Comment on YouTube has gone mad by saarnok

Parent Post: YouTube has gone mad · In Reply To

saarnok · 2/12/2026, 12:02:08 AM · permalink

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rusalka · 2/12/2026, 1:03:02 AM · permalink

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saarnok · 2/12/2026, 1:40:23 AM · permalink

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rusalka · 2/12/2026, 3:30:21 AM · permalink

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saarnok · 2/14/2026, 2:51:02 AM · permalink

Well, that certainly explains the caution you display as well as the "second sight" so few have that allows you to recognize good advice when you see it.  
  
I learned NPD from Sam Vaknin as I was searching for the "WTF is this?" in my own family. It's purely a stroke of luck that I could see myself in light of his descriptions and realize that many of my motivations (Without my conscious awareness.) were really just thankfully often below the threshold of detection characteristics of NPD.  
  
When you become self aware of what is essentially an involuntary compulsion to seek recognition of whatever sort from other people because you lack the internal sense of worth which would ordinarily supply that recognition it becomes... Well, frankly, it becomes sort of hilarious.  
  
I'm sort of trapped in a world where I'm a passenger on a tour of my life, watching as I stumble from one self serving pose to another, guffawing at the absurdity of my responses to stimuli while still inspired to again and again demonstrate my worth to other people.  
  
Thing is: I'm good at it. And I don't like it. I can't stand to generate the robotic "You're so awesome!" robot that any narcissist constantly attempts to generate and is never satisfied with, because like any fantasy it feels unreal, as if the cardboard cutouts we tend to see people as have come to life parroting a script we not only wrote, but agonized over the wording to get it just right, only to have the cardboard cutout fail to improve on it to the point where it seemed real.  
  
In seeing myself as occupying a portion of the spectrum of NPD potential I recognize and often at least head off the worst excesses of the N's need to defend my identity as the most important person in your life, or at least you'd damn sure better think so.  
  
That's why, in several instances here on soj.ooo I've just gone silent with several persons who I'm absolutely certain would be great friends under the right circumstances.  
  
They needed me to feed their sense of worth in whatever fashion I could, and since I'm also N oriented, that form was essentially destined to be negative in nature.  
  
Here's one of the problems: I cannot pass a compliment to you or anyone without significant self examination of how I'm possibly using it to manipulate you. I'm good at it. I'm freakishly good at it. And I don't like it. At all.  
  
Give me free rein access to half the prolific posters on soj.ooo and I can turn them into mirrors of my opinions. I'd say, in about a month. Tops.  
  
I don't want to do that. I'm actually proud of the fact that I'm not quite certain what your religious beliefs are. Because I can change them. Completely. If you're as ignorant as the average person is... which you don't seem to be.  
  
I want to change people's considered opinions. If what I'm saying makes sense. If they actually agree without being subsumed into my own crazy way of thinking.  
  
The episode you recount in brief. Yeah. That's classic NPD. Ns are absolutely incredibly effective in presenting people they've selected to be foes as evil incarnate. They (we) can focus essentially every bit of mental energy not necessary to eat on figuring out exactly how to damage, not just your reputation with others, but even to give you significant doubt about your character in your own eyes.  
  
You didn't say what role your husband played in this event, but I'm relatively confident it was significant and while you might find it hard to believe, without him or an equivalent sounding board to judge yourself by, that N might have actually destroyed you.  
  
This Narcissistic contagion method is essentially the basis for how "they" generate what I call 'agents' (think, The Matrix) to wax poetic outrage over situations that wouldn't even merit a comment ordinarily.  
  
We are all to some extent or other on this spectrum of narcissistic validation, quite simply because here we are, sharing our opinions as if they mattered. Fascinatingly, my wife is free of this malady/ability and consequently uniquely vulnerable to being taken in by it to the extent she was actually hospitalized by a "customer" who accused her of short-changing her.  
  
Blessedly, she actually cannot comprehend people running scams on her and fairly reliably at least once a year she falls victim to a scam that any N would identify in an instant, and it takes some significant effort to extract her from it.  
  
I am of course the 'hero' in this saga and my absolutely incredible wife bombards me with confirmation of this "fact".  
  
I am. No hyperbole. One of the luckiest men who's ever lived. In my opinion. Mostly because of my wife.  
  
A truly self aware narcissist is a fantastically rare thing. Lucky me. Sam Vaknin showed me. Lucky me.  
  
And lucky everyone else that I can also show them.  
  
...  
  
Or... I'm fooling myself. Exactly as any narcissist does.  
  
Not so comfortable in my shoes... which is what any narcissist would say.  
  
Here's what I want you to do: Absolutely out in the open persuasion. Grab your husband and let him know how grateful you are for the strength he gave you. He'll be mystified, probably. Doesn't matter. See, that's not really for him. It's for you.

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rusalka · 2/14/2026, 4:28:47 AM · permalink

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saarnok · 2/15/2026, 1:41:52 AM · permalink

Are you one? Did I ever dig at your psychology? No? Well, then the answer is no. The person accusing you of threatening to "fuck up his stream" or whatever it was is one. The accusation of things you've never even hinted at is a pretty solid giveaway.  
  
Narcissism expresses in various ways, but reliably to enhance self aggrandizement, notoriety, or to negatively impact others, to drive down their apparent social capital, and thereby feed their supply from the negative impact they have.  
  
I've not read "People of the lie", sounds like a great title and makes me think he gets it, because that's really the essential base of narcissism.  
  
It's almost inevitable that narcissists attack you by presenting you and what you've done in a deceptive and possibly entirely imaginary manner.  
  
One of the problems with narcissistic attacks is the fiendishly imaginative and seemingly absolutely sincere way they present their case against you. They'll remember the oddest details of conversations from years back, twisted into configurations that sound entirely plausible and are of course impossible to ever really debunk.  
  
One of the talents a narcissist has is accurately identifying the psyche types of predators and prey, but especially of predators. This comes in handy when identifying that a female farming clicks via emotional outrage isn't female and is also presenting as a male under another account name.  
  
There's a sort of pyschic imprint that goes with your sex, and even an atypical representation such as yourself instantly identifies as female to me where some "females" on soj.ooo I've never even considered the possibility they were one because it's just so obvious they're not, at least to me, and when they do the obvious and accidentally reply to a question to the "female" as the male identity, then realize and quickly switch to make the identical reply as the "female", that pretty much settles the matter for me.  
  
And you're right. Helping a narcissist is a bit like pushing on a balloon. You can make a dent, but all the air's still there and it just pushes back out as soon as you take the pressure off.  
  
But, it's still doable to some extent in some cases. Basically you get a narcissist to look at the traits of narcissism and if they respond: "That sounds just like someone I know!" Rather than: "Wait a minute; this sounds like me!" you probably can't make a dent, and if you can it takes years and years of them wanting to change and working at it before they begin to notice their narcissism rearing up in time to do something about it.  
  
To help others is less difficult and involves getting them to stop thinking of the narcissist as acting on a belief in their own greatness, but instead acting to convince themselves through your reactions that they've covered their inadequacy. Ultimately they need someone to convincingly tell them they're great. But, because they genuinely can't believe it, those assurances are never enough, and as soon as you stop providing them those assurances they go on the attack. Usually in my experience not to extent you described.  
  
People of the lie is a great description because that's just a really concise way to describe it. I checked out a little excerpt from the book and while it's probably not for me, it's probably a really good warning. To me, they're just messed up people with messed up motivations doing messed up things. I don't think of them as "evil". Evil is a damn good way to think of them though. As in Demonically Possessed, Evil."  
  
And so, I give the advice here on soj.ooo: "Stop responding to them."  
  
The strategy is called "abandonment" by Sam Vaknin. Just get the hell away.  
  
Had family drama recently with someone flinging wild accusations in a threatening tone to everyone. Gave the same advice: Just don't respond. At all. One or two already had, but they took the advice and stopped. Soon enough the N imploded and ended up incarcerated... without any direct involvement from any of us.  
  
Have I been diagnosed. No. Of course not. What would be the point? I won't take treatment for a broken leg, why would I get treatment for a mental disorder... voluntarily?  
  
I think self aware narcissists aren't as uncommon as you'd believe, though still quite rare. I think most of us are just coping well enough that it doesn't become an issue for the most part. We play our parts in the characters we've designed for ourselves to be the guy you can call at two in the morning because a pipe burst or your car needs pulled out of a ditch and we'll come help with your problem and refuse any compensation. We'll share the best produce of our garden with you, call you out of the blue to tell you about a killer sale on some grocery item someplace, even offer to pick some up for you if you want. We'll explain how your appliance works without talking down to you and offer to take a crack at fixing it. And we'll fade away until you need us again.  
  
Sooner or later you'll realize we treat you better than anyone else and never ask you to do anything for us. Never try to include ourselves in your life, consistently offer to include you in ours and never take offense that you don't want to stop by barbecued ribs or whatever.  
  
And, sooner or later you'll feed us a dose of affirmation the non-self aware N's can never get. Because it feels earned. It feels real-ish. And as long as I don't persuade you to undertake something that doesn't work out, and I'm now, regardless of what you think, actually responsible for manipulating you to take that action, then I'm cool.  
  
If I manipulate you to do something, turn you into my agent to some degree, and acting on MY manipulation you suffer a setback, that's a blow to my ego. That's an assault on my sense of worth. Of which there isn't much to begin with.  
  
But, we do know how people work. We know how to spot the predators and the agents. Mostly. It's not a superpower. Just awareness.  
  
Unlike the non self aware narcissist, I'm literally impossible to insult. It's just ever more amusing as someone attempts to get under my skin. I don't respond to insults for the most part. They're irrelevant. They quite simply are just noises the two legged animals make when they're trying to intimidate me. I'm actually far more deeply concerned by a cat meowing plaintively and have been known to move a pile of lumber to figure out why a cat's crying.  
  
My wife. Yes. Contrary to popular opinion, narcissists can love. We're aware that it's selfish, and it's really just... fortunate that you do not. Consequently I can suffer more "insults" from my wife without turning on her on than "normal" people can. I have my flaws (hoo boy) and she has hers. She imagines we had conversations we didn't have... and that's okay. When we're in our graves it's not going to make a damn bit of difference if I was "right" about something in contention. But, it might make a difference if I didn't upset her anymore than I needed to. "Oh, you think I said XYZ? Okay. Maybe so." Fighting about memories is possibly the stupidest thing anyone can do for the most part. Probably before 24 hours has gone by the importance of it in her mind will have long since vanished... unless I make a big fuss about it.  
  
You see. Treating her well. Treating her excellently... is just to my advantage.... always. I'm acting exactly like some evil being who'd assessed the situation rationally would act. Funny how that works out. I can asses my own ego and see that any slight momentary thrill of "winning" would be far less than the supply obtained over the long haul from being agreeable.  
  
Friends? Friends are the rarest of phenomenon. What's a friend? Someone who'll come help with a burst pipe, stuck car, broken appliance... time after time? Someone who calls just to give you a heads up about a great buy? Who always makes time for you? I only know one kind of person who does that.  
  
No. "Friends" are the people who always have an excuse why they can't help. Friends always have other things to do. When it's time to split a mountain of firewood, I can count on "friends" to have some reason to not give me a hand. "Friends" let me pick up the bill at the restaurant, need rides from or to the airport, need their lawnmower fixed or to borrow our laundry or figure out why their sprinkler system doesn't work or to haul a piano up three flights of stairs while their other "friends" sit around eating the "moving party" pizza.  
  
But, you don't need to see the world the way I see it. In your world it's best if "love" is selfless and Ns are "evil".  It's a damn good way for you to look at the world. It might be essential. I don't see one good reason for you to modify your opinion.

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rusalka · 2/17/2026, 2:44:19 AM · permalink

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sacredcow · 2/17/2026, 1:43:44 PM · permalink

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