Nicole Finnegan — Beware: Yyc Sociopaths

Nicole Finnegan — Beware: Yyc Sociopaths. People with antisocial personalities can be highly effective at getting you to overlook the warning signs you see or sense. That’s why they’re called con artists: They take you into their confidence. You doubt yourself and trust them. At work, they may steal inventory and re-sell it. They may cook up lucrative schemes as a business owner. As a supervisor, they may bully employees until they quit. Or they may bully their new supervisor, especially if they are older and more experienced at the job and think they can get away with it. If confronted about it by upper management, they will often successfully claim innocence. Many sociopaths will tell you a story about how someone else took advantage of them, or life circumstances treated them very badly. You will feel sorry for them. You will want to help them. But this is a ploy to help them prey on normal, healthy people who naturally care and want to help a stranger. For example, Bundy used to put a fake cast on his arm or leg, then drop a bunch of books by an isolated young woman on a college campus. He would ask them to help him carry his books back to his car, then when they leaned into the car to put the books in the back seat, he would shove them inside. Getting Revenge Sociopaths who are also high-conflict people (HCPs) can be especially dangerous. HCPs are preoccupied with blaming others, have all-or-nothing thinking, unmanaged emotions that drive their behavior and engage in extreme behavior that 90 percent of people would never do. Sociopathic HCPs are preoccupied with blaming a “Target of Blame” for not accepting their dominance. They may seek to punish them in ways that are particularly vicious and sometimes fatal. While some sociopaths do not have Targets of Blame (their targets may be banks, art museums, or internet sites), most are potential HCPs because they can become so outraged at anyone who stands in the way of something they want. I don’t want to scare you, but rather inform you of this pattern of deception, lies, and extreme behavior without remorse. Awareness and a healthy skepticism will help you protect yourself and your loved ones.