Tom Riddle's inability to love

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

No: HPFGUIDX 181433

bdclark0423 wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/181386>:
>
> I took your advice and I have looked at wikipedia and it
> does not reference anywhere how inability to love is connected
> in any way to being a psychopath, 

The normal colloquial usage of the word 'psychopath' is a person who
is unable to feel normal human emotions such as love, affection,
empathy, responsibility, guilt. I didn't even have to scroll far down
the Wikipedia article to find it citing someone called Cleckley who
listed 16 characteristics of psychopaths including "Pathologic
egocentricity and incapacity for love". Inability to love is connected
in the most existential way with being a psychopath. 

> so this does makes me even a 
> little more confused by your response, perhaps you're saying this is 
> what Tom Riddle is, but the original purpose of the discussion is 
> not to describe current state of Tom Riddle, but try and explain 
> what got him to that state.

Tom Riddle is a psychopath. I think a human might become a psychopath
because of being badly abused in its first year of life, with some
combination of head injuries and no cuddling, and in earlier volumes,
hearing that Riddle was raised in an orphanage, I assumed it was a
HORRIBLE orphanage which had abused him, thus causing his psychopathy.
But when we actually saw the orphanage, it was not a HORRIBLE place at
all. Not that it was heavenly, but the children had a few toys and
even pets (the pet bunny who was murdered), and their annual outing
was to some place that was supposed to be fun for them. So now I think
Riddle was born a psychopath.

I assume this was caused by some kind of tiny brain defect, as
apparently happens in real life, and not caused by Tom having been
conceived under the influence of Love Potion. In the past, some
listies have suggested that Tom was born a psychopath because he was
conceived by parents who didn't truly love each other. I reject that,
because in real life many children were conceived by parents who
didn't love each other, sometimes even by violent rape, and they
usually don't turn out to be psychopaths.

It struck me as worthy of notice that Rowling wrote a series in which
the good guys go on and on about the importance of one's choices,
while providing a villain who was unable to choose otherwise. In DH,
Harry advises him to try for a little remorse, when remorse is what he
is completely incapable of. There is some interview on the Web, except
I can't find it now, in which the interviewer (IIRC Melissa from The
Leaky Cauldron) questioned Her on that and She said that was true, but
this series is a fantasy, so the bit of Potter's blood that was used
in Voldemort's re-embodiment spell brought with it the ability to
choose to feel remorse.