In Part I of Narcissism in the Real World, I pointed out the Narcissistic pathology on display from Hollywood, the MSM, the left-wing of our political spectrum and the more malignant aspects of Narcissism among the Islamists. I raised a question about our elites:
At such a dangerous time, when we face implacable enemies who wish to destroy us and our freedoms, why do so many bright people continue to do things that place our nation and our friends at great risk for what seems to be the most minimal, narrow and partisan of advantages?
As luck would have it, current events continue to supply me with evidence to support and elucidate my position. Here are some points for reflection:
1) Narcissists are extremely sensitive to criticism and experience disagreement as criticism.
AJStrata has pointed out that the Democratic party left-wing core has been ramping up the rhetoric in favor of impeachment and have been preparing to force the issue for the Democratic party nominees for the 2006 elections:
Every Democrat will be challenged by their base to take a stand: will the Democrat candidate move to impeach Bush and Cheney if elected? The leftward base is not going to put up with anymore code words and innuendo. They will demand candidates openly pay allegiance to impeachment - or else will sit this out or go to far left parties. [Emphasis mine-SW]
The refusal to support those who recognize that impeachment would be a disaster for their party, both short and long term, suggests that such Democratic party "activists" are unable to tolerate disagreement, even when it is primarily tactical.
2) As a result, the Narcissist is unable to tolerate having their beliefs questioned and reacts to such criticism with disdain and anger.
Roger Simon wrote yesterday about the current travails of Oriana Fallaci. She is now an object of hatred for those who feel she has betrayed them, merely because she questioned their beliefs:
... she is hated by the very people who used to adore her. Once the heroine of the left who faced down dictators for an interview (a far more intelligent and far more beautiful Amanpour), she had the courage to question the orthodoxy of European pseudo-progressivism, became despised and continued on nevertheless through her illness to write more and say more. They think she has changed, but she is the one who has remained true to her ideals, to the Enlightenment. Her critics are the ones who have betrayed them.
3) Furthermore, criticism of a Narcissist evokes feelings of humiliation and humiliation always evokes compensatory rage.
The cartoon intifada is based on the manipulation of manufactured rage; although you wouldn't know it if you only read the MSM, the worst of the cartoons was apparently created (or discovered; the three most offensive cartoons did not appear in the Danish newspaper that printed the original cartoons) by the Imams who were so insulted by the cartoons that they had to actively campaign for the Saudis to support a violent response. The original cartoons were insufficiently humiliating to the young Muslim men whose simmering rage was waiting for the proper trigger.
4) Rage can be externalized and expressed when circumstances allow.
Cartoons, anyone?
5) When rage cannot be externalized it turns inward. One of Freud's earliest insights, which still contains a significant amount of explanatory power, is that rage turned inward leads to depression.
Here we see the outcome for so many of those on the left who find themselves marginalized and humiliated. Two examples should suffice. First, Kobayashi Maru directs us to a truly remarkable reaction to the Best Picture win by "Crash" by a devastated "Brokeback Mountain" fan:
Chrystfferssen Maakorey, who runs the Fennec Awards Database, appeared to be stymied by the win.
“I cannot bring myself to update this Web site saying that the film the Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences selected was the best of the year. Therefore, the Fennec Awards Database is closing down. Effective immediately there will be no more updates to the film side,” he wrote.
“I had no idea that my personal joy at going to the movies and seeing them rewarded with Oscars could be so irreparably destroyed. But tonight it has been.” [Emphasis mine-SW]
His favorite movie didn't win the Oscar and his life has seemingly lost its meaning. KM uses his post to point out the difference between an important issue (Iran's nuclear ambitions) and a relatively trivial issue (the Oscars).
[A brief technical digression. Narcissists rely on "self-objects" to stabilize their sense of self. An oversimplification would be that self-objects are internalized structures, parts of relationships, which are used to support one's self esteem.]
When an idea becomes a partial "self-object" its importance becomes inflated out of proportion to its reality. This also explains how so many Narcissists can believe contradictory ideas at the same time. Once an idea has taken on the accouterments of a "self-object" it can no longer be experienced or explored rationally.
The second example comes to us from Democratic Underground by way of John Hawkins. He found a revealing thread at DU and posted some of their more painful comments. Here is how the thread from Bullwinkle925 starts:
In all of my 56 (and counting) years on this planet, I have never felt this kind of despair over what my country has become.
Another commenter adds:
tom_paine: Well it IS 1933 again and the Curtain of Totalitarian Darkness is falling on the world. As my sigline indicates, I too, am going to keep struggling to restore freedom to America. But you are as correct in your feelings as any Jew in Germany in 1933.
It is quite possible that tom_paine is ignorant of history but even a cursory comparison would reveal that there are no currently announced plans for America to commit genocide anywhere on the planet and there are no laws being promulgated to deny basic human rights to any Americans.
The despair is painful to read:
serryjw: I'm also 56. have never felt this way. I cry daily.
keopeli: I have a dread for the future which causes my despair. I've seriously considered moving to Fiji.
And then there is this:
QuestionAll: i just turned 45...Generation Jones...we're looking to get out- there doesn't appear to be any saving this cesspool.
When ideas become attached to "self-objects" or take on an aspect of a partial "self-object", the ability to discriminate between good and bad becomes impaired by the need for ideas to support self-esteem as opposed to existing relatively free from contamination by the person's psychological make-up. To a Narcissist, all opposing opinions are sh*t. Thus, if their favored group is not in charge, the country is a cesspool. People like this have regressed to treating everything on only two dimensions. While they applaud themselves for nuanced thinking and object to Bush as being a simpleton who makes hard and fast distinctions between good and bad, in fact they only make the simplest distinctrions:
"Good" are things they agree with in their entirety.
"Bad" are things they disagree with in whole or in part.
This suggests an alarming inability to make significant discriminations.
The worst aspect of such a mental arrangement is that they are incapable of reasoning about the beliefs they use to support their self-esteem. They cannot construct supportable arguments that there might have been a better approach to stabilizing the Middle East and removing the threat of WMD; all they can do is attack the current administration, and in a pinch, resort to "the country is a cesspool."
As so often happens, Dr. Sanity, in addressing the Narcissism of the vapid, says it more succinctly and clearly:
His rather fuzzy concept of "critical thinking" appears to mesh admirably with Mr. Clooney's and Hollywood's. And all of them use the same basic strategy to inculcate and nurture this "critical thinking" faculty in their listeners/viewers. It is a strategy that is eerily familiar because it has been used for centuries by every despot, dictator and tyrant in world history. A brief summary of the strategy is: bash your listeners over the head with politically correct thought (i.e., what your opinion happens to be) from a position of power.
If they were less obsessed with themselves, people like Mr. Clooney and Mr. Bennish might have noticed that this technique is antithetical to the very concept of critical thinking.
Yelling at a captive audience and then applauding your own "courage" exhibits the blindness of the Narcissist rather than his erudition.
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