Since the last edition of this book was published in 1964 discussion of the
psychopath has continued and further attempts have been made to evaluate his status.
A remarkable, and curiously misleading, presentation of the subject was offered only a
few years ago by a lay writer, Alan Harrington, first in the popular magazine Playboy and
later in Psychopaths, a book amplifying his theme.
A serious and regrettable confusion, I believe, is likely to come from opinions
quoted by this author that seem very plainly to advocate that the psychopath be
admired, chosen as a leader, or at least as a model for other men. Referring to one of
these opinions, the author says, "The menacing psychopath is embraced. Incredibly ...
it seems at first shock ... we are urged to turn into an 'antithetical' version of the outlaw
and find our way to his radical vision of the universe."
Some of the people quoted or cited by the author of the Playboy article (and the
subsequent book) seem to be spokesmen for, or prominent figures in, the recent
movement of rebellion often referred to as the counterculture. In this movement we
find zealots who embrace hallucinatory confusion under the influence of potentially
brain-damaging psychedelic drugs and aggressively proclaim it as religious experience.
Here, too, we find the antihero, often a figure flaunting treason and dishonor along with
his unkempt beard, barefootedness, and defiantly frayed blue jeans. In this so-called
counterculture the antihero was not only welcomed but by some virtually enshrined. It
has been fashionable also in this movement to degrade the high passion and glory of
sexual love to a significance not far from that of a belch. Perhaps, in this general and
heedless effort to reverse the basic values, almost anything traditionally regarded as
undesirable, or despicable, might be automatically stamped with the sign of approval.
After many quotations from people who may be reflecting elements of this
movement, the author, himself, encourages us to "ask ... if the psychopath's time has
come, if there may be a world-wide need for him." He goes on to say, "Could the
coming of the psychopath be a natural and inevitable result of our drastically
deteriorating environment (which helps fling him up) as well as one answer to it and,
who knows, a potential remedy for such deterioration?"
Other opinions expressed by the author include these: "Although originally
founded upon an anti-social condition, it [psychopathy] offers exciting new alternatives
to the way we have lived until now ... the distinction blurs hopelessly between present
day psychopathic patterns as observed in prisons, institutions and clinics, and equivalent
behavior, which may often be put to use in good causes outside of these places... would
it be best," he asks, "to teach our children the psychopathic style in order that they may
survive?" He speaks of "Brilliant individuals among us that are basing their own lives
on the psychopathic model" and, referring to them, he cites the opinion that, "What was
formerly diagnosed mental illness has turned into the new spirit of the age." He seems
quite serious in repeatedly asking if we should imitate the psychopath, if we should
"yield to insanity accepted as normal? Cultivate one's own latent psychopathy, perhaps
trying to adapt it to good ends?" He also says, "Conceivably the times ate railing for an
idealized version of the psychopath as savior."
Other quotations are given from writers who claim that psychopaths should be
considered as having found the great answers to life. In response to such opinions, the
author asks, "Rave we come to the hour of the psychopath, the advent of psychopathic
man . . . when what was once presumed to be a state of illness is abruptly declared to
be a state of health, . . . can it be true that, with the dramatic appearance of the
psychopathic ideal, a new man has come upon us, that in order to survive the turbulent
years ahead, far from seeking to treat the psychopath in clinics, we should rather
emulate him, learn how to become him?"
Such opinions as these, and many others quoted or expressed directly by the
author, give rise to a number of thoughts. First, let me say that the question of whether
or not it is desirable to be a psychopath seems not so much a real question as a pretext
for sophistry. For a sophistry that is not only obvious but monumentally frivolous. It
strongly suggests to me the sort of argument that might arise about whether or not a
physician should use treatment in behalf of the patient or in behalf of the
microorganisms which are in the process of killing him."
It is true that the psychopath is extremely difficult to understand or to explain.
Confusion has often arisen about just what is indicated by the term. Any reasonable
sane person who feels or says that we should emulate the psychopath must, one might
presume, have a poor understanding of what the term indicates and must, surely, be
talking about something else. Textbooks over the years, as we know, have often listed
widely differing disorders under this term. A sincere choice of the real psychopath as
model or leader by anyone familiar with the Subject would be beyond absurdity.
Even in these times of fiercely dictated permissiveness, this choice would have to
be called by the currently censored, but quite accurate terms, perverse and degenerate.
A true taste for the psychopath as leader or model, or as object of admiration, also
suggests to me the peculiarly pathological and unappealing aestheticism of Huysmans'
fictional character, des Esseintes, who, after withdrawing from nearly all natural
activities, takes another step:
And a pale smile hovered over his lips when finally his servant brought him a
nourishing enema compounded with peptone and informed his master that he was to
repeat the little operation three times every twenty-four hours.
The thing was successfully carried out and des Esseintes could not help secretly
congratulating himself on the event which was a coping stone, the crowning triumph, in a
sort, of the life he had contrived for himself. His predilection for the artificial had now,
and that without any initiative on his part, attained its supreme fulfillment. A man could hardly go farther;
nourishment thus absorbed was surely the last aberration from the natural that could be
committed.
What a delicious thing he said to himself it would be if one could, once restored to
health, go on with the same simple regime. . . . Last but not least, what a direct insult
cast in the face of old Mother Nature, whose never varying exigencies would be forever
nullified. [p. 325]
The basic judgment and the moral orientation underlying a deliberate choice of
the actual psychopath as model or leader could hardly deserve more consideration or
respect than the judgment and orientation leading to a militant demand that Richard
Speck be installed as National Supervisor of Nursing Education in the United States and
that the Congressional Medal of Honor be awarded to the Boston Strangler.
