The Dark Tetrad

Why, what and the 4th dimension

It is typical for people subjected to narcissistic abuse, or indeed any abuse, to ruminate on the “why.” Why did this person do this to me? Why did I get into this situation? Why didn’t I get out sooner? Why are they so cruel?

I gave up on fixating on the why a long time ago. Frankly, the why seemed fairly obvious. Narcissists are insecure and fearful people who for whatever reasons only play a zero-sum game. For them to feel like winners, somebody else has to lose. It doesn’t matter how illogical they are or how they lie and cheat because that’s just what they do. Once you accept that they behave the way they behave because that’s who they are, it’s easier to interact with them. The most pragmatic thing that emerges from this realization is that since they have a different rule book for themselves which puts their targets at a distinct disadvantage, minimizing your engagement with them is the best course of action.

The question that puzzles me more is:

• What do they get out of being so antagonistic, angry and controlling? What is in it for them?

The standard clinical answer to the what question is that these personalities achieve power, pleasure, and profit by winning the game. They gain in prestige, and they feel validated as important. They get what is known as “narcissistic supply.” However, since they still remain the same insecure and fearful personality whose default interaction with the world is playing an antagonistic zero-sum game, the validation is very fleeting. They are stuck in a loop of dysregulated emotional outbursts. Enough is never enough. They will always be dissatisfied and angry about something. It’s like the old joke about not being able to run away from your problems because, wherever you go, there you are.

Even though there is only temporary respite for these personalities, it’s the “pleasure” element that explains the “what” most to my satisfaction, and the Dark Tetrad which expands on the Dark Triad model fills that in rather nicely.

All of the triad personalities are manipulative, lack empathy, and have grandiose illusions of personal entitlement. They are all also somewhat sadistic. Since they take more pleasure in winning than warranted because they cannot tolerate loss, their pleasure in another’s loss appears to be an end in itself, a sadistic end.

I’ll admit that I have been in the company of people who I felt were capable of murder and torture. If we were honest, we’d all admit that we’ve known people who made the hair on the back of our neck stand up in alarm. Every war ever waged has resulted in war crimes- rape, torture and murder. We may be reluctant to admit it, but the evidence is that there are too many among us who would not hesitate to commit murder and other atrocities if they knew they could get away with it. The true crime genre that is so popular on network television validates our perception.

The Pharmaceutical Industry has been fined billions of dollars for marketing drugs that they knew did not help and even maimed or killed.¹ Decision makers in those organizations knew they could get away with it, and so committed mayhem on the public. Same goes for the duplicity on the part of the tobacco and agrichemical industries. Killing people and causing misery was just a good business model for them. Nothing personal, just their job.

Immortal corporations are immoral; they have none of the constraints that normal people expect in social interactions. Since the only purpose of business is to produce profits, the balance sheet is all that matters. We know that about 30 percent of the C-suite in corporations fit the definition of a Dark Triad personality. The fact is, it helps to be ruthless and without empathy to climb to the top of the corporate ladder.

These dark personalities get the power, prestige, and profit from succeeding which validates their false-self as “the best” at whatever it is they want to be. However, beyond what an empathetic person can appreciate as pleasure in succeeding, according to the Dark Tetrad model, there is another dominant trait, another dimension involved that answers the question:

• What do dark personalities get out of the games they play?

  • They get sadistic pleasure.

Sadism certainly answers the question: why do the power-mongers who realize none of the games they forced us to play since 2020 provided any benefit and instead caused us great harm continue to gaslight the rest of us with word salad and dismiss the repercussions of their manipulations and lies as unimportant? They got what they needed: power, prestige, personal profit, and, the cherry on the top, sadistic pleasure.

Maggie Russo is the author of “Dance with the Devil: Love in the Age of Covid”

1. Pfizer to Pay $2.3 Billion for Fraudulent Marketing; Merck Pleads Guilty and Pays $950 Million for Illegal Promotion of Vioxx; Zantac Cancer Lawsuit