An exceptionally good, practically wise book. Readable free online:
Working with Toxic Older Adults:
By Gloria M. Davenport, Peggy Weatherspoon
The study of evil. Ponerology
"Ponerology is the name given by Polish psychiatrist Andrzej Łobaczewski to an interdisciplinary study of the causes of periods of social injustice.[1] This discipline makes use of data from psychology, sociology, philosophy, and history to account for such phenomena asaggressive war, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and police states. The original theory and research was conducted by psychologists and psychiatrists working in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary in the years before the institution of Communism such as Kazimierz Dąbrowski and Stefan Blachowski.[2]
Łobaczewski adopted the term from the branch of theology dealing with the study of evil, derived from the Greek word poneros. According to Łobaczewski, all societies vacillate between "happy times," or times of prosperity, during which advanced psychological knowledge of the danger of psychopathological influence in the corridors of power is suppressed, and "unhappy times," during which the intelligentsia and society at large are forced to recover this specialized knowledge in order to ultimately rectify the social order along mentally healthier lines. It is to be noted that "happy times" do not imply morally advanced times, as Łobaczewski makes clear that this "happiness" or prosperity may well be premised on the oppression of a target group.
Łobaczewski defines many specific "characteropathies," which Western psychology would probably term "character disorders," as paving the way for the ultimate rule of "essential psychopaths" in full-fledged "pathocracy." This is what he says takes place when society is insufficiently guarded against the minority of such abnormal pathologs ever-present in its midst (Łobaczewski asserts that the etiology is almost entirely bio-genetic.) He believes that they infiltrate any institution or state, prevailing moral values are perverted into their opposite, and a coded language not unlike Orwell's "double-think" circulates into the mainstream, using "paralogic" and "paramoralism" in place of genuine logic and morality. There are various identifiable stages of pathocracy described by Łobaczewski. Ultimately, each pathocracy is foredoomed because the root of healthy social morality, according to Łobaczewski, is contained in the congenital instinctive infrastructure in the vast majority of the population. While some in the normal population are more susceptible to pathocratic influence, and become its lackeys, the majority instinctively resist."
While I am non-theistic, I do think there are people capable of evil.
has videos of Thomas Sheridan sharing his thoughts
on the topic of psychopaths.
About Thomas Sheridan
Labyrinth of the Psychopath - When the Demon Knocks at Your Door
A conversation with Thomas Sheridan on the topic of Psychopaths (really worth hearing)
TNSRADIO-Thomas Sheridan-Psychopaths
Online Resource for Victims of Psychopaths and Narcissists
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Chatoyancy is something I really enjoy in a gemstone, especially
in Labradorite
but also in chatoyant ammonites 
| this one is both chatoyant and iridescent |
Another thing I love are enhydro geodes.
Those are geodes with ancient water trapped inside that one can see moving around. About geodes.
Pyrite ammonites are pretty amazing too.
How incredible is that!
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| "Hugs Keep Us Alive" art print of illustration by Lim Heng Swee |
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| modern day Christmas spirit |
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| hedgehog munching a raspberry |
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