The Psychopath Test

In the fourth chapter of Jon Ronson's, "The Psychopath Test," we finally see exactly what the psychopath test entails. Bob Hare is the person of interest throughout the chapter. Bob created what is now the Hare PCL-R Checklist, this checklist consists of 20 behavioral characteristics in determining if someone qualifies as a psychopath. The electric shock test was mentioned often as a method in determining psychopaths and their brain anomaly compared to non-psychopaths. The same idea can be portrayed through a series of images where one is suddenly a gruesome picture. Non-psychopaths are shocked and disgusted by the photograph or the electric shock, while psychopaths feel no fear, guilt or remorse. They do not have consciences. Bob Hare also warned how psychopaths are everywhere,CEO's and politicians you see everyday. Martha Stout gave advice to Jon to tell wives of psychopaths to leave them, because you can't hurt someone who has no feelings. By the end of the course with Bob Hare, Jon Ronson could now spot psychopaths much easier and his skepticism was considerably lower.

I officially keep loving this book more and more. I honestly was getting kind of scared when reading about how certain things people say and do, go back to the Hare Checklist for psychopaths. I feel like I know a psychopath and I am sort of freaked out, a lot. I think I might trick them into taking a psychopath test and analyze their behaviors now, wow, I am a freak. The line that stuck out most for me while reading was on page 114 when Martha said, "...ninety-nine percent of us wandering around down here are having our lives pushed and pulled around by that psychopathic fraction up there." I also found it funny that Ronson was happy to know that something was in fact identifiably wrong with him. In the chapter, "Toto," I was so fascinated by how convincing Toto was that he was "normal?" Then, finding out the truth behind what he meant and everything just came together. I feel like I am a psychopath spotter now, Ha. If Echoes of my Silence (which is an awesome name for a memoir) is a real book, I am so reading it.