Every person’s brain chemistry is different.
It’s one of the many reasons why we’re as unalike as snowflakes in the wide expanse of humanity. Our DNA, brain chemistry, and the impacts of early childhood development, set us apart and launch us on a lifelong course of caring about others….. or not.
Brain chemistry enables the creation of emotional empathy, the ability to feel the pain in our own being when another person experiences harm. If you cringe as a person falls off a chair, you’re experiencing emotional empathy.
Emotional empathy’s impact on moral development
As I’ve discussed, elsewhere on this blog, without emotional empathy, one can’t develop a conscience. If we can’t feel a pang of pain ourselves, by what others experience, we don’t feel badly when we cause distress to another person. We’re only prevented from hurting them by the fear of exposure or consequences. We simply don’t relate to the agony we cause.
Empathy and SexFraud
People who fail to comprehend the harm in sexually penetrating a person without their consent are devoid of emotional empathy. They lack the brain chemistry to connect deeply to another person. Instead of recognizing the emotional trauma they cause by duping someone into sex, they think of sexual relations as nothing more than getting a fix of excitement by exchanging warm flesh and body fluids. To them, sex is a commodity to be obtained however they choose. People are simply objects to service their desire.
Who conducts SexFraud?
When you see the opposition to legislation to prevent SexFraud, ask yourself what is motivating the objection. Is it because the person can’t grasp the emotional connectivity of sexual intercourse or why lying to induce sex is such a terrible defilement to a person? Are they demonstrating that they personally may have no such bonding mechanism? Both the bonding connectivity in sex, and the formation of conscience are fueled by the same neurotransmitters, including oxytocin.
If a person thinks it’s okay to lie to induce sex from someone, which violates the most intimate core of a person’s being, what will they do to get other things they want?
Character Disorder’s Impact on Romance
To a person who’s disordered, the empathetic person is a chump, stupid, a fool, gullible and vulnerable. When they victimize someone, it’s the other person’s fault. “They should have known better,” “It was their responsibility to not be fooled,” “Let the buyer beware,” are all common mantras of a character disordered mind.
Con artists are very good at what they do. Even being highly responsible and intelligent can’t protect a person from them. They master the combination of stirring up brain chemistry through affection and behaviors that build trust. They elevate the production of neuropeptides in others, the very brain chemistry they lack, in order to accomplish their goals. And they fail to see the harm they create because people without oxytocin or appropriate brain chemistry simply lack the emotional empathy to feel their victim’s pain.
Anon-
You’re 200% correct!
The insidious, simple lie is a sign that the person has no compunctions about misleading you. They are an opportunist. If they lie about something they feel is a small, meaningless matter, how could you possibly depend on them not to lie over major considerations.
In truth, their age gives you an impression of them that they obviously think matters, or they wouldn’t lie about it. And yet people will argue that it’s no big deal. I would argue, if age is no big deal, why lie?
It is very painful and emotionally devastating to find out that the man that you fell in love with and had an intense sexual relationship with was a complete fraud. To discover that the sex and romance was used to gain your trust so that you could then be exploited financially. Then, to realize that his sights were set on your financial destruction. It was rape and plunder. Rape and plunder by fraud.
If a man lies about his age, run the other way. Yes, the con man that targeted me, lied about his age. I recall thinking that he must be older than the age he proclaimed and stated on the dating site. Things just didn’t add up. When I considered his educational achievements and career, he should have been several years older. Now that I am on dating sites again, I verify age on internet background checks and if there is incongruence, I have zero tolerance. I call these guys on their age lies and tell them that their age on the dating site does not match their age on internet search. If we demand honesty and integrity in the dating world, maybe we will change the lying mentality. How can we tell the good guys from the con artists, if someone is lying about their age?
The lying about age could have been my first Segway to breaking away. At that time, I believed what he told me. In most cases, the age can be verified on the internet background checks for a nominal fee.
There were other things that this con man lied about, but it took time for those lies to become apparent. A partner that lies about his age may be covering up a lot of other lies, including marital status, intentions, criminal background, or who knows what else. What begins with a lie, may end with a lie.
Don’t learn the hard way like I did. However, if you are reading this blog, you have most likely already had an experience on the dark side.