I Am a Psychopath

Torturing And/or Killing Animals...
One thing I never understood was the predisposition psychopaths have in their early childhood to torturing/killing animals...
Personally, I never had the urge to. Not because I felt bad for them, but I think it's because they can't understand what's happening to them. Same thing goes with infants and mentally retarded individuals; if you look an animal or a baby in the eye and say "okay, now I'm gonna stab you in the face with this spoon!" you're not going to get any reaction from them...just a stupid stare.

Now, I can understand the feeling of control one derives from killing something/anything, but for me it was just never enough to actually make me go out of my way to do it. For me, knowledge of the world around me and the comprehension of it is essential, so putting an animal through torture seems to me a waste of time if the thing can't understand what's being done to it.

Maybe those of you who have experienced the drive behind it can better explain. I'm honestly, yet respectfully, stumped.

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PMurinus

The only difference between human fear and that of other mammals is what you have to do to elicit it. Animals don't understand human language, but they understand pain -- and they remember it. A dog for instance who has been hit before fears a raised hand, or any tools someone has used to hurt him before. And with the social animals, dogs again being a good example, you can even get blatant submission out of them as they try to placate you into not hurting them-- or even hurting them less.

You can even scare them into not resisting while you hurt them, and THAT is a lovely feeling of control. Crossing the species barrier, getting so far inside a dumb mutt's head that you override its instincts of self preservation.

Now, personally, I prefer non-human animal company to that of humans, so I don't usually hurt them. But I do understand the appeal, and of course it is something much easier to get away with than torturing a person.