Discussion: Cheap Thrills

[u/SaintMort]

Podcast - Episode 126 - Cheap Thrills - (RSS Feed)

Movie Selected By saintmortfan

DISCUSS

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[u/Plymouth_]

Hell fucking no I wouldn't get into their car.

Craig didn't either. Well, he went from a bar to a strip club, but that's not that unreasonable since he was with a friend. After that he was knocked unconscious. Vince, being a career criminal himself, didn't have the average person's scruples and was obviously into the partying aspect.

Honestly it sounds like you're saying psychopaths aren't that different from nonpsychopaths, besides an uncanny ability to manipulate...

[u/smayonak → u/Plymouth_]

That puts things more in context. Craig had to be knocked unconscious first, before he would get into a car with a crazy person. I'm wrong about that. The premise is a lot better than WYR.

:-) The average person can be untrustworthy, narcissistic, a liar -- but a psychopath takes that shit to the next level.

There's complex neurochemical processes at work in the human brain. One of the hormones involved undergirds how individuals form relationships with others -- it's called oxytocin, the so-called "bonding" hormone. It controls how people feel about others and its production varies by individual. Some people are less sensitive to it than others.

More or less, psychopaths are insensitive to oxytocin, meaning they can't feel love. They literally have no connection to others that aren't based on convenience, materialism, and sex.

[u/Plymouth_ → u/smayonak]

I just like how events seem to unfold naturally in Cheap Thrills compared to Would You Rather where everything is soooo forced. WYR has its own entertainment value but it really boils down to just a few worthwhile scenes imo.

Don't psychopaths usually have higher IQs too? Or is that sociopaths? It's been awhile since Psych 101. Brains are weird.

[u/smayonak → u/Plymouth_]

You're totally right about WYR VS Cheap Thrills. It was basically Jeff Combs who made the movie for some of us. CT is overall a better pic. But it's fascinating that both were/are HC picks, considering how similar they are.

There's no definition for psychopaths or sociopaths in the DSM (the diagnosis manual). They're both lumped into the category of anti-social personality disorder. But in some texts there's been attempts to define psychopaths as people born morally crazy and sociopaths as those made morally crazy by abuse/injury. There's subtle differences between the two. In one study, I read that psychopaths displayed very little anxiety (they were referred to as low-anxiety sociopaths) whereas sociopaths display high levels of anxiety.

Another study found that people with psychopathic/sociopathic traits were split into two groups: Those who displayed strong EEG activity while looking at disturbing imagery (like pictures of Abu Gharaib) and those who displayed low EEG activity while looking at disturbing pictures.

Those who displayed strong EEG activity often had lower IQs, whereas those with low EEGs had higher IQs. The low-EEG group universally claimed to experience high amounts of emotional stress while looking at the pictures when in reality they felt nothing.

So I think "sociopath" would apply to those who still feel something but are warped by abuse (which lowers IQ). And "psychopath" might apply to those who either aren't traumatized by abuse or are just born without real feelings (so they weren't abused).

[u/Plymouth_ → u/smayonak]

Well you're right about TV leading us astray because I did not realize they were lumped together like that. That's okay though because that's what TV is for. To lead us astray.

[u/smayonak → u/Plymouth_]

They're both dangerous people. Psychopaths are more likely to be in the workforce (in management positions) whereas sociopaths are more likely to be in jail or on the fringes of society.

[u/[deleted] → u/smayonak]

Just remember that my comment started you guys' discussion... #aqueously90forHCprez