You: What Disorder Does Joe Goldberg Have? What Mental Illness Does He Have? Or Is He a Psychopath/Sociopath?

Joe Goldberg on Netflix’s You appears to have antisocial personality disorder (sociopath) and narcissistic personality disorder symptoms, but very few people with mental disorders act like him in real life. He might have also suffered from a mental illness as a result of his childhood trauma. All of us are aware that Joe acts like a psychopath as the man who was supposed to be his mentor had locked him in a box.

You, a Netflix original film, tells the story of a man whose search for love leads him down a perilous path. Joe Goldberg is the story’s protagonist. All he wants is to meet the right woman and settle down to live a peaceful life. When he finds one, he does everything in his power to make them happy, removing obstacles and nefarious people from their lives. However, by the end of the story, he is revealed to be the most dangerous to them.

Every season, Joe tries to find happiness but ends up ruining the lives of the women he falls for as well as the people around them. The show tells his story in such a realistic way that it forces one to reconsider the definition of the good guy and wonder if someone like this exists in real life.

Since the release of the highly anticipated fourth season of the Netflix original thriller series, talks about Goldberg’s mental health have been circulating on the internet again, especially on Reddit. While Goldberg is never explicitly diagnosed as a psychopath in either season of You, it appears that many viewers believe he is. So, let’s get together and find out about what disorder Joe has.

Previously, we touched on if Love will be back for Season 4, Rhys Montrose, and who killed Malcolm.

While the Show Has Never Announced What’s Wrong With Joe Goldberg, He Has the Criteria for Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder Due to His Frequent Anxiety About Himself and the People He Cares About!

Penn Badgley (@pennbadgley), who plays Joe Goldberg on Netflix You, is giving a new meaning to the term bad boy. Many women are drawn to dangerous, attractive men for some reason, and Joe certainly fits this description, but his behavior in You goes too far. People believe Joe has some kind of disorder or mental illness. Also, many people have claimed that Joe is a psychopath/sociopath after watching the show, despite the fact that no diagnosis is given in the script. One fan tweeted, “Love is a crazy b***h it’s true but joe is just a plain old psychopath”.

Even headlines in the media used the word psychopath to refer to Joe, reminding women to look past his pretty face and see the psychopath within. Elle included a poll with their post that asked readers what they thought of Joe. Between “Kidnap me, Joe” and “He’s a psychopath, Period,” the options were given. Fortunately, at the time of writing, 100 percent of readers had selected the psychopath option, even though it is technically incorrect.

Throughout the first three seasons of You, Joe exhibits a consistent pattern of behavior toward the characters he’s become obsessed with: he meets a woman he finds attractive and becomes fixated on her, he sifts through her social media profiles and other online activity, he begins to follow her in real life, he engineers chance meetings, and gradually insinuates himself into her life by presenting himself as the ideal man based on what he’s learned about her.

If someone threatens what he considers true love, he is willing to trap and kill them, leaving numerous characters in the series vulnerable, from Benji, Beck‘s on-again, off-again boyfriend, to Ryan, Marienne‘s ex-husband. And no matter what he does to win the heart of his latest obsession, including theft and murder, he justifies everything he does because it benefits her and their relationship.

According to Susan Hatters Friedman, MD, Professor of Forensic Psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University, Joe’s behavior is an accurate representation of stalking and falls into several categories in the stalker typology created by Mullen and colleagues2, the classification system most commonly used in stalking research.

Despite the fact that he is not mentally sound, Joe isn’t a psychopath, according to experts. In reality, Joe exhibits symptoms of several disorders. According to social scientist Pamela Rutledge, who spoke with Insider said, “Joe seems to be an amalgam of personality traits at abnormal levels that are constructed to make a good story and create a character that elicits a certain amount of empathy.”

We must remember that You is a TV show with fictional characters. Joe Goldberg appears to have symptoms of both an antisocial personality disorder and a narcissistic personality disorder, according to Rutledge, but very few people with mental disorders act like him in real life. Another expert told the same news outlet that Joe’s backstory in season two suggests he may have an attachment disorder related to childhood trauma. After all, the man who was supposed to be his mentor had locked him in a box.

Regardless of the exact wording or diagnosis that viewers give Joe, it appears that the majority of them recognize that his behavior is not sweet or cute in any way. While it’s entertaining to watch these types of stories on TV, acting in this manner in real life is never acceptable. No one should put up with this behavior from a partner, no matter how attractive they are.

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