Why do people follow psychopaths, narcissist and sociopaths?

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i wasn't aware of this phenomenon.

Recently there was this guy in my exercise group who who kept asking me out to dinner, even after I politely declined. He kept saying s**t like "It's not a date, just as friends. ...unless you don't like spending time with me or something." One day I just told him "It's not dinner I mind, I just don't enjoy being alone with you."

LOL! Crash and burn son. That's what you get for trying to guilt me.

I did a google search on my ex and found his parents court documents online about their divorce and their fight was over their land about who gets what and they were claiming some of it was their son's land too and the document mentioned he was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and lives in his own apartment and his mom helps him with daily assistance.

Then I looked it up online and I read about negative symptoms and people with schizophrenia can appear lazy because of their lack of interest in life and extreme lack of motivation and all they do is watch TV or play computer games, etc. as I read on their forums when they were talking about negative symptoms. I thought about my ex "Oh that probably explains his laziness then, he was only showing negative symptoms then and I think he was in his early stages of it because he showed no hallucinations other than strange thinking." Their extreme apathy in life can make them appear depressed and lazy. Last time I saw him in person, he had stopped brushing his hair because it was a mess. When we were together, he quit showering and brushing his teeth. I never thought then he could be sick and I thought my mom was nuts when she told me he might be mentally ill and a schizophrenic. I thought she was just labeling him and I didn't see anything wrong with him other than having ADHD because he said he had that and I also thought he had a learning disability because he was also in special ed and barely graduated high school but only because he didn't get the education he needed like I did. I didn't see him as having lot of problems. He might not have been a true schizophrenic then and only had traits then and then he evolved into it because he left himself untreated and then finally his mom decided to get him help I am guessing and he got that diagnoses because it got that bad.

I've actually been wondering this very thing lately. I really have no idea. For example, Steve Jobs was a certified jerk. No one denies this, but people he treated poorly lavished him with praise. I think it might have something to do with the fact that if enough of the right people like something, other people will claim to like it or be ok with it as well, or a tendency for people to rationalize in certain circumstances, but I can tell you right now that if Steve Jobs were female, he never would have gotten away with his bad behavior. He would have been thoroughly condemned for it such that he never would have become famous in the first place.

There is the rare female who gets away with and can rise to power while being a jerk but they typically have a lot of power to begin with (Leona Helmsley and Gina Rinehart), but they are universally disliked.

Why person A is condemned for behavior that person B is praised for, why person A is hated for behavior that person B is liked in spite of...these things I just don't understand and I find very perplexing.

Steve Jobs: Undeniable jerk, but loved by millions anyway.
Henry the 8th: Murderous woman hating jerk, but celebrated anyway.
The Kim "Dynasty": They live in luxury while they let their people eat grass and starve to death. But treated like Gods by the North Korean people.
Donald Trump: Adulterous jerk. Known to berate employees for his own decisions, and stiffing independent contractors. Well loved by christians.
Christopher Colombus: Murderous, raping, enslaver. Celebrated American historical figure.
Pol Pot: Managed to get his followers to murder 1/4 of the population of Cambodia by clubbing them to death.
Warren Jeffs: Pedophile, regarded as a profit by his followers.

I'd also love to know. Such inconsistency keeps me up at night (might also just be insomnia, but either way). There may be a cultural element, an idea that it's "against Womens' nature" while "compatible with Mens' nature".

In the Steve Jobs vs Gina example, Steve was rather careful to control his public image, whereas Gina made a few ill-advised statements (compare Martin Shkreli) so Jobs advantage might also be better PR.

Pol Pot (as referred to above) was an interesting case, they took advantage of the chaos of the indochina war (if you were a Cambodian villager, the first you know of the war was US planes dropping tons of ordinance on your crops unprovoked, if it were me, I wouldn't have been too impressed with the situation either) to advance an agenda that could be considered as "reject modernity and Make Cambodia Great Again (Restore the Khmer to its former glory)" the difference was these French educated economists were convinced of their own ideas of greatness and the means to achieve it.

I like your previous answer. Also, there's one major problem in my case. I suck at being confrontational I can tell when people are trying to be an as*hole but they perceive me as confused and aloof when in reality I just don't know how to respond. I lock up sometimes, especially when they're being very direct, loud, or invading my space and property. They can say whatever they want, they just can't touch my things, or I tend to explode.

How about those that doesn't involve work. Like stalking by proxy, how can they convince supposed to be " moral" human beings to do their bidding for them?

Women don't get away with that behavior? I'm sure you know what a diva is, that word was made for females. There's just as many females that fit the description as men. As per usual gender behavioral differences, it displays itself differently. Women aren't usually obvious jerks, but covert. They only manipulate and intimidate people directly if they know they can get away with it (higher risk aversion). They're generally also much less averse to play the victim if things go awry. I'm oversimplifying here, but that's the general gist.

Hillary Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, The Queen of England are just some contemporary examples that fit one of the three descriptors mentioned before. Just do a google search and you'll find plenty more, even really high profile ones.

The people I listed are incredibly powerful people who have committed horrible atrocities or have behaved in very negative manners but despite that, have/had extremely large followings. They are in a class apart from lower level garden variety jerks, which I believe these "divas" as well as the majority of male jerks would fall in to. These people don't get to very high ranks in life.

I don't see how you think Oprah Winfrey and the Queen of England meet the criteria for psychopaths, narcissists, and sociopaths (collectively, jerks). I understand that some people think Hillary Clinton is. I do admit she has done some things I do not view in a positive light, though I think many of the claims against her are overstated. During the campaign I did a lot of fact checking and many of the claims people made against her were false, some of them true, but occasionally taken out of context.

The most powerful people often have the lowest notoriety. What makes Oprah a sociopath (or perhaps the others) is her using her huge following to sell her brand of useless stuff. She got/gets rich by lying and manipulating people. Hillary Clinton is a criminal, there's more than enough evidence of that. Most high-ranking politicians are, but that's another story.

Not trying to berate you, but do you honestly think any position of power can be held without appeasing those who can put you there?

I could go into great lengths about the topic of power/fame/money, but I'm not sure this is the right thread to do that. I also suck at not going on one tangent after another.

If any of this sounds belittling or aggressive, please don't take it that way.

No need to worry. You have not berated me. Are you saying that you believe all individuals in positions of power are psychopaths, narcissist or sociopaths?

I do think men get away with certain things more because of that, however the jerks I mentioned get away with things most men can't. Men, on average, I think, get away with being certain kinds of jerks more than women, but most men can't get away with being these kinds of jerks. There is a god level to jerkiness, where one is both a jerk and idolized, that the vast swaths of the population can never achieve. Anyone can be a jerk but it takes a special person to be idolized in spite of it, or sometimes even for it.



Steve Jobs' reputation was well known though. I think the public image focused on being progressive. I suppose one can say that Gina is the anti-thesis of femininity, but she's got enough money and money making resources to leverage. I've always suspected that Martin Shkreil was something akin to a scape goat or whipping boy of some sort. A sacrifice to appease the angry populace, because in reality, his sins weren't all that remarkable for Big Pharma only he wasn't all that big and didn't have a large corporate wall to hide behind. He was a little guy trying to play the big game, and was easy pickings. Of course he deserved it, but so do many others in that industry. Pharmaceutical companies occasionally corner the market on ingredients and hoard them or destroy them merely to keep them out of the hands of a competitor that can offer a competing drug at a lower price.



I will take your word on that but it's a pretty phenomenal thing to be able to get yourself into the position where you can club to death 1 in every 4 people.

[quote=" I sort of attract sociopaths because they see me as a challenge. I am doing my own thing and they decide to come out of nowhere and start up a chat, but I'm cold towards them so I confuse them. They know I'm somewhat socially stupid but they don't know why, or how to take advantage of it. AS hasn't often been useful but in this case it is, because I feel like I can see right through their BS.[/quote] I honestly wished I had this talent. I'm always ambivalent when it comes to people. I mean, I don't trust them but I don't judge them either. But I have my ways of figuring them out, but not as efficient.

Not all, just enough to f**k everybody over. Especially the higher up you go the ladder. Just look at how public policy is made in most countries and ask yourself whether things that get decided really address issues. I don't know about the US, but it's been a long time in Germany that any political decision lead to lasting positive change.

Same goes for corporate conduct. If we had truly free markets, I doubt the majority of people would benefit from it. More than likely the contrary.

I'm very naive and often can't read people's intentions or pick up in the early stages that someone is not going to treat me well. Or if they do something horrible I freeze and don't react. So I was a great target for a couple of narcissistic men who were very unpleasant.

However, I am getting better - I've had to develop a system of dumping someone the minute the overstep a boundary or belittle me.