We're All the New N-word: It's Not About You, It's About Me

Mirror, mirror...

There's a new N-word permeating our culture and it has nothing to do with racial epithets.

The warm bath of public narcissism is getting as crowded as the rooftop hot tub at SF's kink.com on a Friday night. Instead of luxuriating in it, or watching a few privileged porn performers sudsing up, we're all jammed in, flailing around and knocking into each other like the Three Stooges with ego bling.

Sarah Palin suffers from "narcissistic personality disorder," testifies Todd Purdum in the latest Palintology obsession in this month's Vanity Fair. That magazine should know about the excesses of vanity since they reflect it lovingly in most of their cover stories. Mr. Purdum himself also said the same thing about Bill Clinton in an earlier profile. And how about John Edwards and Eliot Spitzer? Narcissists, right? Mark Sanford confessed to the psycho-crime himself in fishing around for some behavioral alibi.

Then there's Bernie Madoff, Hollywood celebrities -- especially reality TV stars with more than a couple of kids, and music legends. Check, check, and check. You have to be a narcissist just to want that level of notoriety, never mind achieve and maintain it. This is not news but it helps to put a name to it.

As SpongeBob's Mr. Krabs tells his beloved money, which has been haunted with a desire to be spent instead of hoarded the way he wanted: "You're all selfish and self-absorbed."

But retiring Governor Palin blames "the media" for her problems, as does a whole raftload of self-loving, often-guilty famous people. After all, narcissists always blame others, don't they? And, like paranoids with real enemies, they're right.

We in the media are also narcissists. Just look at Dan Abrams new gossipy website, mediaite.com. Mr. Abrams, who went from one about-me business (politics) into another (cable TV talk show), says about his new deal, "Part of what we're doing is appreciating the celebrity of the media." There we are.

What do you call it when the Washington Post charges $25,000 for a "salon" at the publisher's house where advertisers, lobbyists, and powerful officials could have the privilege of mixing with the newspaper's reporters and editors? I'd say it's a "pattern of grandiosity," one of the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders" descriptions of narcissism, according to Todd Purdum's Palin article.

The New York Times, of course, maintaining its own grandiose position, couldn't allow a media rival to go unpunished for such hubris. In a ritual of journalistic noogies, the Times ran a huge section front photo of offending Post publisher Katharine Weymouth, along with a big headline noting her "Stumble" and "Concerns about [the Post's] Integrity." Because the Times is infallible, as we all know, and must be first and without equals. Can you say the N-word?

Where was the Nixon Attorney General, John Mitchell, who famously warned Ms. Weymouth's iconic predecessor, the heroic Katharine Graham, not to get too big for her britches over Watergate reporting or she'd get certain private parts "in a wringer"? (Mrs. Graham had the journalistic goods; she didn't need ego.)

Then there was the annual bigwig retreat Herb Allen throws in Sun Valley. You don't get more master/mistress-of-the universe than that. The hot topic this year: media.

So we have the media and the people they cover (including themselves) nicely simmering in a narcissism stew. What's missing?

Well, why is it the media and President Obama have had such a nice pajama party together? And how come, now that the masterful ceremonies at the STAPLES Center are all wrapped up, our long national apology the last week to Michael Jackson for rubbernecking his entire life is not over and done with?

Because it sells. Meaning the public wants to buy it. The popular cultural stool can't stand without its critical third leg: regular people -- consumers -- who aren't celebrities and/or in the media. Sorry NPR, it's not all about "important" stories, though the Jackson media freight train steamed pretty deftly from shock and adulation, to Michael's dark side, to MJ as a brilliant representative of the fluid musical, racial, and aesthetic mixing of boundaries in our society.

Sometimes it just has to be Ab News on Fox. I swear last Sunday I saw this: a tiny box in the corner of the TV screen with an anchor giving the news, while the big picture was Courtney Friel doing stomach crunches.

But, particularly with the ubiquity of social media, there really are no more gawkers simply visiting narcissists in the public media zoo. We're all N-word people, whether you're the performer, the messenger, or the consumer. That's the line that really has blurred.

There's good news in that, though good news doesn't sell as well as the other kinds. Mass egocentricity may be a self-canceling phrase. Can you be a narcissist and part of a group at the same time?

Maybe not. Let's ask Mr. Purdum and all the other diagnosticians to retire the N-word.

Follow Phil Bronstein on Twitter: www.twitter.com/PhilBronstein

Comments

[DMSmith]

Let's just retire Phil Bronstein!

Blather is ugly.

[DennyCrane]

Naricissism seems to be on the rise. Just look at Facebook and Twitter and the way people use those tools. It's all about them and needing an audience.

[MadHeart]

Add to that the trend that to be "competent" is just showing up for a job. Excellence has become merely minimal performance for maximum pay. "Personal best" has become defunct--blind ambition and overrating of one's abilities is now the norm. One prime example of this is Sarah Palin, among many, many others, but she's the queen of this phenomenon right now.

Another result of this is the sacking of older workers who have a fully developed sense of the work ethic, who have long held a consistent knowledge of their own strengths and weaknesses with an eye on correction of deficiencies and a record of contributions to the whole, only to be deposed by a flashier, much younger and ill-prepared person already inbued with a phony self-worth that has been imposed on them by others, rather than by their own hard work and self-sought knowledge--in other words, haven't paid any dues, haven't yet understood any clues about working with others and making real contributions except to themselves--a continuation of the process of narcissism, with the resulting trashing of the very people who have made it possible for the younger to even exist.

Perhaps in the not to distant future, the point of the movie "Idiocracy" may some day come true.

[dm10003]

i love it when people think some aspect of human nature is suddenly rampant, or even new. human nature doesn't change much over all these thousands of years.

[taptaptap]

I had to guffaw when this N-word post ended with the ultimate narcissistic line: Follow Phil Bronstein on Twitter.

[rain39]

We are living in an ancient era of bread and circuses. Distract the common folk with meaningless entertainment and other oddities, such as obsessions with parenting and food while the folks in power take over the world.

Most of us can't read well, write, spell, know geography, history and how to make community. Grades are inflated, parents helicopter so that kids way into adulthood haven't an clue how to face adversity or problem-solve. The idea of being responsible starting in childhood and continuing on through high school and college is a joke. Adulthood doesn't even start until 25 for most people and even then, parents remain somewhere in the eqequationor some kids.

It is all about me for a great number of our citizens. The ones that actually have the N disorder make their close associates, friends and family so miserable with their hot and coldness, and cruelty and lack of empathy that there is no question they have a problem. So there is a big difference between being narcississtic and having the N. Personality Disorder.

[singermuse]

Amen!
I've grown tired of the bread and circuses.
No disrespect intended but if I read or see or hear still yet another Michael Jackson blurb I will become physically ill. Our pseudo culture, replete with the cult of celebrity and the religion of greed is destroying what is left of any real art or culture, and then we export it to pollute the rest of the world.
Celebrities and their dysfunctional lives are NOT news, ok?
News is what you may not read, such as:
The multi-national corporate push to privatize all resources like WATER and food crop seeds (through terminator tech and genetic manipulation) in areas of the world that need it most, places where the poor can barely afford to eat or grow their subsistence crops let alone pay for clean water.
Or how about the fact that the G8 is going on? They are deciding OUR future! Anybody want to know what policies they will soon inflict on the rest of us?
Remember Darfur? Where genocide is still happening?
Or how about the fact that as I type this, people are STILL being abused and tortured at Guantanamo?
Now THAT'S news we all should know about and DO something about!

[RButler]

When you say adulthood doesn't start until 25, it reminded me of a time I asked a young doctor I worked with who was from India if they had teenagers there. Of course they have young people aged 13-19 but I was asking if they had an extended childhood like we do in the US, an in-between phase we call 'teenager'. In some cultures and in our past young people were regarded as adults in many ways. But, we're nuts in this country. We dress 2 year old boys in fatigues or sports uniforms and some little girls get the Jon-Benet treatment, yet we have this delayed adulthood at the same time.

I recall actresses such as Liz Taylor playing 'women' while in her 20s while todays actresses in their mid to late 30s think they are still girls. BTW whatever happened to Meg Ryan? It's funny to see aging rockers with long, gray hair trying to act like they did 30 years ago.

[MadHeart]

Excellent observation. Of course, Liz is of a different generation--when to become 18 was to assume the mantle of responsible adulthood (while preparing for it in your teens). What seems to also be a horrible trend is to see 13 yr olds and their 30-something mothers (or 40-somethings these days since the responsibility of parenthood seems to be put off longer and longer) both dressed in identical hooker gear, strutting in the mall. It behooves a person to wonder how in the world can a parent actually condone the dress (paid for by the parent, of course), the piercings and tattoos (also paid for by the parents) foisted upon young teens to make them appear older than they really are while the inexperienced and naive child still resides inside. What conflict these children must be feeling. Grown up enough to have sex or 24/7 access to it online and exposing yourself there to the world, but not to hold a responsible job? Too many parents just give up in the face of popular culture and trends and peer pressure.

[singermuse]

There was a time in this country when young men and women of 15 would marry, have children, fight and die in wars, farm, work in factories, apprentice in all sorts of trades.
They were expected to act like adults and did. They were held to an accountability we rarely see these days even among so called "adults" over the age of 21.
The industrial revolution is partly responsible for our elongation of childhood, as was the "Gilded Age" when the sons and daughters of privilege were coddled and got to "sit out" the wars, child labor, by having the poor take their place. With the rise of the middle class we inherited both the good and bad results of more leisure and disposable income. Not to worry though. With economic times going as they are, we will soon have to grow up again.

[ProfessorDuh]

This is an essential point about the strange, dangerous American culture in which we find ourselves living. Ironically, it is both self-worshipping and, for that reason, self-destructive.

[GrainOSand]

Narcissism -- 1 : egoism, egocentrism
Egoism -- 1 a: a doctrine that individual self-interest is the actual motive of all conscious action b: a doctrine that individual self-interest is the valid end of all actions
2: excessive concern for oneself with or without exaggerated feelings of self-importance
Egocentrism -- 1: concerned with the individual rather than society
2: taking the ego as the starting point in philosophy
3 a: limited in outlook or concern to one's own activities or needs b: self-centered, selfish

From Merriam Webster Online


Reality TV -- If everyone is on stage...who is in the audience?


All is perfect, everyone is playing their part to perfection. The world could never be more perfect than it is right now. Relax, relax, relax....just be...

[theotherbed]

I'm a big fan of words and etiology and such, but WHY do people quote the dictionary, and then act as if cased closed, there you have it?! Try living with a narcissist for any, length of time, and your definition would fly right out the window from sheer weightlessness. Even the DSMIV is insufficient to the task of defining narcissism. NPDs are serious soul-killers. Looking in the mirror and requiring constant adoration is like the first round of American Idol--you ain't seen nothing yet. But the analogy continues, because eventually you realize there's really nothing there at all anyway, but a seething, smarmy Simon Cowell. There's nothing to reflect back, but this brutality that doesn't give a s**t about anybody or anything else--including spouses, children, pets, grandparents, constituents...We are all what is known as Supply, or Feed. They are social vampires.

They don't have any empathy, which isn't just a simple declarative sentence, it's a serious impediment that destroys relationships of any kind, for any reason they see fit, because YOU are really not there.

Yeah, narcissists belong to groups, like Bernie Madoff's endless supply of "friends". What he did is what the narcissist in the family, or in the workplace, or in government, or in any position of power will do to their--well, whoever you are, Trig, Mrs. Sanford, you lose, big time.

theotherbed

[GrainOSand]

The presentation of the definition was my attempting to see if I displayed the tendencies and then casting that light outward for others to (potentially) ask the same question of themselves. I write quite a bit in this environment. I do not do it because I am interested in me as the sole focus of my purpose for expressing thought. Like a flowing river, free of desire, want, need, or self-gratifying/aggrandizing thoughts of self, I think about many things and as fate would have it (writing and oratory have always been friends), my hands and voice box have always agreed to participate in the conversation going on internally to project it outward so that it may echo off the cavern wall of my solitude of existence...which is as it is for us all. Some covet the echo where I realize only...it is possible, and that it will take whatever form it takes and this is never personal, never really about me for an echo is an abstraction -- at best. The echo of applause some need, but those same people find themselves on their knees begging for the echo of applause -- as you live so shall you live and die.

As for the harmful effects of a narcissistic tendency all I can say is -- good people of Huffington Post it may be time to upgrade the disk infrastructure to accommodate any anticipated diatribe on the ills of a tendency to be selfish.

[singermuse]

I have a friend who suffers from the very real condition of narcissism. He is totally unaware of his inculcated selfishness. He's still a friend, because he can be charming and has these sometime bouts of clarity and attempts at normalcy and unselfishness. This is a real condition and it's sufferers do suffer, when they lose their jobs, or their wives/husbands and have no clue as to why. This behavioral aberration takes its toll on friends and family and the person themselves when they can't understand. I believe it is a neurological disease and hope one day it can be cured.

[IGNSTHMD]

I would rather be investigating eikos.

where do a mans decisions come from

how is his choice manifested

what setting precludes


I have always known sufficiency. My troubles where my own or of a intangible nature. Love found me although I think I was waiting, and now I am not so sure.

[GrainOSand]

"where do a mans decisions come from"

Hmmm, that's a big question. When I consider it...both nature and nurture come to mind as would be expected for the verifiable data suggests both play a role in shaping behavior. Beyond the obvious though, you get into something difficult to describe in words. Some live by gut feeling and amongst those there are varying types. Others are methodical and cautious, every step a measurement, every thought...a calculation aimed at advancing some cause, achieving some end...and amongst those there are varying types. Does it really matter where decisions come from, for if we knew would that alter their arrival, their effect, their meaning?

"how is his choice manifested"
Upon his life and that is as it should be. singermuse above talks of the impact of selfishness on friends and family, but ultimately, it is the selfish that pays the price for no one can occupy the space of another...though they may care, and though they may understand and conceive answers for others. Life is perfect because the punishment and the reward is in the living, one simply has to learn how not to distinguish. Is there unfairness? To quote my sister Sarah Palin -- you betcha! But such is trivial when you really consider life. I write about racism but I accept it because it exists, thus -- peace with no requirement or desire for change just a realization of the potential punishment and reward for stagnation.

[GrainOSand]

"what setting precludes


I have always known sufficiency. My troubles where my own or of a intangible nature. Love found me although I think I was waiting, and now I am not so sure."

Please clarify...

(-:

[Shewolf68]

This is just another example of our empire in midst of a collapse. When a society is loosing ground, a sure sign is the over fascination with all things celebrity. At the same time, our infrastructure collapses as we pay actors/athletes and anyone else who happens to be a social or political train-wreck gobs of money for their story.

It happens to all empires after they get fat and 'happy.' They believe their own hype, get greedy, take the society we have built for granted, get addicted to money and all things it buys and the socisety crumbles.

From the news reports today...America's got the fat down in spades!

[topkatnc]

In other words... we are past the tipping point....And the media are part to blame....a BIG part...

[ProfessorDuh]

I have thought that, sometime during the Bush era, the car straight went off the cliff. The right wingers then turned over the steering wheel to the rest of us and said, "All right, smarties, YOU get us out of this."

[RButler]

When I see the number of people at Michael Jackson's memorial, at his trial, at the hospital, at Neverland, at the Apollo and so on for the last 2 weeks, I wonder "doesn't anybody work?" Do they call in sick, take the day off or what? The response is usually immediate so I'm assuming they didn't put in a vacation request 3 weeks ahead of time.

[SemperVeritas]

Twitter is the epicenter of the "It's all about me" movement. Are you
(whoever you are -- it really doesn't matter) a Follower yet?

What am I doing right now? In the bathroom, flushing.

How about now?? I'm pulling up my pants.

And now??? Elvis has left the bathroom.

And now???? Walking downstairs. Are you still following me, I hope?
My life's every movement is immensely important, you know....

The Iranian "Twitter Revolution" notwithstanding, Twitter is the new
drug of choice for the chronically self-absorbed.

Blogging filled that need for a while, but blogging was only the gateway
drug.

What's next, I wonder.

[mimsnpips]

You can pick out the N word narcissists on Huff by their attitude and sometimes their picture. I mean is it a good idea to put your real pic on this site? Look wise and thoughtful-ha ha.

[Parsifals]

I suspect it is a phase and phases always create excess.

[Economike]

A Narcissist is some one who is better looking.

[lafrance]

Our culture is the worship of celebrity, sadly.
We put second rate celebrities above statesmen and world leaders. We give our best leaders a glance or a sneer while we worship the cult of celebrity to the point where we are willing to make laughing stocks of ourselves for a part of Warhols 15 minutes.
When did being a celebrity, even one berift of much of anything other then the ability to act like an a$$ in front of any camera, be as borish or lewd or classless as possible is considered someone worthy of national attention much more then someone who has done great service for humanity?
We also need a media that is about reporting, the truth and justice and less about making themselves the celebrities and preening for spotlight spouting the most shallow and inane things. Seeing the media treated as celebrity in Colorado is sick. They should be chasing down these so called chosen and special and asking what responsibility they bear for the state of things today rather then being part of them.
When our media became the celebrity and treated as such, we lost our 4th estate and the integrity of journalism as well as the ability to enjoy a news media that educates us rather then fill us with cotton candy silliness and teaching people the love of celebrities.

[listeningpost]

Yes of course, it is the American psyche that is suffering from malignant narcissism. Celebrities, public figures, and the media are reflections of our attention and self-image.
We are the people who created Superman, Hollywood, super-powerdom, and a system that "may not be perfect, but the best there is." We've maintained our emblem of freedom and remained ignorant of the past hundred years of toppling foreign governments, undermining other's national sovereignty, and naked economic aggression.
Our state of denial is like that of an addict and the recent recognition of self-absorption in our public figures is an indication that, like a drunk, our "bottoming out" may be near at hand.
Good in the long run, but sobering up can be an ugly thing.

[lafrance]

this is very true. We have become a society addicted to shallow pleasures and the inane.
Look at how so many consider Sarah Palin a serious contender for president, including many in the media, because she has 'star power'.
Excuse me?
What happened to ability, intelligence, knowledge of policy and issues, ect. Did the country learn nothing from Bush?
Since when is someone unqualified, ignorant of basic facts and willfully incurious but, has some 'star power' thought to be seriously in line to run this country?
But, this is the kind of society we have become. Willfully ignorant ourselves and unwilling to reflect, to appreciate intellect, to think deeply or educate ourselves independently. We have put celebrity above competence and hold celebrity to be higher then service or statesmanship.

[Brewtopia]

I would have to say the same thing of the Star Power of the community organizer in chief... I.E. the biggest narcissist in the history of the presidency!!!
Take Honduras for example... a lack of knowledge on foreign policy and then when all the facts come out about what really is going on down there he wont admit he was wrong...
Not being able to admit you are wrong is the first symptom of narcissism...
That being said... Palin is a narcissist for sure as well!

[lcats]

There are degrees of narcissism. If we are without healthy narcissism, we are a doormat. If we don't have a degree of body narcissism, we wouldn't care about our appearance. And so forth.

Pathological narcissism, as found in narcissistic personality disorders, is a real handicap in sustaining either close relationships, or positions of responsibility and power. The pathological narcissist is often able to get into positions of intimacy with others, or power and responsibility, but eventually blows it as their superficiality, venality, callousness, and manipulativeness becomes apparent. The only exception to this are people who are so superficially attractive or get into power because of historical circumstances, and who are in a position to maintain their status by beguiling others big-time or abusing military power.

Of course pathological narcissists are attracted to politics, but so are some people with healthy narcissism.

Sadly the public doesn't understand, and is often gullible for years.