More interesting stuff from Sopranos on Psychopathy, and now i think it quite disturbing, as they seem to be using the popularity of the show for damage control. Look below:
From this one
The Soprano's Last Song
So in some way it is fitting that, despite our fondness for Tony, disaster looms as we head into the final hour. Dr. Melfi's slammed door speaks for all of us. "Even under the very best of conditions, psychotherapy for an anti-social personality disorder is unlikely to succeed in real life," according to Dr. Glen Gabbard, psychiatrist and author of The Psychology of "The Sopranos". "The show began with an upbeat attitude about psychotherapy," Gabbard notes. But as time wore on, "Tony's psychopathy and his inaccessibility to therapeutic change became intractable." By the final season, "Tony has shown himself to be irredeemable. And that was always the hope of the audience--maybe a bad man can become a good man, and be redeemed."
It is a valid point that people (not psychopathic) who lack the knowledge on psychopathy, will always hope, wisfully think that the bad person will turn good and all will live happily ever after. Of course it is what the patrocrats have been promoting through various sources by different means throughout the millenia, in order to keep non-psychopathic people from seeing the real face behind the mask of sanity in order to save their positions, control, image, etc. And the rest of us bought it. It seems that now that the word is spreading, slowly but steadily, "they" will have to distort it's meaning. The term antisocial personality disorder used by Dr Gabbard in the quote above, and the one from the "bible" of clinical psychologists and psychiatrists alike, the DSM (whatever number it reached now), is a very vague one and intentionally obscures the subjects, so Dr Gabbard is not even wrong when using the term "unlikely" instead of "impossible" in stating:
"Even under the very best of conditions, psychotherapy for an anti-social personality disorder is unlikely to succeed in real life,"
But "their" work is not done. In this article, the twisting is much more obvious:
From:
Did the shrink make Tony a better thug?
Though the article starts stating what other researchers discovered in years long studies and experience:
But have those many hours on the proverbial couch helped Tony Soprano become a better human or just a better criminal? As the show heads to a denouement this Sunday that has devoted fans already in mourning, the dark vision of creator David Chase seems to be steering viewers toward the latter conclusion.
Recent shows – particularly the penultimate episode with its disturbing therapy-related twists – have included repeated references to The Criminal Personality, a study of offenders serving sentences in hospitals for the criminally insane.
The seminal mid-'70s work, conducted by Americans Stanton Samenow and the late Samuel Yochelson, suggested that criminals who undergo therapy actually learned to better manipulate others and that they are more likely to re- offend than those who do not go through therapy.
the big twist comes a little further
"I would say it's rarely that simple," Dr. Margaret Crastnopol, with the William Alanson White Institute in New York City, says of the notion that therapy only teaches sociopaths or psychopaths new tricks.
Crastnopol, who confesses she hasn't watched The Sopranos this season after burning out on the show's brutal violence, says there really aren't clear and predictable rules about who therapy can help and who therapists shouldn't work with.
Which is a truth, but followed by a lie
"There might be instances where somebody's psychopathy could be unlocked and undone. And so the temptation of the analyst to try to make that happen . . . could be there and still have it be a worthy temptation," she says. "You might give it a try to a point. I wouldn't."
And when again Dr Gabbard is quoted
Gabbard says there is a body of opinion among some psychiatrists that therapy can worsen criminals, teaching them to use language they may not believe and express feelings they may not have.
"That makes sense knowing their psychology," he admits. "(But) there's just not a lot of data from research to support that."
What Gabbard is missing here is that Stout and Cleckley, Hare, Lobawescki and Frisk, and Laura along with the QFG, and all the others, who did extensive research on the condition of psychopathy and wrote about it, were not writing their
opinion on the matter, but first off they expressed their shock and astonishment at the possibility of the existence of this condition, that their experience, data and research made clear that it was a reality beyond any doubt, beyond anything they could have ever thought of.
Pathocrats are working hard it seems, or better, have others work hard for them. So i don't know how positive it is that Hare was mentioned in the series.
FWIW.
