in 'the wild' - even if she benefitted from a lot of her traits (high status, feared by some males, access to food), she'd probably ultimately be in a poor position to raise her children well/propagate her genes. She'd be seen as competition by the strong males she went for, and not protected by them. And, this isn't taking into consideration the fact that she might outright leave her kids to fend for themselves.
I'd never go around promoting the theory that 'psychopathy is *evolutionarily* good for men and bad for women', as there are so many nuances. However, it seems like this may be an overarching truth... which is interesting, as the same can't be said for many other phenotypes.
2). As you'll be all too aware, lots of neurotypicals try to 'play games' with psychopaths, only to find that they can never 'make them stay/fall in love' because the psychopath doesn't care. I grasp that they're immune to petty emotional influence, and have a strikingly abundant mentality - even if someone is their perfect partner, they know they can move continent and find something similar within weeks (since they're looking to feel primitive reward, not the specific bittersweet emotions we neurotypicals seek from others and find so rarely).
But, this makes me curious - I feel like I have a fuzzy understanding of when (intelligent) psychopaths consider it in their interests to live normal lives versus chasing highs. I know quite a few high-functioning female psychopaths choose to be monogamous and settle down, but suspect that females' relatively lower obsession with sex plays a huge part in this.
Would you say it's reasonable to assume that a high-functioning male psychopath could think similarly 'realistically', finding a woman who provides him with enough mental stimulation and choosing to settle down with her (deciding to permanently stop sleeping around, just like he may have decided to *stop stealing as a kid*)? Or, would he be very likely to eventually cheat and abandon his family unit - considering his inherent biological interest in younger partners/diversity?
I suspect yes, because promiscuity is more ingrained than other impulsive behaviours that psychopaths do genuinely seem to leave behind (like stealing, reckless driving). I guess what I'm asking is, if you felt that sex with a range of different partners was the most 'interesting' experience possible for you, would you live the monogamous life you currently live?
Feel free to ignore these if they're too personal - thanks again for all your work!
No, psychopathy is quite beneficial for women. The ratio of male to female is unknown because psychopathy is not readily assessed in women, the notion of what it looks like in females is laughable, and ASPD is hugely overdiagnosed in men. Frankly, they have no idea what the ratio is because the researchers can't seem to critically think, and only research psychopathy in the prison population.
A female psychopath would just take a male psychopath as a mate. When we are dealing in the dominance hierarchy, women select their mates from the top of the heap. I have no trouble getting and retaining high value mates. Males do not see female psychopaths as competition. They see us as a preferential mate selection. The strong likes the strong, and see them as the best choice for passing along genes.
I know a male psychopath, and I have spoken to several that had good reason to suspect that they were. None of them found a bit of interest in sleeping around either. As self centered as this sounds, we see no point. We have already seen that anyone is within our reach.
It's much like having a ton of money. For a psychopath that is boring. There are no challenges in having a lot of money. Same thing for mate selection. Once you know there is no challenge, there is not a great deal of interest either. Sex is sex. It doesn't get more interesting just because the person is new. Anything that could be done with them, just as easily can be done with the top tier selected mate.
The idea of psychopaths being sexually promiscuous comes from Robert Hare. As he has done his level best to deliberately misunderstand and misrepresent psychopathy, that doesn't surprise me. The better version of the PCL-R (not a good version mind you, a better one than the slow moving train wreck that the PCL-R is) does not list this as a trait. Instead it says:
"An impersonal, trivial, and poorly integrated sex life."
This idea relies on the idea that a neurotypical sex life is "normal" and "healthy", and this is the measurement that he is using to compare. That doesn't make sense. I wouldn't use our version of a "healthy" or "normal" sex life and say that neurotypicals sex lives are clingy, obsessive, and codependent. You wouldn't measure apples against razor blades, and yet measuring us against NTs is standard operating procedure. We do not have the emotional noise when it comes to intimacy, the need to be touched, the oxytocin bonding, all of the things that are considered normal to you guys, we don't have. If you are looking at it through the perspective that those things have value, it is easy to use such negative words.
Instead of saying that there is a difference, instead we are pathologized, and assumptions are applied to us. The male psychopath that I know has been married for years, and has no interest in other people.
As I said, sex is sex. It does not magically improve because the person is new. Rather it is just work to be done when the person inevitably won't go away. Some psychopaths sleep around, but I don't think it is noteworthy compared to the hookup culture that is so prevalent now.
That is so interesting. I am not someone who even considers dominance hierarchy or choosing from the top of the heap, or that lower heap which is on my own level. I recognise it as a trend but it hasn't played out in my own life. What you say about sex is extraordinary, and yet so rational. That there is nothing you could do with X that you couldn't do with Y. Its all about the 'activities' and if they could be pleasurable in the moment. Remove the emotions and that's what's left. And yet, for NTs in the throes, the particularity of X would make similar activities with Y irrelevant and unwanted. The activities are secondary. The particularity and the desire for the person is all.
This is such a great way of describing it. When I find one of the rare people I can fall for (someone with a rare, abundant, logical view of life), I get swept up in a wild emergent experience that renders all other options boring.
But, I can see that for the psychopath - who will never experience this full-blown, all-encompassing experience of love - sex/doing anything with anyone is just another 'activity', as you describe.
This is mind-blowing for neurotypicals to imagine, and most will never understand it and call the psychopath 'callous' for his or her lack of interest in continuity/enmeshment. But it makes perfect sense to me. Dating people with psychopathic traits is not for the faint-of-heart, if you're neurotypical... but if you decide the cost-benefit ratio is worth it for you personally, I feel like you have to simply learn to view their 'quirks' impartially.
I always like to see reality as it is, and I consider understanding these interesting people as just another psychological challenge for myself!
I'm not sure that neurotypicals can't understand the psycopathic take on this, because the 'falling for and being swept up' etc is not the only type of NT sex and some of it IS just about the activities. Someone may have a kink that is most simply satisfied by paying a sex worker, say. And there is plenty of casual sex, hook ups, going out to 'pull', where the only requirements are finding the partner reasonably attractive (and sometimes not even that) and that some type of sex will occur. I think it would be more accurate to say that many NTs would find it hard to understand when that is someone's ONLY possible way of experiencing sex.
I can see dating someone with psycopathic traits working out if the partner is armed with all this information that we now have from Athena and from the few legit researchers. But without this information, well, here comes trouble. My own partner lacks some basic emotions entirely and is on the spectrum, and it took many years of misunderstanding each other terribly and lots of conflict, and a lot of reading and learning, before we were able to sort through it all and make it work.
You have a head start!
Very interesting replies, thank you. I can see that a female psychopath could end up with a high-value mate if she plays her cards right and looks good too, for sure. Particularly if she finds a psychopathic male (which I'll elaborate on...)
However, I don't agree that strong men look for strong women in general. Such guys do look for *equivalently coveted female traits*, of course, but in the neurotypical world, these nearly always translate to things like attentiveness, agreeableness, etc... since these traits signal to him that she'll be a diligent mother and raise/educate his kids well. Top-of-the-hierarchy guys also tend to like other 'feminine' traits like spontaneity, playfulness... things that entertain him in a sensual way and distract him from his 'life mission'. Of course, he'll want her to be intelligent (since many genes pertaining to intellect are passed on from the mother), but he won't want a CEO or a high-profile scientist.
This is because the principle of comparative advantage is very apparent, when it comes to mate selection - think intelligent corporate guys... how many of them have wives with similar jobs (or who even had similar jobs before having kids)? A few, but probably around 10% of the large number that I know. Neurotypical guys very rarely want a woman who's truly intellectually matched to them.
They may say they do, but they don't like the reality...they don't want her to be busy, 'selfish' and in 'masculine mode' like him - which she inevitably will be, after the honeymoon phase. They virtually always prefer a woman who's a bit less intelligent than them, but still passionate about something ... and who will be a softer presence to come home to. Of course, the mimetic desire to have a woman who's 'their level of the hierarchy' can come into play, but they'll still prefer a committed teacher from a good family to a self-made, steel-disciplined female Elon Musk.
I'm just elaborating on this point because it's very prominent in the neurotypical world, and you might find it intriguing. Men who are neurotypical but very high-calibre/logical astoundingly rarely 'choose' a woman who is very driven and entrepreneurial/scientific/whatever *over* an equivalent (looks and general sense of humour etc.) who is going to be LESS focused on her mission and more on him/their family.
They want to bond with/protect a woman who they feel truly admires them, hence the differential needs to be present. This is why we neurotypicals have axioms like "you can't be cherished and respected at the same time", why countless ambitious women come to the supposed realisation that they need to "hone their feminine energy" to actually gain commitment from a worthy NT male.
I'm very open-minded, but life has confirmed this to me over and over again. Most NT guys see feisty, hyper-driven women as fun dating options - and probably 'respect' them more than the woman they eventually marry (in the same way they respect their male colleagues more) - but they'd never have their bonding instinct triggered by her. We NT females get a lot of bad rep for being more emotional than our male counterparts, but NT males are incredibly emotion driven too. Very few would make a 'logical decision' to marry a woman who didn't trigger that warm feeling/who they didn't feel respected them. Pride is a huge thing for them... an emotion I certainly can't say I feel.
However, I strongly suspect that what you are saying holds true for male psychopaths. The one I have had experience with was exactly as you describe - he wanted a genuinely strong, competent woman because he didn't have that 'urge' to protect or cherish a woman at all. So, in his mind, why not level up every possible trait... he actively wanted his 'life partner' to be level 10 in every way... level 10 beauty, but also level 10 intellect, level 10 ambition. This is why I fell so hard for this individual, as I'm naturally logical and will always prefer language, science and research to people (despite seeming like a normal woman in her 20s). He's the only case of an extremely intelligent, business-minded guy I've come across who's actively sought out a woman equal to him in all ways (not caring at all about softer feminine traits).
Very interesting indeed. And, thanks for clarifying that about promiscuity... I've always suspected that psychopaths can seem 'hypersexual' because sex is just another option for them and they don't tie their identity to their acts, but that they don't crave it more than the average person. That makes a lot of sense.
That's interesting about what you have found men to be attracted to. Of course, my experience is tainted by my experience. That is to say that what I see as normal to me is easily extrapolated to apply to the world at large. I am quite a strong individual, and tend to attract like minded people. However, as I consider that, I have to also acknowledge that I have attracted all types of mates, but the only ones that I give my time to are the strong ones. If I have a mate that does everything I want I get bored and annoyed with them quickly.
NeuroGirl is extremely perceptive and absolutely right in her judgement about 'what men want' and why. The experience of neurotypical women may be more representative than your particular experience and there is much to be learned from this.
I can absolutely relate!
Hope you dont mind my jumping in here. And I have no background in neuroscience. You are right that strong men don't necessarily look for strong women. I used to think that men who liked compliant, cowed women were weak, but then it turned out thay many apparently strong ones liked that too. It's a fantasy.
Yes men are emotionally driven, and pride is huge, often false pride.
My own partner used to look at movie characters of sexy strong women and say how much he liked that, and I just laughed and laughed.....yeah mate, sure.
I wish I had been as cluey as you in my own early 20s, and had such experience and wisdom.
So much here is so perceptive. I think your combat sports example inspired.
Somehow I don't find it incomprehensible, I am not sure why. And yet I am similar to you, and am attracted to very few people, and it never happens quickly, I have to be around that person for a long time before it happens. But when it does, whether sexual or emotional, it's dreadfully intense and can be a problem.
It certainly makes for some interesting conversations with my partner. He has no conception of grief at all, and until a few years ago assumed it was a performance people put on to make themselves look good. The horror of losing a child by violence, which was topical recently, is not something he understands at all, just cognitively recognises it as a terrible injustice done to the child. His empathy is confined to the victim and he cannot understand the family feeling upset. Well!