Narcissism

Welcome to the first Rob Mulholland's Blog Roll, the first in a semi-regular series of ill-informed, ill-advised ramblings from the brain of an insignificant blot on the landscape of life. Each time I guilt my idle fingers into tapping the pertinent keys I will be examining a different concept, person, idea, artwork or irritant that has had an impact on my life, or the lives of others. Considering I have been vain enough to assume anyone in this already shit-filled world would be idiotic enough to waste precious seconds of the tiny slither of life they possess between vast swathes of death to sit and actually read this drivel, rather than doing more constructive and enjoyable things like attaching batteries to their genitals, today's subject will be narcissism. As you will see, the subject of the article will be way lain immediately, and the ranting will commence.

Narcissus does not fall in love with his reflectionbecause it is beautiful, but because it is his. If it were his beauty that enthralled him, he would be set free in a few years by its fading. - W.H. (Wystan Hugh) Auden

If you aren't quite self-consciously middle class enough to have picked up the Guardian's recent series of pamphlets on Greek mythology you may not be aware of the story of Narcissus, the etymological root of narcissism. He was a man who fell in love with his own reflection after seeing it in a pool of water. He knelt by the pool gazing at his own reflection so long he died of thirst. He couldn't drink from the pool, for if he was to do so, he would shatter his reflection into a thousand pieces. Here's what I imagine the smug bastard looked like:

The narcissist enjoys being looked at and not looking back. - Mason Cooley

In the modern day the narcissist is king of his own domain. The whole world is made to tell him how fucking brilliant he is because he once put his cock in his mate's pint. Legend.

The Internet is the narcissist's best friend, it gives them a pat on their back and says "Well done champ" to each and every one of them each and every day. Narcissists can upload their new pics of them being totally 'crazy' on a 'mad' night out within minutes of them stepping through the door and have their slack-jawed, spanner-faced friends gawp at them and leave insightful comments about how, omfg, that night was totally random LOLZ. Being crazy on a mad night out would entail writing an essay about Toy Story 2 on the wall of the British Library in shit, while David Ike flew past on a hippogriff made of Lego bricks, not a hundred pictures of you and your chubby faced fuckwit friends holding a drink in a plastic cup and looking slightly pissed. That's you being 'dull' on a 'dull' night out. And whilst I'm at it, unless you determined you were going to talk to that particular bloke by lining up six blokes and then rolling a dice, it was not 'random'. It was peculiar. You semi-literate, greasy-faced shits.

Narcissists can put a video on youtube of them lip-syncing to a cheesy old shitbag like Rick fucking Astley and hope someone out there gives enough of a fuck to scrawl underneath "lol, what a legend!!!!!!". Using too many exclamation marks is the first sign of absolute, irreconcilable stupidity.

Or they can write a crappy little blog about how shit everything is and hope that people think they're somehow above the rest of the prattling masses.

The Internet has become the proverbial house-share toilet, blocked with the remnants of last night's curry and taco sessions, overflowing with the slurry of human thought, the salacious service of base desires and 14 year old self-harmers arguing with 40 year old accountants about which episode of Thundercats was best.

Reality TV allows slow-witted people who whole-heartedly believe they have a talent in singing or juggling dogs to put themselves up to the scrutiny and mockery of people so self-obsessed they wouldn't bat an eyelid if Jesus Christ walked in the room to show them his magic routine.

Adverts scream at us that we're worth it, and we lap it up, all any of us want is to be reassured that we aren't just another arse-barnacle clinging on to a rock spinning round a fart God once lit as a joke.

We're all narcissists to some degree (I know I am, I'm fucking brilliant), we have to be in order to keep our insignificant minds from imploding with doubt, but there are clear levels, and far too many people have achieved the highest level of narcissism, the level I call 'Cunt'.

But what damage does it do really? Does it matter if someone loves themselves so much that they're physically incapable of holding a conversation on any topic other than themselves?

It matters if they manage to somehow gain some real power and authority (see any political figure ever), but mostly the answer is no, not really. It doesn't impact on me at all. But narcissists are happy, they will always have themselves to love, and they will never betray them, and other people being happy for such a pig-fucking stupid reason is fucking annoying, and that's what matters to me.

To bastardise a Martin Luther King quote, "A man who has not found someone they would die for is not fit to live".

I hope you enjoyed my thoughts on the matter, I know I did.

A narcissist is someone better looking than you are. - Gore Vidal