You could be a meat eater, kid, and I mean people, not their garbage!
—“A No.1” (Lee Marvin) to “Cigaret” (Keith Carradine) in Emperor of the North
The Great American Psychopath (GAP) is a kind of cross between Captain Ahab from Moby Dick and Wyle E. Coyote from the Roadrunner cartoons. He isn’t necessarily American, this Psychopath, being a common “type” in every culture, representing basic human traits and tendencies. The big difference is that in America the GAP is in part our national heritage, the dark side of what the American environment creates. Here at the start of the millennium (where the serial killer is as much a popular commodity as the hot dog), the idea of the GAP has finally come into its own, becoming virtually synonymous with (or indistinguishable from) the all-American (anti) hero. (A process begun in the ’60s but fully consolidated with Dirty Harry, in that great year 1971, and more or less completed with the execrable Silence of the Lambs.) Beyond this—the heroification of the psycho and psychotization of the hero—there is a lurking, creeping metaphysical angle to consider. Films like The Usual Suspects and Se7en (the serial killer as messiah) give us a psycho wholly reconciled to his psychosis (though still somehow abject), and as such—it is hinted—none other than the Arch Fiend himself, in street-friendly form.
The GAP actually has his origin not in society or even movies, but in nature itself. The fact is that so-called “psychotic” or “evil” (i.e., obsessive destructive) behavior is the distortion of purely natural, instinctive “urges” that have been denied (and hence distorted) in the human animal. At the same time, it’s essential to realize that the psycho, as such, has not only been encouraged by our present society (especially American society) but actively created and propagated in (and through) the human species (through a combination of too much caffeine, Coca Cola, TV advertising, ultraviolet lights, e-product food additives, prescription drugs, elevator musak, kiddies cartoons—you name it, the list is potentially endless). The Psychopath, like the Artist, like the Magician, intends himself into being. Such intent comes from ego, however, which is a phantom, an imaginal construct. Of course, everything is imaginal and “unreal” at some level, but the difference between ego and everything else is that ego takes itself for real; it sees things literally. Perhaps this is even its job, its very nature; but if so, anything that comes from such a fallacy must come to no good, if taken to extremes. So it seems only natural that, if we embark into magical territory (the id), we must do so “unintentionally,” by accident, or be tricked into it (as Neo in The Matrix is tricked). Otherwise, the ego’s literalism will spoil the magic, force it to conform to dayworld preconceptions, losing touch with the subtlety required for finding one’s way through the id world.
This, in a nutshell, is the GAP. He launches himself towards an idealized vision, and in his attempt to grasp it as real, he takes it literally. As the journey progresses he surpasses the limits of literal thinking and must learn a new way of seeing or else perish. The journey begins as an effort to grasp an ungraspable ideal and the GAP, if he’s lucky, may accidentally learn a few things along the way. If he allows these “lessons” to take hold, he takes a step toward enlightenment; if he rejects them and continues on the Psycho Path, he self-destructs. The Psychopath is both madman and idiot.
As the Psychopath approaches the edge of all human limits, a transformation can take place; provided his desire/obsession continues to propel him, this may even involve an outright physical transformation. A form of transcendence?1 A metaphysical transfiguration? There is a distinction to be made, however, between serial killer and Psychopath. Often the serial killer may be a Psychopath, even a GAP (John Doe from Se7en certainly qualifies here), but not in every case. Once the GAP has become “wholly reconciled to his psychosis,” he almost becomes a different animal. An evolution, of sorts, takes place. The creature starts off as one thing and then goes through a process of change, one that is usually sparked by environmental factors. This happens either as a result of the environment changing, and so creating the creature, or of the creature itself changing its own environment, by moving from it, attacking it, or otherwise directly altering it. As evolution continues, the creature changes by degrees until it becomes unrecognizable, something else entirely, albeit something that still retains a residue of its former identity (like tail and gills on a human fetus).
In Michael Mann’s Manhunter the psychopath Dolarhyde makes explicit the transcendental intent behind all his transgressions; to Hannibal Lecter he writes: “You alone can understand what I am becoming. You alone know the people I use to help me in these things are only elements undergoing change to fuel the radiance of what I am becoming. Just as the source of light is burning.”
As Philip L. Simpson writes (in Psycho Paths, the only work I know of to cover some of the same ground as the present essay): “Dolarhyde attempts to transcend his human weaknesses by imaginatively transforming into an omnipotent, transcendent being.” Simpson further embellishes on the psychopath’s motives:
The goal is to establish a stable core identity. This identity can only be reached through a mythic existence that transcends the destabilizing change inherent in temporality. In these works, ritualized repeat murder is the strategy by which the besieged individual grasps eternity. For the identity-obsessed serial killer, the inescapable immediacy of extreme physical violence erases intermediary thought, modes of interpretation, conflicting ideologies, and so forth. . . . [These characters] attempt to divorce themselves from social context and live in the eternal present of myth.i
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Find a Clown and grind him down/He may just be laughing at you
An unprincipled and uncommitted/Clown can hardly be permitted to
Sit around and laugh at what/The decent people try to do
Laughing Boy, keep moving
— Randy Newman , “Laughing Boy”
Blue Velvet is the most powerful statement of the revved up Psychopathic psyche in modern movies. In fact, it was probably my excitement over Blue Velvet that intensified my interest in such films, finally coalescing them together into the GAP idea. I LOVE Frank Booth. I recognize him. I’ve seen a bit of Frank in people I’ve met and have known, I’ve felt a bit of Frank in me. Frank exists at that edge where the Psychopath has jacked himself up so high on his own obsessions and other substances that he begins to flicker over to the other side. This is implicitly suggested by the bizarre cut in the film, when at Ben’s place, Frank cries “I’ll fuck anything that moves!” cackles insanely, and—disappears! It’s this level of freedom, which is not realistic but literally deranged, and which comes from being pumped up on “the American Dream,” that the Psychopath is searching for, and which he will never find (at least without destroying himself). The Psychopath wants complete personal control over time and space, over himself, and over other people. He is like a super-baby in an adult body (note Frank’s Mommy/Daddy fixation). Americans (and any other Psychopath, at least in the present terms) are big babies. They want it all. Frank is such a strangely endearing character because, among other things, his search has taken him deep into his own psyche, and through his heroic indulgences, his psyche is exposed for us all to see. Through Frank, we begin to see what it is that the Psychopath has been up to all along.
Another film that gives us such a glimpse, albeit in a very different manner, is Martin Scorsese’s The King of Comedy. Rupert Pupkin is a definitive case study of the GAP—far more so than Taxi Driver’s Travis Bickle, in fact (who is really less of a Psycho than Rupert, even though his actions appear more psychotic). Rupert actually fails to distinguish between reality and fantasy, which is the watermark of the true Psycho.2 Travis is merely tragically isolate (God’s lonely man), dissociated, disconnected from his own feelings, hence he becomes literally unhinged and explodes in psychotic behaviour. But he is different from other Psychos discussed here, in that one could imagine sitting down and having a coffee and apple pie (“with slice of melted yellow cheese”) with him, without feeling in any way endangered. He’s the Psycho as Everyman, as Bernard Goetz later proved to the world.
Pupkin, on the other hand, really brings forth that connection between the Psychopath (as we have outlined him, not necessarily as he’s clinically defined) and the Clown (more on which later). Rupert’s goal and his ideal self are hopelessly intertwined. As he obsessively pursues this goal/ideal self, he crosses the line that divides socially acceptable action, and arrives at the unacceptable. He becomes what he always was: a lunatic. But in his own mind he is merely acting out his destiny as an artist. The King of Comedy is a near “perfect” GAP film, in that its plot so closely matches the ideal model of the GAP journey of transformation or death.
Taxi Driver, on the other hand, is as much about loneliness as it is about Psychopathy. The film shows us what happens to the Psychopath when he becomes trapped in the city, the urban environment, where direct, forward action is impossible. His cab is a prison that isolates him from other people and the world around him; it takes him only in circles, not in a path toward a goal. In this way, Taxi Driver is a more philosophical GAP film, something more internal. Place Travis in a different environment and he might become more directly Psychopathic. But Travis spends most of the film trying to fit in, to become a “person like other people.” He is the Psychopath trying to re-enter society, doing a lousy job of it because he’s naive, basically a bit dumb, and unaware of himself, of his own psychosis. Like Rupert, he actually thinks he’s normal. After much failure, he finally realizes, and then KA-BLOOEY! He explodes into Psychopathy. This is true enough to life, in fact. The real psycho/sociopaths are usually very good at concealing their sickness under a mask of normalcy. On the surface Travis seems like a naive dope, a cowboy-attired throwback and a square (all of which he is. . . but then again isn’t), which to hip urban America seems like a quaint and harmless thing. But inside he is a heavily armed Psychopath, not a good-natured cowboy but a Mohawked savage. This is the Psychopath’s secret. Travis’ Injun-inspired haircut connects him with our more “primitive” past, with the hunter, not to mention our frontier past (the name “Travis” was borrowed from a John Ford Western). He circles the city in his cab, hunting for fares, looking for that link to humanity, but all he finds are cold women, whores, and shallow politicians. Finally, perhaps without even knowing it, Travis wakes up to his true role in this crowd (society)—he is not there to fit in, but to tear it apart.
Another key figure in popular mythology is Bruce Wayne/Batman, an archetypal GAP if ever there was one. Batman has the all-important quality of obsession; like all true Psychos, he lives in a world strangely of his own making. Obviously the Adam West Batman hardly qualifies, but Frank Miller’s Dark Knight makes the case plain enough. The Tim Burton 1989 movie toyed with the idea also, but presented the character more as a lovable neurotic rather than the “batshit” crazy, revenge-driven vigilante that he is. Chris Nolan’s Batman Begins (2004) attempted to take the character further into psychological reality, but in a very superficial way. Dark Knight (2008) was more successful, but it was still restricted by the conventions of the genre; Batman is the Hero, after all, he can’t be seen as a Psychopath, except through his distorted reflection the Joker (superbly—and fatally—embodied by Heath Ledger in his final role).
Batman is obsessed. He crosses that line and transforms himself, becomes a force of nature, but also a freak. His war against crime brings about an encounter with his personal devil, The Joker. In fact, in both Burton’s and Nolan’s films, Batman’s actions create the Joker. It’s significant that the Joker is a clown-like figure, because the specter that haunts the Psychopath is the Clown. By pursuing his dream so vigorously and blindly, the Psychopath becomes a foolish figure, one at which we’d laugh if he weren’t so frightening. While the Clown may know he is a psycho, however, the Psychopath does not realize he is a clown. Batman’s existence brings about the creation of super villains, as is made explicit in the movies: he creates (summons) the Joker as his necessary nemesis, his shadow side, his “raison d’être.” In a world without these villains, Batman would be the Psychopath. As it is, he becomes the Hero, reminding us that the Psychopath is the shadow of the Hero, just as the Clown is the shadow of the Psychopath. In Batman the Hero-Psycho-Clown relationship achieves symbiosis; expressed as it is in an exaggerated (Archetypal and dreamlike) comic book form, the machinery is exposed for all to see.
This Clown spectre also haunts Blue Velvet; witness Frank’s admiration for Ben, a harlequin-like figure who lip-syncs Roy Orbison’s “In Dreams,” Frank’s theme-song, with its opening line about the “candy colored clown.” When Frank abuses Jeffery he smears lipstick on his own face and kisses him, giving them both the appearance of clowns. Frank seem to admire—and even wish to be like—Ben, the candy-colored clown who lives at the center of “Pussy Heaven.” Ben is a bizarre figure, but he’s also dangerous. He perplexes us, and the Pussy Heaven scene (in which Ben, at first a friendly face, punches Jeffrey in the gut, then pats his cheek) is very much the film’s centerpiece, and put a dent in many an unsuspecting psyche. Look at a classic representation of a clown face, pay attention to the eyes: they often have that wild look, the one where the whites are visible above the iris, with the iris half-buried at the bottom—this is the laughing clown face, but it’s also the eyes of a deranged person. Many photos of Charlie Manson show him making this face. If you see someone on the street with this look in their eye—watch out!
Another seminal scene on the clown/psycho theme occurs in Goodfellas, when Joe Pesci’s Tommy abruptly shifts from a jovial storyteller to a fuming Psycho. “What do you mean ‘funny?’ Am I a clown? Do I amuse you?” This shift is genuinely chilling, and was the most remarked upon moment in the movie: clearly it had a great impact. The Psychopath, in his unhinged desire, which develops to absurdly revved up levels here, becomes laughable, and we are taken aback as much by his absurdity as his violence. There are always moments in these GAP films where the Psychopath appears absurd. Sometimes it’s a major point, sometimes it’s very subtle. As his desire increases, and his efforts along with it (all influenced by his strange and often stupid way of going after his “dream”), the Psychopath becomes a parody of himself. In much the same way, Circus Clowns ape normal human behavior, particularly our flaws, exaggerating for comedic effect. Realizing that he has become a clown, that his desire and his quest has surpassed certain boundaries and become absurd, is one of the few ways a Psychopath can check his progress towards destruction. This realization can then lead to some kind of redemption or healing. The realization of one’s absurdity, one’s humanity, the futility of one’s quest, ushers in a new kind of humility. This may help the Psychopath to see himself, and others, more clearly, more humanly, and more humanely.
Some Psychopaths, however, realize their absurdity, their clownishness, and incorporate it into their Psychopathy. When this happens, both in films (Frank Booth, for example, and the Joker, obviously) and in real life (John Wayne Gacy), the Psychopath becomes all the more dangerous, because he has assimilated what had the potential of stopping him in his tracks, of waking him up, and channeled it into his psychosis instead. He reaches the next level on the GAP journey, which often entails physical transformation.
The Psychopath’s fatal flaw is that he takes himself desperately seriously. The thing he fears most (like Apache warriors) is to appear ridiculous. Apparently Hitler couldn’t stand satire, because he knew that ridicule was the one thing that could defeat him. The present GAP thesis requires such a satirical approach, which is why we promote Wyle Coyote as the ultimate psycho-archetype. Wyle Coyote’s desire for the Roadrunner far outstrips his need for food, and no amount of failure can cause him to question the sanity of his desire. Instead, he just escalates his efforts to catch the bird until the bird no longer seems to matter; this is precisely what makes him so funny. He tries so hard, so desperately, for what seems like so little. We may see ourselves in him, especially his inability to effectively bring about his desires, and the way this only makes them all the more obsessive.
Another clown-psycho of note is Freddy Krueger, from the Nightmare on Elm Street films. Freddy is as much Trickster as he is Psychopath, perhaps even more of a Trickster. His ability to break the laws of physics and his outrageous powers belong as much, and maybe more, to the world of the cartoon than the horror film. From the view of “the other side,” the lives of mere mortals must appear ridiculous, their tortures mere jokes. The Psychopath is deranged, unhinged, hell-bent, in a word: obsessed. He pursues an idealized goal of some kind. This pursuit, so long as the Psychopath continues past all natural obstacles, can, and often does, take him into bizarre territory. Some Psychopaths manage to cross this border, usually in the more symbolic/metaphorical/fantasy-related works, to the next stage of evolution. Some do it and die (in the more realistic works), and some do it and live, in some new form or another. This only occurs in the fantasy genres, but is the next step in the evolution of the Psychopath, whereupon the GAP becomes—something else. Still Psychopathic, he is now entering into “transcendental realms.” The Psychopath now becomes a sort of disembodied Psychopathic Spirit, if you will, which can possess others but also act on his own in some way. Freddy would apply here, as would “Killer Bob” from Lynch’s Twin Peaks. The problem here is that, the further away from “normal” humanity this Psychopathic Spirit gets, the more he evolves into a different animal, still Psychopathic but not the same Psychopath. As long as the Psychopath remains human he tells the GAP story. When he transcends his humanness, however, he no longer faces the same issues the GAP faces. This is the major distinction. Freddy has broken the bonds of the human, and as such he no longer speaks to us as a Frank Booth can. Freddy becomes a “monster,” of sorts, not-human, a caricature of the GAP (though he does also become a species of Clown).
Yet this in turn may only be symptomatic of our own steady dissociation from our unconscious psyches, our humanness, as we become ever more lost in the abstract “fantasy” realms of our technology. Freddy seems to know instinctively of the relationship between the Clown and the Psychopath, between fear and laughter, because he becomes a trickster figure quite consciously. He is the Psychopath as stand-up comedian. What’s essential to know about Freddy is that he exists as the actual symbiosis between the outer and the inner Psycho—he is our worst (hence most repressed) tendencies, come not to haunt but to devour us. As such he appears fantastic and irreal, at this time (even a little silly), but is gaining credence and validity (and therefore power) in our psyches with every passing minute.3
On the other hand, a movie like Silence of the Lambs gives us a wholly phony psycho, one that has no real bearing in either reality or myth. People like this simply do not exist. Yet, unlike Freddy, who’s obviously a fantasy figure, the film pretends to be a “serious” study of the psychopath. Serial killer and bogeyman: the one is a reality, the other a fantasy, character vs. caricature. But again, in terms of popular movies, the latter (caricature) seems to be superseding the former with ever-growing speed and totality. I don’t think we want to admit there are people like Frank (we can pretend there are people like Hannibal Lecter instead), because then we would have to look at why. The only answer is: because: because they are necessary (for our evolution?).
The problem with Hannibal is that he’s presented as a “real” guy, when in truth he has more in common with a monster, more specifically, a vampire/werewolf combination. It’s Nightmare on Elm Street taking itself seriously. Hannibal is a cold, inhuman figure who combines the traits of the superhuman with the sub-human monster. He has a super-intellect and the hypersensitivity of an animal. He seems bloodless like a vampire, cold and calculating, yet he attacks like a wild animal. He hisses like a snake, he stares like a predator. Hannibal is a Psychopath who has transcended humanity but has remained human, therefore he turns the film from realism to fantasy while fooling viewers into thinking he’s “real.” Maybe that’s why people took to this film—it made them believe that monsters could indeed be real. In fact, Silence (widely acclaimed as it was) is largely responsible for the cult of the serial killer becoming so prominent, and for this very reason. Many misguided people began to “worship” real-life psychos like Charlie Manson, who, like your Gacys and Bundys, embodies many of the things we have been talking about. Because of this, the general public, once exposed to these GAP musings, will immediately think we are discussing serial killers, which completely voids these ideas of any meaning and gives them permission to indulge in more misguided hero-worship. Make no mistake, the GAP is a heroic figure, but only if he brings us back to our humanity, such as it is.
Serial killer worship such as inspired by Silence and other similar products leads to goofy fandom that is almost incapable of deep insights (re: Anne Rice vampire nerds, etc.). Still, Lecter qualifies as a post-transcendence Psychopath, albeit one that doesn’t really interest us here.4
The message of these “post-transcendence” psycho movies (Natural Born Killers is another) seems almost to be —“if the psychopath would persist in his psychosis, he would become sane.” The danger, of course, is that it’s rather too close to Manson-speak for comfort. The idea is most fully, yet still I think superficially, developed in NBK, where Stone actually suggests his heroes are somehow redeemed by the “purity” of their acts. But this is nothing to do with the actual truth, because Mickey and Mallory are the same shallow “TV-Babies”ii at the end of the movie as they were at the start. The demons that drove them could hardly be so easily exorcised, and such demons (which make NBK the perfect “overlap” movie between, say, Badlands and Twin Peaks or Lost Highway—it’s hybrid crime/metaphysics) invariably devour their hosts long before they ever leave them. However, it is true that the afore-mentioned “metaphysical transformation,” though yet to be adequately represented by cinema fiction, would seem to be the only possible “redemption” for the Psycho. This is why he invariably seeks death as the only kind of transformation of which he is capable. A Psycho who truly became a saint would have to undergo a genuine dark night of the soul (that “crossing of the Abyss”), in order to come out the other side of his madness and discover that dementia is merely the poor man’s ecstasy. He would realize that the path of destruction is for those too weak and cowardly (let’s be more generous and say “confused”) to create anything. The hatred/rage of the Psycho derives, then, from this very artistic frustration. The Psycho wants to control the whole universe, to mold it in his own image, which is precisely what the artist does, in a small way. Again this ties up with the “natural” or evolutionary angle: the first “psychopathic” urge, as it were, is when the baby grabs for the shiny bauble and howls when it doesn’t get it (and when it does get it just wants to devour it!).
Shakespeare once wrote that if a baby had infinite power it would destroy the universe in a heartbeat. Its “will” (actually something else, but we have no word for it) is so powerful and so utterly unbending, yet its knowledge and understanding so completely inadequate, that it would end up destroying the very thing it wanted to embrace. Rather like the love-obsessed Frank. Doesn’t this kind of infantile derangement happen to us every time we can’t get the cap off the pill bottle or the cellophane off the CD, or the lawnmower to start, etc, etc, etc? The adrenaline rush of rage that our impotence creates feeds our own sense of grandeur and allows us to become momentarily “carried away” (possessed) by psychosis. It is one of the deadliest “pleasures” of them all, the negative flipside of transcendence: one is not elevated but debased by the obsession (to open the CD, start the lawnmower, whatever). Instead of receding, the ego takes over entirely and sees the whole universe as an adversary to be defeated. Hence the subsequent rush of utter foolishness and absurdity that every “psycho” (using the word in its profane and common sense) experiences when he catches a glimpse of himself wrestling with his own demons, without ever admitting they are in him, and not in the lawnmower or the universe.
What seems to have happened in such moments of foolishness is that the demon of rage/self-hatred/frustration has been temporarily placated by a new humility (i.e., has no emotions left to feed it). It remains lurking deep inside, however, only waiting for the next circumstantial occasion to exploit and thereby regain its hold. There would seem to be only three options for the common Psychopath called Man: total overcoming of these demons (which entails converting them into allies, in the shamanistic sense); complete subjugation to them, whereupon the demon becomes the man and the man the demon—a “fully-functioning homicidal maniac” along the lines of Gacy, Gein, the Joker, etc. Or else, at this time the most common (and easiest) option, simple passive surrender, or stalemate, involving the refusal either to confront these demons or to fully embody them. This last is a kind of straddling the Abyss that cannot continue indefinitely, and at best results in a sort of unconscious despair/terror/paralysis, such as characterizes present society in the new millennium.
Those who effectively “master” this “surrender” are known as “useful citizens.” On the other hand, we could say that total subjugation to his demons makes the Psychopath “useful” only to himself, just as passive surrender to them renders him useful only to society. Overcoming, or Transcendence, serves to transform the individual Psychopath (the Enlightened Psychopath?) into someone who is “useful” (a positive, creative, sustaining influence) to both himself and society. Overcoming/Transcendence is the true “healing” work, while the other two options are at best a temporary cover-up that conceals the sickness, allowing it to go on festering. The problem is to get at the root, something we are now working on. What I refer to as “useful” seems to revolve around a Danger/Safety dichotomy. The most dangerous Psychopath has given in to his Demon (or Daemon, if you want to be archetypal about it) and is a danger to society, benefiting only himself (or at least his Demon). The surrendered Psychopath is safe to society but a danger to himself; his Demon has been imprisoned and is eating away at his mind, body, and soul. Only the enlightened Psychopath has transcended the duality of self and Other (society), and so can begin to function at a higher level, freed from the influence of his demons.
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Don’t you think the Joker laughs at you?
—John Lennon, “I am the Walrus”
It is possible to utilize a certain kind of Psychopathic derangement in the search for enlightenment. In this case, the Psychopathy of our model becomes a kind of tool or technique, not something to be relied upon exclusively, but not to be ignored or feared. It takes a hearty constitution to transcend desire by indulging in it fully and burning it out. Success depends on retaining an inner separation between self and experience, and Psychopaths, by their nature, are usually so identified with their experience that this is impossible for them to do. Nevertheless, they unconsciously play out some of the same dramas that seekers after wisdom (awareness, enlightenment, transcendence) do. There is a key here, but dare we use it?
To “tap into” the energy of the Psychopath and so utilize it requires total submersion in psychosis, at least for an instant. It cannot be an act, it has to be real. This is, to many, a truly enticing idea, sort of the psychological equivalent of crossing the Abyss: if we must die in life in order to be reborn, we must also go completely insane in order to achieve true sanity. Better the psychosis that acknowledges itself as aberration than the “normality” that refuses to admit its own psychosis.
This “key” does work, so we can’t really throw it away (the potential for it is built into the very foundations of the human psyche and so is non-returnable). Perhaps the main reason we have stumbled upon it is that we had no choice in the matter. Once circumstance, nature, and action/personal choice have given you Psychopathic tendencies, there is no turning back, you simply have to deal with them; this is especially so if you achieve a level of awareness where you can no longer deny this tendency in yourself. This tendency is so powerful (with its potential to be both beneficial and harmful) that we simply must resolve our difficulties with it. However, if someone is not really a developed Psychopath (we all have the potential, but that’s not enough), then they probably shouldn’t attempt to use it. Why tempt fate? Why call up the Demon unless you really need it?
A lot of this is happening in America right now—kids shot dead by crazed classmates and so forth. Invariably, when the photo of the killer appears he looks like a half-wit, too immature, stupid, and unaware to deal with his impulses. One day they’re rejected by a girl, the next they steal Grandpappy’s squirrel gun and are slaughtering indiscriminately. You also get a lot of mildly disturbed suburban kids fixating upon serial killers and such, lacking any deeper understanding of what’s going on and confusing themselves in the process. The lack of humanity, of self-awareness and restraint, of any kind of barriers at all, is the real danger here, and not simply Psychopathy, which, as we have argued, has its positive connotations, and even its uses.
The transcendence sought by the GAP is linked by his desire to stand out from the crowd and become free of all restraints. Often, these restraints are natural and unavoidable, such as gravity, space and time, etc. Sometimes these restraints are social, moral, and so forth. Sometimes they are physical, such as prison, stifling jobs and relationships, etc. When a Psychopath is struggling against the more social and physical limitations, he tends to have our sympathy, since these are the same things we all experience holding us back (the need for money and the impossibility of finding fulfilling and rewarding work, other people’s expectations, and so on). When we feel we are imprisoned, the lengths to which we’ll go in order to be free will sometimes drive us into Psychopathic frenzies. The transcendence the GAP seeks is not always a transcendence of the human condition or the present state of human evolution, but simply a transcendence of a temporary condition, such as a shitty job or a low social position.
If there is a desire to become a new being driving the GAP, a will to attain a different state of existence, then this is a desire for metaphysical transcendence. And sometimes an effort to transcend a more temporary condition will drive the GAP past his more attainable goal and on to something more exotic, something resembling the metaphysical, while not necessarily equaling it. All manner of transcendence must be considered when we look at the GAP, for the same sort of confusion that mistakes the GAP for just another serial killer can mistake one kind of transcendence for another. Often the naive thrust toward self-transformation of various kinds seems an effort, not only to get past a barrier of some kind, but also to somehow enter a new world where former restraints do not exist.5
This is a kind of dream, albeit a childish and regressive one, and it seems to have a deeper component, some urge towards essential transformation, transformation of Being. It’s an urge toward development without the knowledge of how to properly go about it. This happens when a child is raised by parents insufficiently aware to guide it through stages of development (until it can become an aware and capable adult itself). From the Psychopath’s perspective, it seems like Transcendence, and he becomes enamored by fantasies of it. But seen from without, it’s probably more like the progression through “normal” developmental stages, of which “overcoming” (of obstacles) probably serves as a better description than “transcendence.” We might even look at it as “Transformation”—a word that doesn’t describe the event as it is happening, so much as an overall process, taking place over various stages.
In the task of writing the GAP story, therefore, we must be very careful to draw subtle but all-important distinctions between the varieties of Psychopathic experience. When travelling through the Psychopath’s shadowy world, we must always remain sharp, making clear distinctions and maintaining a certain distance, lest we be drawn in and become Psychopaths, or victims, ourselves. What fascinates us about the GAP is, perhaps, that his journey touches upon the more progressive aspects of existence, the same things that all strange, paranormal, or uncommon phenomena touches upon. The GAP, in all his misguided fury, is partly looking for the same things that attract people to, say, Zen Buddhism, Surrealism, various religious experiences, drugs, mind expansion/altered states, and so on.
There are some Psychopaths who are just as committed to their folly as other, more dangerous/self destructive ones, but whose goal or dream or vision is more personal, more introverted, and hence less destructive. Likewise, there are some who are, perhaps, a bit more enlightened or “gentle” at heart, or otherwise more aware than other people. Even if their vision and their desire is of the potentially destructive type, they stand a good chance of living through it, or at least arriving at some realization. These GAP’s will come to a realization before they self-destruct, or otherwise leap to the “other side” and arrive whole, in one piece. Provided they survive (i.e., that their realization isn’t accompanied by death), they may live on after the Psychopathic episode has been completed. They are the walking wounded. They’re the people that Tom Waits sings about in the song “Diamonds and Gold,” from Rain Dogs. Murray from A Thousand Clowns is a good representative of this Psychopath in films. These GAP’s are post-transcendence, but only in the sense that they have given up their insane desire for transcendence. They are humbled, heartbroken; they bear the scars of Psychopathy, the humility of one who has caught a horrible glimpse of his own foolishness. They are, in a sense, redeemed, but this redemption will probably not lead to anything great, especially if they surrender to it and make no attempt to move beyond it.
At the end of A Thousand Clowns, Murray gives up and is swallowed back into the crowd; the same thing occurs with Travis Bickle at the end of Taxi Driver. The fact that they are so humbled (or placated) shows that they are still Psychopaths; somewhere deep down in their heart they still cling to their unrealistic dreams. In much the same way the failed artist returns beaten to society’s fold and endures its mockery, all the while secretly nursing his wounded aspirations, keeping them warm and secure (and useless) under his broken wings. The idea of creation/destruction being two sides of the same coin (the frustration of the one leading to the other) is not only valid but key here. The line that separates a Van Gogh from a Psychopath is sometimes very thin, but it is always there. A failed artist may well take consolation in being a successful Psycho, and vice versa. The GAP is perhaps the effective marriage of the two, into a single, much maligned Archetype. Is not the Artist, after all (in the words of Paul Bowles): “the enemy of society”? So long as he is doing his job, he is exactly that.
Again, the Great American Psychopath, or Psycho for short, 6 is largely a fictional construct. Like all fiction, the GAP is a refined, distilled, and concentrated form of the Psychopaths that appear in real life. In fact, as cannot be overstated, guys like Manson and the serial killers are not really GAP’s; they merely display some traits found in the fictional Psychopath, giving credence and significance to his “experiences,” just as a Hero is a concentrated version of the seemingly minor heroisms we see in daily life. The misguided, violent actions of a Manson become the grand Psychopathic quest of the GAP, just as the fireman who rescues a dog from a burning building becomes Bruce Willis saving the world. The Psychopaths of “real life” often take many years to develop.
We can only begin to see ourselves as Psychopaths when we look at the direction our lives have taken since childhood. When the Psychopathic journey is condensed into a two-hour film it becomes artificial, but it is (or can be) the positive kind of artifice that we see in all art forms: a microcosm for the Psychopathic Journey upon which we are all, like it or not, embarked.
1 “That serial murder serves as a method of transcendence is not so incomprehensible when analyzed in the context of myth and ritual. . . . The serial killer in fiction often longs for the spiritual surety of apocalypse, and attempts to will it into being through constructing a grammar of murder. Murder or sacrifice is essential to the project because, as our modern conceptions of entropic exhaustion dimly echo, the energy of the godhead requires regeneration through mediated exchange of life energies.” Simpson, Psycho Paths, pg. 175-6.
2 Simpson quotes the dilettante author Brian (played by David Duchovny) in Kalifornia: “Sometimes there’s a moment as you’re waking when you become aware of the real world around you, but you’re still dreaming. You may think you can fly, but you better not try. Serial killers live their whole lives in that place, somewhere between dreams and reality.” Psycho Paths, pg. 191
3 Wes Craven’s last installment, New Nightmare, had the “no more Mr. Nice Guy” approach, and was also a profound take on the “monster from the id” subtext which underlies all good horror movies.
4 Lecter’s own rationale for killing is simply that it “feels good”: “And why shouldn’t it feel good? It must feel good to God. He does it all the time . . . and if one does what God does enough times, one will become as God is.”
5 On Early Grayce (Brad Pitt) in Kalifornia, Simpson writes: “Paradoxically, he achieves transcendental heights at the exact moment he reaches the ebb of his humanity. . . Early’s murders have been primitive dress rehearsals for his own mystic transport. . . Grayce, then, as a replication of the image of evil is menacing but empty. He suffers from an internal emptiness that he seeks to fill with the glaring light of heavenly fire. . .[This is] what Richard Slotkin calls the cult of personal regeneration through violence. As with Mickey Knox, Grayce’s lustmord elevates him to a higher plane of existence and identity.” Simpson, Psycho Paths, pg. 192, 194.
6 One thing that we must be careful of is using the word “psycho” as a substitute for “Psychopath.” A Psychopath (in this model) is not a psycho, though he often acts like one. The Psychopath’s deeply ingrained vision, his quest, gives his madness a focus and an organization, a purpose, that a mere psycho does not possess.
i Simpson, Psycho Paths, pg. 110, 173
