M.E. Thomas

I wondered early on, while reading Confessions of a Sociopath, suppose I were a sociopath? Would I like this book? And if I didn’t, would I confront the author to express my displeasure with actions free from restraint or moral boundary? You know, give her a “sociopathic” review.

As it turns out, I liked a fair amount of it. One thing that tickled me: Among author M.E. Thomas’s confessions and opinions is her thought that lots of CEOs and lawyers are sociopaths (she is a lawyer). I show more like to think of this when the news reports a CEO or lawyer doing something lousy. Instead of bemoaning a failure to behave in accord with my moral compass (M.E. says, “we don’t have a moral compass”), I now just mutter, “That damn sociopath.” It’s therapeutic. I guess that means I owe to one of the sociopaths out there a word of thanks.

She presents some interesting information and claims. Examples:
• She’s Mormon and it seems to suit her. She calls the LDS church “a sociopath’s dream.”
• Justice as a moral judgment doesn’t makes sense to her; justice as a way to control people’s actions does.
• Zealous empaths manipulated by appeals to their emotions can commit horrors far worse than sociopaths ever would bother to undertake, in her humble opinion.
• It’s not insanity. “Sociopaths actually know what society considers right and wrong most of the time, they just don’t feel an emotional compulsion to conform their behavior to society’s standards.”
• Corporations display the classic signs: inherent amorality, elevation of their own interests above all others’, and disregard for moral and sometimes legal limits in pursuit of their own advancement.
• Psychotherapy has helped her commit sociopathic acts more effectively. Good news, don’t you think?

Since “sociopathy,” as she conceives it, differs somewhat from what recent psychiatric practice calls “anti-social personality disorder,” Ms. Thomas admits that “I could not be legitimately diagnosed with ASPD.” She was diagnosed as sociopathic after voluntarily being tested, but she’d also researched the subject thoroughly and probably could mimic well the typical behaviors and thoughts. Since the diagnosis could help validate her already existing blog for sociopaths, she acknowledges readers might be skeptical. Still, whether she really is a sociopath ended up not mattering to me all that much. I found Confessions educational while minding that this author might not be a reliable guide.

Most readers, I’d guess, will have a limit for how much of M.E. Thomas’s specialized self-congratulation will be tolerable. Sooner or later you just may conclude that Hell is a place where one is forced to chit-chat with a sociopath day after day after day after . . . show less

As an empath, I have mixed feelings about this book. (Ha!) The first third is crazy good, (okay, I'll stop now) as the author tells us about her life, her family and the peculiar landscape that is her mind. I was fascinated with how she uses her intellect to create emotional props with which to engage other, more emotional people. She has an artificial emotional intelligence.

I would argue that so do most of us, in that emotions and their regulation are culturally bound and therefore, in show more large part, learned. But the hill the author has to climb to approach normality is steep indeed, and she achieves it through hard work, cunning and, interestingly, a desire to connect emotionally. She has remarkable insight into her own interpersonal processes (because she examines them constantly), so it makes for compelling reading.

But only for a while. The material about her family is wonderful, and I wished for more of it. I found myself skipping over some of the second half. As other reviewers have noted, it gets repetitive. It's a shame, really, because there is an honest story here, being told from an ostensibly unreliable narrator. What could be better?

I recommend this book to anyone interested in psychology and the interplay of social convention, emotional expression and intellect. show less

M.E. Thomas, a diagnosed sociopath, talks in depth about the way she lives her life, the forces that shaped her, the nature of her thoughts and feelings, and the way she navigates through a world of people very different from herself. This is both a memoir and a work of advocacy, as she makes the case for sociopathy not being all that bad a thing, painting sociopaths as being perhaps just one more point on a natural human spectrum.

As far as her intellectual arguments go, she does this well. show more Attempting to dispel a common stereotype, she points out that while the number of sociopaths is higher among violent criminals than among the general population, it is very much not true that all sociopaths are violent criminals, or even that most violent criminals are sociopaths. She argues that, while sociopaths lack feelings of guilt and shame to guide them and do not respond emotionally to the idea of doing something hurtful or morally wrong, it is entirely possible for sociopaths to behave pro-socially because they recognize that it is in their rational self-interest to do so, or because they recognize that society will function better, for them as well as for everyone else, if they follow certain rules. She calls this having "a prosthetic moral compass," and even suggests that claiming it is impossible to be good without an emotion-based sense of morality is as offensive as suggesting that it is impossible without religious belief... an argument that I personally cannot help but respond to. She also points out that there are areas where the dispassionate ruthlessness of a sociopath can be a definite advantage, such as her own field of law. A trial lawyer, after all, is supposed to be able to put aside her own emotions and moral judgments and concentrate solely on making the bast case she can.

Heck, Thomas even makes sociopathy sound kind of appealing: a life lived with a confident sense of self-worth, free of any of those often downright neurotic worries about what people might think of you, or about all the potential bad consequences of your actions.

And yet. And yet, in the midst of all this, I was constantly brought up short by the way she would casually discuss truly appalling things as if they were no big deal. She cheerfully talks about her favorite hobby of "ruining people," including all the details of why it's so much fun. She trots out lines of reasoning that are clearly twisted and self-serving to explain why such things are perfectly acceptable, and makes it clear that, to her, what "I didn't do anything wrong" means is only "I didn't do anything illegal" or "I scrupulously followed the rules of some game that only exists in my head, and that I did not ask anyone else if they actually wanted to play." Some of the things she describes are enough to raise the hairs on the back of your neck, and on the whole I think it may have left me feeling significantly more frightened of sociopaths than I ever was before, however much appreciation I might also have for their humanity.

And, of course, there's also the question of just how much we can trust anything Thomas says here. This memoir certainly feels tremendously open and sincere, and her stated reasons for writing it that way, her desire to be understood, seem very real. But then, this is also a person who, by her own account, excels at faking sincerity and manipulating people by telling them what they want to hear, so it's impossible not to wonder to what extent she's also doing that to her audience of readers.

The cumulative effect of all of this is illuminating, unsettling, and deeply, deeply fascinating. Not only does it provide a window into the world of the sociopathic, but it also offers up a very different perspective on the rest of us, raising a lot of extremely intriguing questions about what "empaths" have that sociopaths don't, how it works, and what it means. show less

Where do I even begin.

Well, how about with this:

"This sort of behavior may seem uncouth, but is it really immoral? Prichard's disgust with sociopaths for being immoral seems largely unwarranted unless you ascribe to his particular brand of morality. Was I really in the wrong by temporarily taking my neighbor's bike? Only if you think that violation of the personal property of others is immoral. Even the law recognizes that this is not always the case: If you're stranded in a snowstorm, it show more would be permissible to break into someone's ski cabin and spend the night, as long as you pay for any damage .... you can still use this defense if if you knew for a fact that the owner would not grant you permission, for instance because you two are mortal enemies and the cabin owner has made it clear that he would not piss on you if you were on fire. The cabin owner can take this position, but the law will not support it.... When seen through this lens of reasoning ... perhaps my neighbor was acting improperly by being unreasonable in not allowing me to borrow her unused bike."

Keep in mind that she didn't ask, she just took it without telling the woman, and when the neighbour found out she got ("unreasonably") angry.

If you want to spend 300 pages with such a person, you'll love this book.

Seriously. She compares her "borrowing" a neighbour's bike without asking to breaking into a cabin during a blizzard to save your life.

And get this: she goes on and on (and on and on and on) about how brilliant and rational she is.

Does that sound brilliant or rational to you? Does it even bear a passing resemblance to even average intelligence?

Like many people I've met in my life who pride themselves on their super-rationality, she is nothing of the kind: she simply doesn't base her decisions on the same emotions other people do. Instead of guilt, remorse, empathy, consideration, or compassion, she bases her decisions on greed, egotism, anger, desire, and boredom. They're still emotions, and she's still rationalizing her actions after the fact. Repugnant emotions, but emotions just the same.

For instance, she blathers on for far too long about how fantastic sociopaths actually are because they do so well in business careers, and thus must be good for business. But this is rank nonsense. It does not follow that just because corporate America creates a culture where sociopaths can make a lot of money, that the sociopaths must therefore be productive employees who contribute to their organizations. Plenty of empiric evidence demonstrates otherwise--that teams composed of respectful and compassionate people outperform the snakes. She simply ignores this and instead posts a lot of crap from her blog readers.

You can't trust a word she says--obviously. Oh sure, yeah, she averaged a 9.5% annual return on her stock investments and fully funded her retirement by 30 ... ok. And of course she is a brilliant law professor whose students all love her. And she is adored by everyone and has close relationships ... because she says so.

You can find some speculation as to her real identity at the link below:

http://abovethelaw.com/2013/05/sources-and-dr-phil-offer-insights-author-of-conf...

Doesn't seem like this super-brilliant insightful genius who can see through the heart of all humans to the real motivations beneath was real careful protecting her identity while promoting the book. Way to go, Jamie.

God only knows what it's worth. The only thing I'm sure of is that sociopaths, if they're anything like what this woman is claiming, are even worse than I thought. Sure, yes, some proportion of humanity will probably always be exploitative and lack empathy, and it is even possible that they do contribute somehow to the greater social ecosystem--though I can't imagine how. But so do venomous snakes, and I don't invite them into my living room. show less