Read Online Erased: Missing Women, Murdered Wives by Marilee Strong - Free Book Online
Authors: Marilee Strong
Tags: United States, General, Social Science, Psychology, True Crime, Health & Fitness, Pregnancy & Childbirth, womens studies, Murderers, Murder, Case studies, Violence in Society, Crimes against, Uxoricide, Pregnant Women
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concentration of all three
traits could be extremely dangerous.
Even though Paulhus and his fellow researchers have not applied
the Dark Triad to murderers, having studied it only in general
community populations, I believe that the concept provides the
missing link needed to explain the complex and often contradictory
psyche of eraser killers—whose actions at one moment may be
expertly calculated and at the next astonishingly self-defeating. It
would explain why these killers are described by friends, by police, and
sometimes even by their victims as charming yet callous, generous yet
self-centered, solicitous yet highly controlling. The use of the richer
psychological vocabulary of the Dark Triad allows us to describe and
make sense of behavior that has heretofore seemed incomprehensible.
Q
Let’s explore the three psychological traits in a little more depth,
beginning with psychopathy.
Not all psychopaths are like the humorless killing machines
depicted in an entire genre of true-crime books and movies. Many are
likeable, charismatic charmers, but their charm is slick and insincere.
They may be able to mesmerize and manipulate others with finely
honed skills of persuasion and flattery, but beneath the glossy surface,
their words are devoid of any real meaning or honest emotion.
Some psychopaths can fake normality better than others. We may
occasionally pick up on the sense that something is not quite right,
the vaguely queasy feeling one gets when a movie and its soundtrack
are out of sync. But more often than not we are fooled, even dazzled
by the show they put on for us.
They know how to draw us into their web because psychopaths are
masters of studied communication. But nothing they say connects
to anything genuine inside. The classic description of psychopaths is
that they ‘‘know the words but not the music.’’ They move through
the world with the deceptive verisimilitude of computer animation,
their emotions painted on, their words spoken as though by an actor
reciting lines. It is all a performance, calculated for the effect it will
have on a select audience, to get what they want by pretending to give
us what we want.
Psychopaths are practiced liars and expert manipulators. ‘‘Some
psychopaths get this huge joy out of duping people,’’ says Paulhus.
The Dark Triad
3 9
‘‘Being on the sly, having a secret life: that is the greatest part of what
they are doing.’’ As one man who topped out on Hare’s psychopathy
test said, ‘‘I lie like I breathe, one as much as the other.’’ They lie when
there is no reason to lie, even when they are certain to be caught.
In a nationally televised interview with Good Morning America ’s
Diane Sawyer, Peterson said he told police about his affair with
Amber Frey the very night Laci went missing, a statement police
immediately contradicted, and he had to retract before the second
part of the interview had even aired.
‘‘A psychopath will look you in the eye and lie when the truth
would be easier because they get a kick out of lying to people like
Diane Sawyer,’’ said former FBI profiler Candice DeLong. ‘‘They feel
superior.’’ When caught, they just shamelessly roll over into another
lie or, in the words of Robert Hare, ‘‘rework the facts so that they
appear to be consistent with the lie.’’
Even veteran researchers are taken aback by the sheer emotional
emptiness of psychopaths, and the remarkable ability many have to
hide that fact from those around them.
‘‘[W]e are dealing here not with a complete man at all but with
something that suggests a subtly constructed reflex machine that can
mimic the human personality perfectly,’’ Hervey Cleckley wrote in
The Mask of Sanity . ‘‘. . . So perfect is this reproduction of a whole
and normal man that no one who examines the psychopath in a
clinical setting can point out in scientific or objective terms why, or
how, he
traits could be extremely dangerous.
Even though Paulhus and his fellow researchers have not applied
the Dark Triad to murderers, having studied it only in general
community populations, I believe that the concept provides the
missing link needed to explain the complex and often contradictory
psyche of eraser killers—whose actions at one moment may be
expertly calculated and at the next astonishingly self-defeating. It
would explain why these killers are described by friends, by police, and
sometimes even by their victims as charming yet callous, generous yet
self-centered, solicitous yet highly controlling. The use of the richer
psychological vocabulary of the Dark Triad allows us to describe and
make sense of behavior that has heretofore seemed incomprehensible.
Q
Let’s explore the three psychological traits in a little more depth,
beginning with psychopathy.
Not all psychopaths are like the humorless killing machines
depicted in an entire genre of true-crime books and movies. Many are
likeable, charismatic charmers, but their charm is slick and insincere.
They may be able to mesmerize and manipulate others with finely
honed skills of persuasion and flattery, but beneath the glossy surface,
their words are devoid of any real meaning or honest emotion.
Some psychopaths can fake normality better than others. We may
occasionally pick up on the sense that something is not quite right,
the vaguely queasy feeling one gets when a movie and its soundtrack
are out of sync. But more often than not we are fooled, even dazzled
by the show they put on for us.
They know how to draw us into their web because psychopaths are
masters of studied communication. But nothing they say connects
to anything genuine inside. The classic description of psychopaths is
that they ‘‘know the words but not the music.’’ They move through
the world with the deceptive verisimilitude of computer animation,
their emotions painted on, their words spoken as though by an actor
reciting lines. It is all a performance, calculated for the effect it will
have on a select audience, to get what they want by pretending to give
us what we want.
Psychopaths are practiced liars and expert manipulators. ‘‘Some
psychopaths get this huge joy out of duping people,’’ says Paulhus.
The Dark Triad
3 9
‘‘Being on the sly, having a secret life: that is the greatest part of what
they are doing.’’ As one man who topped out on Hare’s psychopathy
test said, ‘‘I lie like I breathe, one as much as the other.’’ They lie when
there is no reason to lie, even when they are certain to be caught.
In a nationally televised interview with Good Morning America ’s
Diane Sawyer, Peterson said he told police about his affair with
Amber Frey the very night Laci went missing, a statement police
immediately contradicted, and he had to retract before the second
part of the interview had even aired.
‘‘A psychopath will look you in the eye and lie when the truth
would be easier because they get a kick out of lying to people like
Diane Sawyer,’’ said former FBI profiler Candice DeLong. ‘‘They feel
superior.’’ When caught, they just shamelessly roll over into another
lie or, in the words of Robert Hare, ‘‘rework the facts so that they
appear to be consistent with the lie.’’
Even veteran researchers are taken aback by the sheer emotional
emptiness of psychopaths, and the remarkable ability many have to
hide that fact from those around them.
‘‘[W]e are dealing here not with a complete man at all but with
something that suggests a subtly constructed reflex machine that can
mimic the human personality perfectly,’’ Hervey Cleckley wrote in
The Mask of Sanity . ‘‘. . . So perfect is this reproduction of a whole
and normal man that no one who examines the psychopath in a
clinical setting can point out in scientific or objective terms why, or
how, he
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