Why We Shouldn't Empathise with Bad Guys This text is about the difference between neurotics and people with character disturbance and how it influences the way a therapist should approach them. Neurotics are people whose problems lay primarily in their sense of guilt and shame and in a generally overdeveloped conscience. They also tend to be more fragile and sensible than an average person. Character disturbance, on the other hand, is a problem that stems from the lack of all these traits. It usually goes along with an inflated self-esteem and a lack of consideration for others. Also, guilt and shame are absent or weak. So what is the practical use of this distinction? The traditional approach to therapy would be typically an analysis and a general focus on the patient’s feelings. And from what we know now, for people with character disturbance the feelings do not seem to be the problem, as these individuals are very much different from those guilt-ridden neurotics. The problem is actually their behaviour, not their feelings. And since the behaviour is usually caused by our thinking patterns and beliefs, this is something that should be addressed in the first place. This, however, would mean that a therapist has to be less empathetic, at least in how they appear to the patient, and more decisive and firm in their approach. This means asking questions and confronting the patient who in turn will be very often manipulative and simply lying. While this is not something therapists would normally assume about their patients, with those people, they certainly should.