And despite what the author implies, a hallmark of a sociopath is a lack of any genuine awareness that they are a sociopath. So it is safe to assume the “admission” is just another manipulation.
That's why when I read the article, all I see is attempted manipulation and exploitation of the reader.
“Experience that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn. - CS Lewis
Nobody deserves to be marked unlovable based on the way they are born. Period. If someone has already hurt you personally then that's different: an individual is different from a category, actions are different from hypotheticals, and trust is different from compassion. I'm not saying a person's past actions should be ignored. What I am saying is that everyone should be considered based on their own individual choices.
“We are all receiving Charity. There is something in each of us that cannot be naturally loved.” ― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves
Plenty of non-sociopathic relationships are transactional or exploitative. What do you think a young attractive woman marrying an older wealthy man is?
>That's why when I read the article, all I see is attempted manipulation and exploitation of the reader.
And again, half of the news articles I see every day are guilty of the very same thing. When an author goes on a podcast tour before the release of their book, what else is that other than manipulation to buy their book, are they all sociopaths?
All I see when I read that article is honesty. Every person in that woman's social circle knows what's up, how is that even manipulation, what you see is what you get. She clearly has functional relationships, what you seem to be hung up on is her intent.
I just don't really believe this is always true. What do you call the people consciously doing sociopathic things?
This is a ridiculous paradox.
An alcoholic might engage in behavior that matches sociopathy (lying, manipulation, irritability, etc) for various reasons (covering for their drinking, getting access to alcohol and so on). What makes it different is that the alcoholic deep down can recognize that their drinking is a problem and hence also act to mitigate their destructive behavior.
A sociopath might be theoretically knowledgeable about their condition, but they can do little, if anything, to mitigate how they act and even if they know that everyone else might think something they do is wrong, they simply don't care. In other words: an alcoholic is likely to wish for not being an alcoholic, while a sociopath is likely to want to stay a sociopath.
An example of this is Sam Vaknin[0], who also monetizes his personality disorder after a fashion. There's a documentary about him and his wife floating around on Youtube, "I, Psychopath".
So now they know, as I suspected, but want to stay that way.
While they also have to take the Turing test for us to be convinced that it’s genuine awareness
Mmmmmmmk
Deep down you know this is flawed, unnecessary addition, just so the rest of us can be comfortable that other people are different
The lying, deceit and manipulation I refer to as performed by otherwise psychologically stable alcoholics is different because it's usually employed to cover for the lack of control over their drinking - things like taking sick days when hungover, lying about drinking, coming up with plausible reasons for "needing a drink", and so on.
Thus, unlike in ASPD alcoholics, the behavior originates from feelings of guilt, shame and remorse - which, inevitably, is "handled" with more drinking. The key difference is that in empathic alcoholics, this behavior will cease if/when they give up drinking.
I used alcoholism as an example because I couldn't really think of anything apart from addiction that would make an empathic person engage in a somewhat comparable behavior for prolonged periods of time, despite feeling remorse.
It's normal for all people to lie from time to time, but that's not "consciously doing sociopathic things". ASPD/NPD manifests as such a massive, sprawling, unpredictable and destructive web of manipulation, lying, gaslighting and callousness that I'd personally say it'd be impossible for an empathic, healthy person to even come up with something that mimics it.