Other Trying to understand "lack of empathy"

[grit]

One of the route of healing cptsd is to enhance empathy. It is hard for an abused child to develop. So in Essence for all of us to still suffer could mean we have not reached certain levels of empathy as it is.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I've been in the service dog community on youtube for quite some time now. There is a handler of an in training dog on the spectrum. I believe it's Aspergers if I'm not mistaken. She is currently being abused by her older brother who also has a youtube channel, videos his verbal and emotional abuse and then uploads them. It's disgusting. She's also a teenager. 15 or so. She recently did something that was very hurtful to a lot of people and made a lot of people upset. She then, with a lot of urging, made an appology vieeo that sounded like she was reading a script. I want to appolgize to "list off the names" super flat, super uncaring, total lack of empathy (so it sounded anyway) and just sounded like she was reading and didn't really understand that what she did was wrong, hurt people, nor that she was truely sorry that she hurt all of these people. I'm the sort of person that once you loose my trust it's very hard to get it back.

Youtube took away private messages and gave us private chats. So, either one on one chats or muliple person chats. I was in both at the time. The the ones she hurt was all in one chat with me, without her but we were discussing on adding her. I also have a seperate one on one chat with my MOD. We are good online friends. I went to my MOD to express my concerns about her flatness, sounding like she was reading, lacking empahy or true knowledge of how wrong what she did was and how much it hurt people, and what not. Expressing my own concerns and my own lost of trust. My MOD is a psychology major. Has her masters I believe. She said I was seeing disability. I was seeing Aspergers. That it doesn't mean she doesn't know how wrong she was or that she wasn't truely sorry and that's just how Aspergers displays itself.

I say all of that to say...

I do have a big big problem with these things being lumped in with the autistic spectrum. This isn't autism and its so sad it was linked from the start in this thread. JMO.

...maybe that's why austism and that spectrum is linked in the beginning? Because it's how it displays itself? I was quite upset to see austism in there in the beginning as well. Especially when talking about paychopaths, perps, and the like. Most especially when someone calls them "non-human" as that's just cruel. Especially when linking austism as there is enough stigma about austism but maybe it's just how it displays itself?

Everytime I think of this thread and the autism spectrum I think of this person and the situation I just wrote about up top. I don't think judgement is needed as what was first written about to understand lack of empathy. But, to understand it as a whole, I think you would want to understand then entire umbrella or spectrum of those that cannot feel empathy. Autism included. Or maybe it's not lack of empathy at all with autism but just the lack of displaying empathy. Actions rather then feeling?

I hope that made sense.

 

[ILoveLife]

Maybe in the autism spectrum we should not confuse sincere disinterest with lacking something?
I've worked with enough kids on the spectrum to know there isn't a lack of empathy, mostly just general disinterest in spending their energy that way - imagine an autistic brain, always on overload, seriously commited to it 24/7, does it need to process "Look, that person is having an emotion, am I going to give my attention to it?"
We, non-spectrum people, actually do the same. Have you walked past a person crying on the street and didn't stop? Saw someone angry and didn't engage, forgot about it 5 seconds later? Well...

 

[Abstract]

Also realised a long time ago that emotional empathy does not stop someone harming others. Cognitive absolutely doesn't at all. In fact in my experience many who are emotionally empathic can be quiet emotional in general with loss of control which can be aimed at others while they are lost in that emotion. I think there is sometimes a little correlation between Myers Briggs feeling types. Thinking can mean more moderation and control. One thing is for sure. Human beings are endlessly complex and can almost always surprise us. Negatively or positively. I love that young people particularly have so much potential to change. Wish more of us on here had the right input at that point in our lives.

 

[TTC18]

It’s lack of empathy PLUS maliciousness.

*THIS*
It's the malice that causes issues - empathy or no empathy. Malice.

Also to add... I grew up with a parent who had no empathy. She just didn't care about anyone/thing but herself and her own comfort and convenience. Some people who have no empathy are probably fine with faking it, or are struggling with it, and so on - but having a caregiver who looks at you like you're a bug when you're a little kid is awful. I think that looking into the eyes of a parent or anyone who should be caring for you, and seeing that 'You're a thing in my way' look is disconcerting, disturbing, and yes - haunting. I don't know if that's a lack of empathy or a lack of simply seeing others as anything other than objects to be used or pushed aside, but it is disturbing to be on the receiving end of.

Possibly, @Sophy it's more like a sociopathic thing than a simple lack of empathy. In my experience, there's a lack of empathy so extreme and profound as to be hard to imagine if you haven't been in a room with it. It's more than just struggling to feel empathetic, which most people do on occasion... It's like a complete absence of any vestige of empathy at all. So much more extreme than it seems like most of the people on this thread are talking about. Or - who knows, I may be 100% off base, and everyone else on the thread has also dealt with this and just views it differently. I know about as much about this stuff as I do about the ham sandwich I just ate. ;)

 

[lostforgottensoul]

Maybe in the autism spectrum we should not confuse sincere disinterest with lacking something?

It was this:

It really depends on the observable behavior, not an idea of whether or not someone feels it.

That I was thinking about. I'm not saying austisics don't feel empathy. I am saying that I observed the lack of displaying empathy in someone with Aspergers. Was thinking that maybe the lack of displaying is why they were on the list?

No one can really measure how much a person feels something without first asking them and studying them. So, are we talking about the lack of feeling empathy or the lack of displaying empathy? Or both?

ETA:

Malice.

Adds yet a 3rd layer.

ETD2: These layers is why I had trouble grasping it.

 

[ILoveLife]

Oh I got it, @lostforgottensoul, I wasn't speaking at you directly, more on the general theme of the thread.

I was replying to the whole "autistic people don't have empathy" thing, that I honestly feel it's a lie.

Besides, is empathy an emotion to be felt or a trait we have, or a mechanism in the brain, or...?

I read an interesting book on how emotions and feelings shape culture, and surely empathy is needed for that, so I assume there are varying degrees of it in us all.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

'You're a thing in my way'

The way I experienced it was way more dark and distrubing. It was seeing me in pain was erotic. It was pleasurable in very dark ways. I don't want to get graphic in here as I know that's triggering for most and though we don't have trigger warnings, still. But, I knew that the more pain I was in the more sexual pleasure he got. And it got really, really distrubing. Much I advised elsewhere on the forum and some I did not. But knowing that is very distrubing indeed. It was like I was a sexual tool. A thing to be tortured, used for his sexual pleasure, then discarded until next use. Knowing that plays very dark roles in my mind even today.

 

[mumstheword]

I am not, nor anything else, there.

I was literally just reacting to what you wrote, and the misconceptions contained in that, and a different reading on that situation. That personalizing and assuming things of emotional state, and a need to get on defensive, instead of talk about the topic (psychopathy or not in kids, from a number of traits) was not mine.

Look, my post was not Mumstheword is a Bad Mom, someone take that kid away for their well being, quickly.
It was I think there may be something else going on *for that child*, whether they are autistic or anything else (FYI, on the spectrum *is still autistic*, just a different type / manifestation, that comment of He is not autistic, just on the spectrum, literally makes very little sense in my head, category wise.).

I was not aware that *simply discussing a topic* and differentiating things is an issue.

But it seems you have lesser issue taking points very similar to mine from Friday, than me, so well.

Yeah, it was particulary the "eye roll" comment that got to me. Eye rolls are characteristically indicative of an emotional reaction.
And no you are still reading your own thing into what I said. I never said my kid was a psychopath, but that he is a child prone to excessive violent ideation and aggression, however, that he has been raised to negate those impulses in himself.
He is not, in a classic way, exemplifying autistic traits. He gets social cues. It is more like the other thing and yes I'm sensitive about it because his father ticks pretty much every trait on Hare's psychopath list and has traits and behaviours that would get him diagnosed as someone with a cluster b type personality with strong characteristics of narcissistic personality disorder and anti social personality disorder and before you condescend to me and tell me I'm not qualified to diagnose, yes, I know that, but I lived with the man for long enough, I am intelligent enough and I've researched and read extensively so I'm going to assert what I believe to be the case. Genetics can and do play a role in these things. So does culture and conditioning, pavlovs dog and all that. My kid is reared with training in opposition to any kind of fertile ground that would turn these genetic predispositions into full blown behaviour and thought patterns. I'm the opposite type of person to any that enjoy power over others in a harmful way, I don't understand delighting in violent fantasies and although I've had other boys who said at that age they were the same, they were not aggressive like this child was in very young childhood. This child picked up big pieces of wood and hit me, hard, over the head, as a toddler. He would lash out and pull my hair and attack, kicking and punching as a preschooler. I ended up having to hold him while he had his flailing temper tantrums, it was extreme. And before you scoff at me saying, "well he obviously suffered from trauma and kid's with Aspergers can be known to lash out, yes, but they are not typically exhitibing these traits, these are the kinds of traits that can blow out in anti social ways if not managed right, I know my own child And my point was very aggressive children can become the kind of anti social adults the OP was talking about, but it takes the right epigenetic conditions, typically, neglect to provide the right kinds of boundaries, protections, and examples and loving respect and intellectual stimulation required to negate the extreme aggressive tendencies, that, left unchecked, or provoked into a pathological state, can turn into people, like my children's father, who exhibits many traits and characteristics of these cluster b symptoms (narcissistic and anti social personality type personalities) and show no remorse or sense of empathy or consideration for welfare of those they target .

 

[Ronin]

I get being worried.

But that point stands, still, that children are children instead of bad rolemodel adults, fantasies do not necessarily transfer to real acts, actions while a little child do not automatically predict adult ones, and a question of measure (excessive), IDK: How much in that are your own fears playing out, and the history of abuse, or seeing the kids father in him?

Honest question, not meant as a cricitism.
Just wondering how much is reading past abuse, fear of abuse, normal developmental stages being distressing because there was other violence going on, and anxiety, affecting how you read him, or others in that age group.

 

[ILoveLife]

mums.. I've met some disturbingly aggressive kids in my time who didn't grow up to be violent adults. Even without the compassion and love of a wonderful mum like yourself.
I think that's the point folks are trying to make here, that there are developmental phases that kids go through. But you know this, so maybe your fear that your kid will turn out like your ex is speaking louder here?

I do think that if he feels bad about having those violent thoughts - in an age where violence on tv, video games, movies, etc etc etc, is everywhere - I do think there's hope for him to grow out of it. Especially because you're such a loving influence on him. There's a lot to be learned from role models. And he is learning that he doesn't want to be like his father - that is a massive developmental stepping stone right there.

 

[EveHarrington]

Well, you know what they say...

When you’ve met one person on the spectrum, you’ve met ONE person on the spectrum!

Meaning, no two people on the spectrum are the same.

So I think we may be dealing with a bit of “the person I know on the spectrum isn’t like the person you know on the spectrum”...

Once I asked one of my friends on the spectrum if he would comfort/hug me if I was having a bad day. He said he doesn’t usually offer people comfort as he sees it as something children learn to do for themselves, but he would hug me and talk through the issue with me until I was ok. He didn’t really “get it”... Well, in that emotional comforting between two individuals isn’t necessarily a matter of there being an issue that needs to be solved. I mean I can go to my boyfriend and feel better with just a hug, no words exchanged, no problems “fixed”. I don’t know exactly what this difference is, I just know that my mind works differently than my friends. It APPEARS that he lacks empathy, but really it may just be that our minds work differently. I know he cares about me as he shows it in different ways.