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'I Always Knew I Was Different': The Wall Street Journal Sociopath Essay

from P. Diddy & The Loneliness Plague | The Tim Dillon Show #386 · #386

5 min

News

Tim reads and mocks a Wall Street Journal personal essay by a self-described sociopath who stole a Beatle's glasses as a toddler and claims she feels no guilt or empathy, comparing her rationalizations to those used to justify wartime violence.

In this bit11 moments
  • Tim reads a Wall Street Journal essay titled 'I Always Knew I Was Different' about a woman coming into her own as a self-identified sociopath.
  • If you saw her in person, would you even need the article to know something was off?
  • The author claims she started stealing before she could talk and had an entire box of stolen items by age six or seven.
  • She includes a memory of stealing glasses off Ringo Starr's face in his backyard when she was a toddler.
  • The author describes not feeling guilt when lying, not feeling compassion when classmates got hurt, and feeling nothing instead.
  • Tim argues that someone with no conscience and no emotions should be incredibly successful, given how many sentient people struggle just to put one foot in front of the other.
  • The author claims that after earning a PhD in psychology, she can say sociopaths aren't bad or evil, they just have a harder time with feelings.
  • She reassures readers that millions of sociopaths have good jobs, close-knit families, and real friends—which Tim finds darkly comforting.
  • Tim compares the essay's tone to Braveheart, with the author positioning her inability to feel as something everyone should sympathize with.
  • Tim compares her self-pitying narrative to Israel's justification for bombing, both framing harmful actions as something that hurts the perpetrator more than the victim.
  • The essay's central message: she's a sociopath surrounded by millions of others who don't care about anything, and they all have jobs and families like normal people.
Mentioned here

IsraelRingo StarrPeople magazine

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