Dr. Martin Hash Podcast

The field of Pop psychology is absolutely chock full of pseudoscience, mostly to prop up or justify the researcher’s personal deficiencies. It’s almost always a matter of applying disparaging labels; name-calling hiding behind post graduate degrees. There's no better example than when they throw around the concept of a dark triad. The Dark Triad is said to be composed of narcissism, Machiavellianism & psychopathy; which doesn’t sound unreasonable until the explicit definitions of those words comes to light. Basically, according to them, everyone who excels in the context of liberty, meritocracy & Protestant Work Ethic are charter members of the Dark Triad.

A “narcissist” is what an unaccomplished person calls another person displaying pride in their achievements. Besides the envy & resentment aspects of those who use the label, their primary complaint is that narcissists aren’t spending enough time thinking about them; these are the same people who think ambition is ego. Also, be suspicious anytime you see the word “empathy” applied for or against anyone because that is the word unnoteworthy people use to make themselves the center of attention.

Machiavellianism, as most people know is named after a famous wise author whose insights troubled the altruistic sensibilities of timid people, and means simply ignoring the artifices of morality. Morals are notoriously subjective, so whether one sees Machiavellain as a good or bad trait depends on who’s calling who what. The very fact that patience & calculation are considered signs of Machiavellianism is a clear indicator of the predispositions & prejudices of its detractors.

These same people intentionally conflate sociopathy with psychopathy; the former is a sign of the highly capable, competent & conscientious among us, while the latter is a medically diagnoses for broken individuals who receive pleasure by hurting others. Since perversity is a trait that all these name-callers seem to share, taking pleasure in other’s misfortunes even when personally detrimental; it’s more likely the people calling other people psychopaths are the majority of psychopaths. Evidently, the darkest thing about the Dark Triad are the ones using the term.