(no subject)

[rivka]

Diagnostic criteria for 301.81 Narcissistic Personality Disorder

A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:
(1) has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)
(2) is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
(3) believes that he or she is "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people or institutions
(4) requires excessive admiration
(5) has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations
(6) is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends
(7) lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others
(8) is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her
(9) shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes

The Internet is a good place to be a pathology watcher. Not in the way that countless amateur net.pyschologists operate, cataloguing the emotional deficiencies of their opponents in Usenet debates or dispensing diagnoses and prescriptions to anyone with a downcast tone. That stuff drives me crazy. But the Internet is sometimes a good place to catch the feel, the flavor, of a disorder you've only read about. I know lots and lots of people with narcissistic traits - I'm sure you all do, too - but I've only ever once diagnosed someone with full-fledged narcissistic PD. I've never seen a really florid case in my practice. I think I'm seeing one now, though, in an online forum. There's a feeling to it, a sort of flash of illumination: "Oh! So that's what the thisness is behind the list of diagnostic criteria."

The last time I had this feeling online was in July, when my brother pointed me at this site. The scanned letter at the link is from our grandfather, and as far as I can tell the author of the page has paranoid schizophrenia of the coherent, well-organized sort. Reading through the links I had the same feeling of disturbed recognition. Made worse, I think, because my grandfather was involved - even peripherally - as a subject of his delusions.

When I thought this current guy was a fool, I was amused. Now that I'm pretty sure he's got a mental disorder, I'm feeling more sadness than anything else. I'm watching people bounce off his pathology and get angry, and I recognize that this probably happens to him again and again and again and again.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I just wanted to say it.

Comments

[micheinnz.livejournal.com]

If this is the person I think it is, I've had to restrain myself from responding "wow, could you _get_ further up yourself without actually blinking out of existence?" several times.

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

Care to join pleonastic and me in the gallery for some popcorn?

I too was aggravated by the group's response, BTW. I dunno if he's a real < fitb >, or just annoying, but I do think he's a drain on the positive energy I get from alt.poly. Someone like Chris (choxnpix, IIRC) is different, him, even though he royally pissed me off sometimes, could at least be talked to. He listened sometimes.

BTW, did you notice that Al Montrestuc (sp?) is back too. It's troll week at the poly saloon.

[saoba.livejournal.com]

I could make some of my writer kibble for the gallery, she said diffidently.

(Writer kibble: Into one large ziplock bag put 12 oz. cashews, 6-12 oz. M&Ms, 2-3 cups cheerios. If
sharing with fruit allergic person, shake now and put their share in a bag. Otherwise proceed to the adding of 1/2 cups raisins, shake. Keep on hand near keyboard for those moments of staring unhappily at a wall searching for words.)

He's well into the Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain, I am the Great and Powerful Oz stage. I hadn't realised how far into that he'd gotten or I might not have replied to him at all.

At any rate, I'm all for amiable hanging out not feeding the troll.

Barbara

Re:

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I too was aggravated by the group's response, BTW. I dunno if he's a real < fitb >, or just annoying, but I do think he's a drain on the positive energy I get from alt.poly.

I'm not so much aggravated by the group's response, actually, because... hm. I'm having trouble articulating this, but essentially, I think it's hard to avoid getting sucked into this kind of pathology even if you know what's happening. And in this case, people didn't - he was a stranger when he came in, and the full flower of his arrogant imperturbability in the face of argument has just been obvious in the last day or so.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

The concept of it being pathological never even occurred to me.

And I'm not sure how I feel about the possiblity that it is.

There's a part of me that feels that it would be disrespectful, patronizing, *not* to get angry. To me, that would be saying that his ideas don't matter.

Because, if it's pathological, then, to me, his ideas *don't* matter.

If he's arrogant and annoying, and I get angry at him, then his ideas *do* matter.

And I hate the idea of saying that someone doesn't matter.

Ah, well. The thread's done, anyway. I wish I'd read this earlier, so I could have considered this possibility. I don't know how I would have changed my actions. Well, my three most snarkiest comment, I shouldn't have posted. . . but then, I knew that when I was posting them.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

There's a part of me that feels that it would be disrespectful, patronizing, *not* to get angry. To me, that would be saying that his ideas don't matter.

Because, if it's pathological, then, to me, his ideas *don't* matter.

If he's arrogant and annoying, and I get angry at him, then his ideas *do* matter.

And I hate the idea of saying that someone doesn't matter.

Well, I think that he matters as a human being. I'm not letting go of that. Nor am I letting go of the recognition that his ideas are wrongheaded and pernicious, and that it would be a shame and a pity if other people who encountered them believed them. What I'm letting go of is the idea that my input into the system will have some effect on him.

One does have to be very, very careful about attributing someone else's beliefs or experiences to pathological causes, because it can be unfairly dismissive. But... well. If you had a kid in your class with untreated ADHD, and you were telling him to settle down and sit still every two minutes, the only practical effect would be that both of you would be frustrated. Trying to use logical arguments to convince this guy that he's mistaken is pretty much just like that.

[redbird]

I could use some popcorn, I think. When I find myself arguing with Tal and this new person-without-a-real-name on the same day, I need help something, like a deep breath and a movie. (Spirited Away was very cool, btw.) That he writes long, breathless, almost unreadable prose is actually a help--because it means I'm not reading so much as skimming.

And you folks have seen my paragraphs.

[redbird]

I'm now most of the way through the monster alt-poly thread, and have plonked the Idiot Du Jour publicly.

noodlings on pathologising

[submarine-bells.livejournal.com]

Hrm.

Your post raises some interesting issues. I'd be among the first to recommend caution regarding "diagnosing" the failings of others, despite knowing how tempting it can be to pathologise the traits of other folk that one has difficulty dealing with - but I think that doing so can often be problematic, to say the least.

On the other hand, there have been situations in my life where considering patterns of behaviour within a framework of a particular disorder has helped me make sense of stuff that has seemed totally nonsensical up until that point. Maybe the person in question hasn't been diagnosed as having Disorder X, and maybe they never will be. But if the face they turn to me has many of the characteristics of Disorder X, then responding to those behaviour patterns as if they were caused by Disorder X (whether or not it is actually the case) has sometimes been a helpful way for me to get a bit of emotional distance from the behaviours that I've been unable to cope usefully with any other way.

Um, I dunno if this makes much sense in the abstract, so as a worked example I'll mention my mother. For my entire adult life I've had huge difficulties with the way she acted toward me - she seemed contradictory, erratic, and vastly provocative in many ways. I found her actions toward me totally bewildering - until the point where a close friend of mine who also knows her said to me one day "you know, the way she acts toward you reminds me a lot of someone I know who's been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder".

I didn't think that comment was particularly significant at the time. But later on, when I did a bit of reading on BPD, it was as if the light suddenly turned on. The behaviours described were so totally exactly what my mother did! As I read more, and got more of a sense of how the BPD thing worked and why folk with BPD do what they do, I was able to apply this to my mother's actions and finally see some underlying coherence and pattern to her behaviour. It at long last started making sense to me; and after that I found dealing with her a LOT easier.

While I'll never know if she is in reality diagnosable with BPD, I've found that thinking of her behaviour as if she had this disorder has been very useful *to me*. It may or may not be "the truth", but it's been a valuable tool for me in learning how to deal better with her. And I think that's a Good Thing, overall.

[fourgates.livejournal.com]

I had the naive impression that the key difference between narcissistic PD and paranoid schizophrenia is that the NPD really needs and thrives on the reactions of others, whereas the PS might be content to ruminate independently, loading up 6 anti-spy-ware utilities on the home PC. Oh wait, I just noticed the bottom of Graf's home page. I'm leaning toward PS with him.

I thought your grandfather's letter reflected a very deep respect for humanity, internal peace, and practiced serenity -- an interesting counterpoint to Graf's site. Too bad the wacko can't see it.

By the way, Graf's picture says a lot to me.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

I had the naive impression that the key difference between narcissistic PD and paranoid schizophrenia is that the NPD really needs and thrives on the reactions of others, whereas the PS might be content to ruminate independently, loading up 6 anti-spy-ware utilities on the home PC.

Well, the key difference is the presence of hallucinations, delusions, and/or disorganized speech in schizophrenia.

From Graf's website:

At the instigation of New York State officials and their associates, the United States of America has waged war against me -- "low-intensity conflict," if you will -- since at least 1984. A surveillance device that emits ionizing radiation has become a weapon for destruction of my immune and reproductive systems. Subject to innumerable break-ins for which no legal recourse is available, I appear to have been poisoned over the years with chemical and biological weapons. Sporadically since 1985, and continuously since September, 1987, government agents and their associates have subjected me to the hell on earth of electromagnetic tracking, surveillance, and mind-reading technologies. Repulsive, anonymous "voices" torment and degrade me incessantly. Bio-chemical poisons weaken me and "biological process control" weapons disrupt somatic functions.

There really isn't anything narcissistic about him. This is classic delusional thought content. The other diagnostic possiblity would be delusional disorder, but that requires that the delusions be "non-bizarre," and I don't think he qualifies.

[elisem.livejournal.com]

By the way, Graf's picture says a lot to me.

Me too, and I wish it would stop saying it. (wry half-smile)


Then again, the incredibly disturbing voice-over that that page has as an audio component had already spooked the hell out of me.

[jinian.livejournal.com]

Thank you for saying that. It hadn't occurred to me. It's helpful.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

A certain person (whom I don't want to name to avoid this being searchable) proclaimed himself to be schizophrenic on alt.support.attn-deficit. He'd been diagnosed as ADHD in childhood, and given Ritalin, which may have caused him harm.

It was a long time before I realized (and then, it had to be shoved in my face) that he *WAS* schizophrenic. It hurt to realize that I was attacking someone for no purpose, and that I had to completely re-think my perceptions of who and what this person was.


"It's a real person on the other keyboard" usually means "don't say nasty shit to a usenet poster that you wouldn't say to a real human being", but it also means "it's a fallible human who may have problems and imperfections that you don't know about".

There are folks with schizophrenia, there are folks with autism/aspergers, there are folks with all kinds of other problems... and sometimes, they mix with the same group of jerks, morons and other pains in the ass that are all over usenet.

Sometimes there aren't any good answers.