Doctor Andrew Lobaczewski, a Polish psychiatrist, wrote the ground-breaking book Political Ponerology, exposing the psychopathic personality that is so common in the political, institutional and media spheres. In his book he breaks down some of the techniques used by psychopaths, such as ‘reversive blockades’ (big lies), ‘projection’ (ascribing one’s own negative qualities, actions, or intentions to others), ‘paralogisms’ (logical-sounding but wrong statements), ‘paramoralisms’ (inversions of common morality meant to appeal to our innate moral sensibilities), ‘eliciting maladaptive responses’, and using ‘pathological egotism’ to terrorize and coerce. These all share something in common: they are designed to deceive and to influence others to do something they otherwise wouldn’t do.
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