The Problem with Narcissism

Narcissism warps a person's moral compass. If you think of yourself as exceptional, does that hand you permission to invent whatever version of reality flatters you? Because that is what it amounts to: lying. Somehow the ends get to excuse the means. People in business and politics drift away from what is actually true the moment the truth stops being useful to them, and then they look for reasons to justify holding power over others even when those others gain nothing from it.

Then there is the self-obsession itself. It is me, me, me. And when it isn't that, it flips to you, you, you. Everybody seems to want their ten minutes of being looked at. Reality television runs on exactly that hunger, and we feed it by watching other people live instead of getting on with our own lives. Think about the Kardashians: a whole livelihood built on fame, fixed on the shallowest parts of existence because that is what keeps the attention, the popularity, and the money flowing.

So which matters, the shallow or the meaningful? The largest channels we have for information (the news, the internet, social networks, television) tend to reward the pettiest version of narcissism, and they wear away at whatever values we had to begin with. Being superficial and chasing selfish ends has quietly become something like the American way of living.

We also pay it far too much attention. A good share of the stress people carry comes from propping up their own narcissism and everyone else's. The uglier parts of commerce and politics seem to grow from the same root. Often it counts for more that you are in front of a camera than what you actually do or say once you are there. People in public view rarely own what they project; they treat the spotlight as a chance to push their own agenda rather than to change anything for the common good. Why were we never taught to ask what we might give to other people and to the world, instead of only asking what we can squeeze out for ourselves?

There is a motto a lot of these people live by: grab everything within reach and leave next to nothing for anyone else. When wealth and influence come our way, do we spend them only on ourselves, or on everyone? I am not arguing for a welfare state with the government playing mother and father to us all. But consider the alternative: as a person climbs, they use what they have gained to pull a few others up behind them.