Sadism - How far does our lack of empathy go?

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Sure, why not?

I'm a firm believer in the idea that there's no such thing as a thought crime. Thoughts come to us without being invited. It's just how you act on them, and whether you let them taint your perceptions and logic or not. That being said, we're not always as much in control as we think we are, and I still think you should try to get some help with this - just to make sure.

I can think of some other things besides medicine where being calm amidst suffering might be a really useful trait. Fire/rescue and disaster response for example.

I can see why you would say that, but I generally dislike people and wouldn't risk my life for a stranger.

In my opinion most people have some form of violent/sadistic thoughts/fantasies from time to time - it's the brain's way of coping with pent up frustration and anger toward others. It's whether you act on your thoughts that is the main thing.

If I've been through a situation where I've been humiliated/bullied I will often get an image in my mind of me taking revenge on the people involved - it feels satisfying to get my own back on these people and as it's all in my head it's not dangerous to me or them - it's a safety valve to enable me to release the anger in a harmless way.

It's a form of ego protection - you imagine wiping these people out to remove the bad feelings they've caused in your mind. It's cathartic and serves a purpose.

To dwell on causing other people pain if they haven't actually done anything wrong towards you is another thing altogether and a lot more worrying - that's a sign of a sadistic mindset in my opinion and you'd have to make sure you never acted on your thoughts. If you did feel like acting on them you'd need to tell other people so they could try and help you not to or possibly give you some kind of medication to dampen down the thoughts/impulses.

Generally though I think you are decribing the normal thoughts many people have when they feel angry towards others but they just don't tend to talk about them as it's socially frowned on.

While I agree with what you said, I think about hurting people who haven't done anything to me.

Euhh, yeah, no, I agree with what you are saying in terms of the normalcy of violent thoughts. But what he is talking about is, I would say, exemplary of a sadistic mindset.

Having normal violent thoughts is considerably different to watching torture/violence to calm down, and the other things that Shadewraith described.

Something interesting I had thought about was getting into BDSM, mainly the DS/SM portion. My fiancee would never go for it, though. I would love to have some slave who would let me dominate them. Maybe let me tie them up, blindfold them, and either cut them a bit or let me stick surgical needles into their skin.

Relevant to what was discussed earlier, I was watching some videos on a typical day of (insert medical profession here) and I watched an anesthesiologist stick a long needle deep inside of a woman's spine. It sent me into a manic mood. I actually smiled and started clapping .

Hmmm that's a bit disturbing.

Were your parents aggressive/violent towards you at all when you were growing up?

Or were you bullied at school?

That's more worrying. But you are aware of it and say you don't want to act on it so that's a good thing. As long as you don't act on these thoughts you're ok but if you cross that line it's serious ie you then become a threat to society.

I'd try and think of something else when these fantasies come into your head ie try not to dwell on them.

Would you say you have a conscience? ie if you upset someone do you feel bad about it?

Does lighting fires/committing arson appeal to you?

Did you wet the bed a lot as a child?

Yes, I was bullied at school. My dad was pretty unhelpful when I was going through depression. He even offered me a gun to kill myself once. When I replay that scenario in my head, I accept the gun and shoot him. But plenty of people are bullied and have bad parents and still turn out perfectly fine.

I'm thinking of asking my doctor to order an fMRI to see what my brain looks like. Think that could reveal something?

Yes I totally agree - I hadn't realised he was having these thoughts about anyone/people who hadn't done anything wrong to him.

Hard to know how frequent this type of thought pattern is within the general population though as most people aren't likely to admit it - it might be a hell of a lot more normal than we think judging by what I read in the papers!

I do want to act on them. I just don't because being in jail would be terribly inconvenient. I also care deeply about two people in my life who I wouldn't want to be separated from.



Rarely. I might get mad at myself for offending someone. I often say things differently than I'm thinking them. When most people get upset about what I say, I really feel like they're too overly emotional.



Setting fire to people? Not really. Setting fire to buildings? Depends. My sadistic fantasies are more personal. Lighting a building on fire is just really impersonal. Like using a gun instead of a knife.



Nope.

Very interesting

Basically some peopke are predisposed genetically or neurologically to thinking/behaving in a sadistic manner and depending on their experiences in life, it might come to the fore and be acted on or it might remain latent

So a person with a very violent upbringing might become a sociopath/psychopath but a person brought up in a loving supportive family might not and might go on to have a law abiding, productive life

You seem to have been 'triggered' by the school bullying and your Dad's terrible behaviour

Your Dad sounds as if he has sociopathic traits to me so perhaps you've inherited that gene/genes?

That's horrendous what he did offering you that gun - off the scale evil!

I saw a documentary where they could scan a person's brain to see if they had the markers for
psychopathy - it's something you should definitely look into in my opinion as it would make the Drs take you more seriously if the indicators were present in the scan

My dad's not a sociopath. He's just a tactless idiot. I doubt he carried the warrior gene.

Giving your own child a gun to kill themself is a horrendous thing to do - it shows a complete absence of compassion or conscience.

Have you ever killed or tortured an animal/living creature?

I really think he was being sarcastic. He's known for saying insensitive things.

Read back a few pages. I've tortured bugs, snakes, and have shot a bird or two with a bb gun. I once threw a large rock at one of my dogs I had when I was younger too. I could never bring myself to hurt a cat, though.

Oh dear - exceedingly worrying then!

Are you in the USA?