Are all criminals pyscopaths/sociopaths?

Dreamer

Argument Topic: No, there are psychopath who are not criminals.

People commit crimes for a large variety of reasons. Peer pressure, desperation, revenge, etc.

https://theconversation.com/not-all-psychopaths-are-criminals-some-psychopathic-traits-are-actually-linked-to-success-51282

just_sayin

You don't have to be a psychopath or sociopath to commit a crime.  

MineSubCraftStarved

@theinfectedmaster
No, but a significant amount of them are. The two tend to correlate, but committing a crime doesn't mean you are a psycho/sociopath, nor does being a psycho/sociopath mean you'll commit a crime(though it is usually far more likely than if you weren't a psycho/sociopath).

Bogan

All criminals are not psychopaths, and all psychopaths are not criminals.      Like all human behaviour, it is caused by a mixture of nurture and nature.     With the very worst criminals, I would opine it is more nurture than nature, and my opinion is backed up by renowned FBI profiler John Douglas, who wrote in his book that serial killers were unreformable.    Douglas declared that once a serial killer is made, "you can't unbake the cake" 

Psychopaths tend to have above average IQ's which is the main reason why so many of them can be successful in business.     They usually make smart criminals.    Their main feature is a complete lack of empathy for every one else in society.    They really do believe that they are the centre of the universe and other people are of no account.      Hitler, Napoleon, Stalin, and every other blood thirsty dictator were psychopaths.    So too are  are a lot of stockbrokers and other money fraudsters.    Sam Bankmann Fried is probably a psychopath.

Most crime before the 19th century was committed by ordinary people to survive.    many of the crimes they committed were hanging offences because poverty, starvation and helplessness was so widespread that most people had to indulge in it in order to eat.     This crime wave could only be combatted by the harhest of punishments, as governments of those days were unable to fund prisons, or to feed large numbers of prisoners.    However, with increasing prosperity, welfare was proposed as a way of eradicating crime.    This was only marginally successful, and the typical sociopathic criminal today is usually subsidised by the taxpayer.   These criminals receive public housing, public social security payments, and sometimes free medical care, which gives them the time and opportunity to plan their next crimes of robbery, rape, burglary, and violent behaviour.

 The responses of authority to combat crime ahs changed over the centuries.    From the harshest punishments, to preaching to criminals, to reforming criminals, to providing welfare for criminals, to the recent novel approach in many US cities, that of claiming that black criminals are just victims of white oppression and that they should be allowed to do as they please. 

Crime in westrn society is increasing when it should be going the other way.    There are two reasons for that.    The first is the importation of ethnicities well known for their genetic predisposition to serious criminal behaviour.    That is not going to stop anytime soon because most western people ar in denial about racial differences.    The second, is that our culture in western society has changes from one of condemning criminal behaviour to one of admiring criminal behaviour.     The media is the means of cultural transmission today and the media glorifies criminal behaviour.     Most violent movies are revenge movies, where the lone hero usually suffers some appalling crime against himself or his family, and the movie progresses through the hero hunting down and killing all of the people who have tormented him.    This I think is the primary reason why today, there are so many mass shootings.   In addition, "rap" music is primarilly concerned about glorifying criminal behaviour.      The common themes are drug trafficking, killing police officers, the joys of raping your mother, bashing your "hoe" girlfriend, and solving personal disputes with weapons.     This "music" is directed at young, poorly socialised males from dysfunctional and genetically prone to criminal behaviour ethnicities, and then we wonder why crime by this demographic is out of control? 

 

Barnardot

@theinfectedmaster @Bogan ; The first is the importation of ethnicities well known 

Just to put it in to context instead of lying. It might be well known to racialists who only use half there brain and only want to know half of the negative info that that they choose to support there dog mess views. Because even if people are white and treated like animals for generations I bet that there is going to be a heap of white criminals. And if you really want to make a comparison I bet that the white red neck and white bogin criminals are a 100 times worse than the black criminals. Do you want to see the research on that. I bet you wouldn't want to know.

Barnardot

@theinfectedmaster I reckon that they are because when you analize the word criminal it usually means some one who habitually does crime or even some one who only commits a very serious crime just once. For example there might be a wealthy well to do guy who is a piller in society who commits murder of his wife. And it is easy to say well that was a crime of passion so he isn't really a criminal. But when you look at the guys past you will see that he had psycho or socialistic tendencies any way and the murder he did was just waiting to happen. 

jack

Argument Topic: Are all criminals pyscopaths/sociopaths?

@theinfectedmaster

Hello the:

Nahhh..  I just wanted to smoke some weed.

excon

jack

MineSubCraftStarved said:

No, but a significant amount of them are.

Hello M:

Nahh.  

Way back, when this nation WAS a great country, we defined CRIME as conduct so depraved that it shocked the public conscience.  

And then you made marijuana illegal...

excon

ZeusAres42

Not all criminals are psychopaths or sociopaths. While the terms "psychopath" and "sociopath" are used to describe specific personality disorders marked by a consistent disregard for the rights of others, it's an oversimplification to assume that every individual who engages in criminal behavior fits these definitions.

When we dive into the realm of psychopathy, we are dealing with a condition characterized by persistent antisocial behavior, diminished empathy, lack of remorse, and a bold, disinhibited nature. Although some studies suggest that psychopathy might be present in about 1% of the general population, its prevalence is notably higher in incarcerated populations, possibly reaching 15-25%. However, even in these environments, not everyone is a psychopath.

Sociopathy, on the other hand, is a term often used interchangeably with psychopathy, but there are nuanced differences. Rooted more in environmental origins, like adverse childhood experiences, sociopathy tends to manifest in a more disorganized and erratic form of antisocial behavior. The implication here is that environmental factors play a crucial role in shaping criminal behavior for many, which extends beyond the confines of personality disorders.

Indeed, there are multifaceted reasons why individuals might engage in criminal activities. Economic strains, such as poverty or lack of access to education, can push individuals towards crime out of desperation. Social environments, like peer pressure or gang involvement, can make criminal activity seem like an appealing or even necessary choice. Psychological challenges, like impulse control problems or substance abuse, can also predispose individuals to criminality. There are also times when situational factors, such as finding oneself in the midst of a riot, might lead to criminal behavior due to the chaos and lack of immediate consequences. Furthermore, in certain cultural contexts, behaviors we might label as "criminal" are normative and might even be valued, showing that our understanding of crime is sometimes relative.

To cap it off, it's pivotal to understand that even if someone is diagnosed as a psychopath or sociopath, it doesn't inevitably lead them to commit crimes. Some might use their traits in socially acceptable ways, never once violating the law.

So, when we examine the intersection of criminality and personality disorders, it's clear that they overlap, but one doesn't necessarily imply the other. Oversimplifying this relationship can obstruct our understanding and potentially impede rehabilitation efforts.

Bogan

The biggest and most significant factor in modern criminal behaviour is low intelligence..  

MayCaesar

By definition, a criminal in a given jurisdiction is someone who has violated a law issued by an organization that claims (and is somewhat widely accepted) to be the ultimate authority on law making and enforcement. Given the variety of jurisdictions and then the groups of laws within each jurisdictions, there are very few generalizations that can be made about criminals. A criminal can be someone who murders 100 children and laughs about it in court, or it can be someone who bakes bread for 100 children in his local village when the local communist government has declared that all grain is to be handed over to it.

As I see it, psychologically the only requirement for someone to be an intentional criminal (cases where someone violates a law they did not know existed are a bit irrelevant) is lack of acceptance of law as the ultimate authority. As long as a person is willing to violate a single imaginable law in a single imaginable situation, he has the same predisposition to violating the law as any real criminal - he just has happened to not run into a situation where this predisposition would lead to criminal action. So, unless you have infinite faith in law and always follow what the law says regardless of any considerations (which I doubt a single person who has ever lived did), you are a criminal in *some* jurisdiction. Does it make you a psychopath/sociopath? Rhetorical question.