g m g D e s i g n . c o m

What do you get when you cross someone who is impulsive, thrill-seeking, deceitful, and completely without a sense of right and wrong? A psychopath, of course.

And despite the high rate of recidivism of psychopaths, perhaps they should be cut some slack. After all, they can’t help their neurological make-up. In a sense, it’s really not their fault, or at least that’s the argument that lawyers will be making.

A psychopath is someone who has no capacity to empathize. Note that the term psychopath does not suggest that someone is crazy. In the movies, “psychos” are invariably portrayed as killers. That reputation does have a basis in reality, but it is certainly not always the case. In “Snakes and Suits” (a book co-authored by Dr. Hare, the inventor of the psychopathy checklist), the authors describe psychopaths who attain high positions in corporate America, taking credit for the work of others and spreading enough confusion and misinformation to keep their opponents in check and their bosses happy with their “work.”

Psychopathic individuals already have a good chance at getting out of trouble. They can lie remorselessly and convincingly, persuading even the skeptical recipient that he or she is wrong and the psychopath is correct. Psychopaths are expert human predators — societal parasites who will use our weaknesses against us, sometimes for no obvious reason.

Throughout history people with psychopathic tendencies have gleaned power for themselves at the expense of many. I certainly can’t prove that Hitler, Stalin, and Saddam were psychopaths (per the checklist), but it seems highly probable that they were.

Psychopaths in America aren’t quite as powerful as the aforementioned psychopathic candidates, if only because our system is more effective at incarcerating them. A disproportionate share of the prison population scores high on the psycopathy checklist. Rather than attaining power, they go to prison.

Some people with psychopathic tendencies, such as James Arthur Ray*, attain wealth from his gullible followers before being exposed. But, as is typical of psychopaths, not everyone is convinced that they’ve been duped, even after the predator is exposed. On one of James Ray’s “vision quests,” three people died and multiple people were injured due in no small part to negligence on Ray’s part. Unsurprisingly, Ray fled the state (Arizona) following the incident and, to my knowledge, never took responsibility for his actions. I suspect he will face no serious repercussions for his criminal negligence, in large part because he will likely have no trouble persuading a jury of his “innocence.”

Having read about the chilling, disturbing, cold world of psychopaths, it’s tempting to believe that psychopathy itself should be criminalized. Maybe that’s a bit draconian. But in regards to this talk of cutting psychopaths some slack, I say that it’s a dreadful idea. A psychopath would de-fraud you of your wealth or kill your family and not feel bad about it for an instant. Feeling sorry for these predators is a travesty for the line of victims left in their wake.

* Note – at no point have I claimed that James A Ray is a psychopath. I cannot prove that and will not make such a claim. I merely point out that, based on media reports, he has psychopathic tendencies.

Security expert Bruce Schneier has a great editorial on zero-tolerance rules. So what are zero-tolerance policies?

These so-called zero-tolerance policies are actually zero-discretion policies. They’re policies that must be followed, no situational discretion allowed. We encounter them whenever we go through airport security: no liquids, gels or aerosols.

Why are they annoying?

These policies enrage us because they are blind to circumstance. Editorial after editorial denounced the suspensions of elementary school children for offenses that anyone with any common sense would agree were accidental and harmless. The Internet is filled with essays demonstrating how the TSA’s rules are nonsensical and sometimes don’t even improve security. I’ve written some of them. What we want is for those involved in the situations to have discretion.

And finally, Schneier’s recommended solution to them! (emphasis added at the end)

The solution is to combine the two, rules and discretion, with procedures to make sure they’re not abused. Provide rules, but don’t make them so rigid that there’s no room for interpretation. Give the people in the situation — the teachers, the airport security agents, the policemen, the judges — discretion to apply the rules to the situation. But — and this is the important part — allow people to appeal the results if they feel they were treated unfairly. And regularly audit the results to ensure there is no discrimination or favoritism. It’s the combination of the four that work: rules plus discretion plus appeal plus audit.