Johns Hopkins Psych finally said it: Malignant Narcissism

[politicat]

http://www.usnews.com/news/the-report/articles/2017-01-27/does-donald-trumps-personality-make-him-dangerous?src=usn_tw

John D. Gartner, a practicing psychotherapist who taught psychiatric residents at Johns Hopkins University Medical School, minces as few words as the president in his professional assessment of Trump.

"Donald Trump is dangerously mentally ill and temperamentally incapable of being president," says Gartner, author of "In Search of Bill Clinton: A Psychological Biography." Trump, Gartner says, has "malignant narcissism," which is different from narcissistic personality disorder and which is incurable.

This is actually an enormous risk professionally. We've had a rule since the 1960s called the Goldwater Rule that prevents us from making diagnoses at a distance.

Narcissistic Personality Disorder is also incurable, at least with current methods. It can be managed, sometimes.

[Crunchy Frog]

1. Wikipedia entry.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malignant_narcissism

[bucolic_frolic]

19. Ouch!!

"an extreme mix of narcissism, antisocial personality disorder, aggression, and sadism."

The narcissism is bad enough, aggression adds to the ferocity, sadism is a twist at
times, but the one that hits me is antisocial personality disorder .... this is attributed
to many or most criminals, and I don't mean misdemeanors. It's like hating society,
all the people in it, and all it stands for.

[politicat]

26. So... the developmental view of Cluster B is a fault around age 3.

Children at that age are deeply solipsistic -- they are the center of the universe. Which is fine, and good, because during language acquisition and early socialization, they need to be learning language and recognizing that they're unified beings. The problem is when someone gets stuck there. A trauma can do it, and sometimes that trauma isn't even significant enough to register for others. The birth of a sibling can do it because it takes away a caregiver's attention. But not always.

For the narcissist, they're not actually convinced the rest of us exist. And if we do, we don't exist the same way they do. They have a faulty theory of mind and cannot shift perspective. We're non-player characters in their single-player game -- we exist to give them rewards and to serve as targets. When we speak back, it's as offensive and unexpected as the little green army men objecting to being buried in the sandbox. But narcissism is also born in that failure of theory of mind, because a narcissist cannot generate their own self-approval. They have to seek it from others, and they're constantly being torn between wanting approval from the toys and not believing the toys have the right to comment.

So adding in sadism and aggression and antisocial behavior? It means they're even less convinced we're real, and have decided affirmatively that the toys aren't worth having, even for approval. That's why they're dangerous.

(And this is absolutely a 40K foot view, not the details.)

[starshine00]

29. yep

both my parents are/were (one has passed).

You can tell by the way he treats Melania in public that her life is probably a living hell in private.

[They_Live]

34. that pretty much was his campaign

and stump speech, and his interview with Muir the other day.

[pnwmom]

2. Right. Neither NPD nor the malignant version can be treated with drugs.

These people have warped personalities, and you can't treat that with drugs any more than you can treat a broken leg with drugs.

[politicat]

3. I doubt Dr Gartner made that distinction. That reads like a reporter's interpretation.

But yeah, personality disorders are broken software. The only thing therapy does is make them better at fucking other people over. With life-long support and training and a stellar environment, they're just assholes, not scheming manipulators.

It's not legal insanity -- Cluster B knows exactly what they're doing. They know we think they're wrong. They don't care. That's what makes them so dangerous.

We've been talking about this within my professional group for months, but it's a good way to lose a license and be sued into penuary. (Which is fine if you're a rockstar shrink, with a $1000 an hour billing. Not so great when you're an academic researcher with a mortgage.)

[pnwmom]

4. I don't blame professionals who are not making this diagnosis.

To do so would put them at great personal and professional risk.

But I am grateful for the few, like Dr. Gartner, who are speaking out.

[politicat]

11. Thanks.

My practice has been doing ALL of the circumlocution -- we are correlating observed behavior, we are not making a diagnosis, we see disturbing trends -- and have been doing one to one talking with our electeds. But we're easily destroyable, so public statements -- if the Uni hadn't forbidden it anyway -- have been out.

Seriously, this is such a relief. Yeah, it's a label, but we use labels because they mean we have something we can talk about.

[Ilsa]

13. My son's psychiatrist showed me the journal

The day after she got it reminding them of not making armchair diagnoses and risking their professional careers.

I can't imagine how difficult it's been to remain mum on this when someone asks.

[Blue_Roses]

7. So how does this type usually

play out? In other words, do they burn the house down and everyone around them?

[politicat]

9. ... They tend to try, yeah.

We very rarely get them into positions of exceptional power because they do tend to flame out first. But these are the family annihilators when they're humiliated.

There's a level of narcissism that's almost required to be in the public eye, whether business, entertainment or politics. For the most part, that's not terribly dangerous -- they're unpleasant but they're essentially bullies who would rather nurse a grudge and pout in the most ostentatious way possible because they have to have an audience.

But the malignancy tag means they can ramp up obsession. And obsession is always dangerous.

Here's the thing -- the Secret Service actually trains on this, because narcissism is correlated with stalking. I am hoping they've noticed, and have a plan.

[pnwmom]

16. I have had a few garden variety narcissists in my life.

So I've had some decades to learn about them the hard way. (I'm not referring to the "healthy narcissism" common to higher achievers -- but narcissism to a degree where they completely lack empathy.) It was very disorienting, till I finally made my first "diagnosis" and all the pieces fell into place. Once I understood, it was easier to deal with this person -- and I didn't even have to blame him for his behavior because I understood that he was broken and he literally could not see other people as separate human beings -- so he could hurt them and have no idea he was doing so. He thought he and everyone else shared the same feelings -- so if he wasn't feeling hurt by something he said or did, why should anyone else?

Knowing how negatively the ordinary narcissists affected me, I can only imagine what kind of life the Trump kids have had. His narcissism is so far beyond anything most of us non-professionals have ever dealt with. It really is amazing that he didn't "flame out" long ago.

I know why his people think they can handle him. I used to handle one of my narcissists, whenever she got very negative, by simply changing the topic to one of the things she loved to brag about. She took the bait every time. This is what DT's handlers are doing, no doubt. And depending on who he last talked with, who most recently flattered him, he'll do an about-face on almost any position without a second thought. But any conventional Republicans who think they are okay with him, that they can work with him, aren't paying attention to his main handler -- Steve Bannon. DT is broken but Bannon's a monster.

Interesting to know that the Secret Service have had this training. I hope they turn out to be the non-partisans they are supposed to be.

[Blue_Roses]

17. This is so interesting...

and the Secret Service trains on this specific disorder? They've got to have picked up on this then and I wonder what they are thinking. I can just imagine the stress they must feel with the unpredictability and impulsivity that Trump exhibits. It has to be nerve-racking.

I don't see Trump being able to sustain a "normal" presidency no matter how many people try to handle him. I just worry about the eventual fallout.

[3catwoman3]

35. If I worked for theSecret Service, I would...

...have to quit. No way I would take a punch for Trump, let alone a bullet. No way in hell.

[NoGoodNamesLeft]

23. They destroy everything in their path

But not before creating deep division and conflict between everyone they come in contact with.

He WILL destroy the country if he's not stopped.

[Control-Z]

10. It must drive every mental health care professional

out there bonkers to not be able to say anything. And knowing what you know it is probably more frightening too than it is to the average person. I lived with a Trump grade narcissist for 13 years (still legally married to him). No one and nothing has ever hurt me as badly. The things he said and did to me were worse than my father's physical abuse. As painful as, maybe more than, my mother's death. I still haven't fully recovered.

So I know, first hand, what Trump is capable of and it scares the crap out of me. The only advice I ever got was to run as far and as fast at I could and to never look back because there was no treatment. Stopping trump's inauguration was all I cared about after election night. Now that he's in office how will we, an entire country, ever get away from him? There is no cure for what he will do as long as he's there. He's got to be removed.

[politicat]

12. It makes us question ourselves a lot.

Because we see it, and so we spend a lot of time reality checking for each other. We can be gaslit, too, after all. The hardest part has been recognizing there is consensus within the community (one of my teaching peers is actually using the circling shark debate video to train grad students) but not being able to take it public, then watching the public and the media fall for all of the classic traps and gaslighting.

The good news is that narcissists are more alike than different. They're highly predictable, in a general way. And denying them attention while enforcing boundaries is a functional strategy. The only one, as it happens. But to make it work requires a massive proportion of the population to sign on to ignore the antics, isolate the offender and enforce boundaries.

But with this? Now we can start doing Narcissist Survival 101 seminars.

I'm so sorry regarding your (hopefully) STBX. I can't imagine marrying one -- I grew up with two of them (different varieties, and fortunately, they were each other's primary source of supply). They are like being through the looking glass. (Disordered parents -- the reason most shrinks are shrinks!)

Seriously -- do your self-care, at the very minimum. You and we need you as recovered as possible, so if Il Douche is triggering, mute his tangerine ass and work the trigger. It's not weak -- it's a form of resistance to refuse to play his game.

[BainsBane]

5. Malignant narcissism defined

Kernberg described malignant narcissism as a syndrome characterized by a narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), antisocial features, paranoid traits, and egosyntonic aggression. Other symptoms may include an absence of conscience, a psychological need for power, and a sense of importance (grandiosity).
Malignant narcissism - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malignant_narcissism

Yep. Spot on.

[NoGoodNamesLeft]

6. The Trump "movement" is a political cult

That's why his followers are so out of their fucking minds. Hitler was the same way and Trump is far more dangerous than Hitler was because Germany was never anywhere near as powerful as the US is.

He MUST be stopped. They need to impeach him NOW AND prosecute.

[UTUSN]

8. Can we kick this to high Olympus, please?!1

[spanone]

14. K&R...

[grantcart]

15. Oh my god is it metastasizing??

[politicat]

18. I laughed! Thank you!

I have a really germy cold so didn't head out to the airport when I got the call. I've been feeling like all I'm doing today is education and 101-ing. I needed that.

Oh, and a new nick, too : the Golden Glioma!

[calimary]

28. Shit - you too?

I've been in bed most of the day with a massive cold - my first big one in a long time.

I have no upper sinuses. So when I get a head cold, it goes straight to my face - below my eyes. I feel like my face is a block of concrete.

[politicat]

40. Oh, yeah. I want root-rooter to come out and drill my face.

I blame my students - they went home over winter, collected a bunch of new viruses and brought them back.

[KewlKat]

20. That's what I thought and have posted about it a few times. Here's one thread I did

last July,

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1251&pid=2330653

THE MALIGNANT PERSONALITY:

These people are mentally ill and extremely dangerous! The following precautions will help to protect you from the destructive acts of which they are capable. To recognize them, keep the following guidelines in mind:

(1) They are habitual liars. They seem incapable of either knowing or telling the truth about anything.

(2) They are egotistical to the point of narcissism. They really believe they are set apart from the rest of humanity by some special grace.

(3) They scapegoat; they are incapable of either having the insight or willingness to accept responsibility for anything they do. Whatever the problem, it is always someone else’s fault.

(4) They are remorselessly vindictive when thwarted or exposed.

(5) Genuine religious, moral, or other values play no part in their lives. They have no empathy for others and are capable of violence. Under older psychological terminology, they fall into the category of psychopath or sociopath, but unlike the typical psychopath, their behavior is masked by a superficial social facade.

More on it here.

http://www.manipulative-people.com/malignant-narcissism/

Narcissism becomes particularly “malignant” (i.e. malevolent, dangerous, harmful, incurable) when it goes beyond mere vanity and excessive self-focus. Malignant narcissists not only see themselves as superior to others but believe in their superiority to the degree that they view others as relatively worthless, expendable, and justifiably exploitable. This type of narcissism is a defining characteristic of psychopathy/sociopathy and is rooted in an individual’s deficient capacity for empathy. It’s almost impossible for a person with such shallow feelings and such haughtiness to really care about others or to form a conscience with any of the qualities we typically associate with a humane attitude, which is why most researchers and thinkers on the topic of psychopathy think of psychopaths as individuals without a conscience altogether.





I have a few more threads on DU about this.

[politicat]

21. Yes. And I've been really happy to see them.

Those of us with licenses have not been able to speak. It's a professional standard, and violating it can mean losing our malpractice insurance or our license -- so our profession.

I've been so pleased when others have noticed and talked about it. Thank you.

[Blue_Roses]

24. I am bookmarking this

Thank-you

[Hugin]

22. I'm just going to leave this here...

Again.

[NoGoodNamesLeft]

25. This video analysis about Trump is spot on

The man doing the analysis is actually a narcissist and puts out a lot of very good videos on the subject.

[politicat]

30. Oh, him.

Yeah, he's a narcissist. At least he's sort of channeling his pathology into public service. He's really not my favorite person, but he's much less toxic than most. Just don't give him direct money. (Ad revenue is fine.) But don't engage with him. Just for your own good. He can be... manipulative. He's kind of well known in the victims of narcissism recovery community.

[NoGoodNamesLeft]

31. It should not be surprising that he's manipulative...he is about as severe a narcissist as they come

Not sure why anyone would want to engage him unless they are doing research or something and fully understand what they are getting themselves into. I have pretty extensive experience with different varieties or narcissists. I've never felt compelled to interact with him, but his videos offer a very unique and useful perspective on narcissism. I'm not aware of any other narcissists that are doing what he does. I find them interesting but then again I've been studying psychology for over 35 years.

[3catwoman3]

37. If he could watch over...

...600 hours of Trump footage, then he is a masochist as well as a narcissist.

[starshine00]

27. I called this months ago

Whereas Pence seems like a sociopath to me. Which is worse than NPD. They are much harder to detect (I think W. was a sociopath too, and Cheney definitely was).

[politicat]

33. The funny thing is? Sociopaths can be easier to deal with because they understand rules.

The differential diagnosis criteria breaks down like this: A sociopath can maintain relationships and follow social rules as long as they understand the personal benefit to maintaining those relationships and following the rules and consider the personal benefit greater than the potential gain. Their relationships are extremely transactional, very tit for tat, but the potential is there. (The current argument on this diff dx issue is do we roll psychopathy into sociopathy, and if not, what is the diff dx? My personal leaning, though it's not my area of work at all, so I barely have any input, is that psychopathy is when someone cannot maintain relationships and follow rules, even when doing so is of benefit.) Basically, one can negotiate with a sociopath, given that one is willing to stick very closely to the established rules and enforce the boundary, because the sociopath won't unless they are closely monitored. And sociopaths tend not to care about the attention of others, so they're more likely to stick to a deal as long as it remains beneficial.

Versus narcissism, where relationships are maintained at a superficial level as a means of gaining attention, and social rules only exist for other people or when the rules benefit the narcissist. Narcissism doesn't fully admit to the existence of other people while deeply needing the attention of other people. Narcissism only cares about social rules when those rules are serving their needs for attention. Oh, they will complain when they're held to a rule or contract, but that's part of the performance. It's all attention. As soon as the attention dies or shifts, they need it back, and they don't care if it's positive or negative attention. Disapproval is almost as potent as approval. A narcissist is likely to stir a pot or cause drama or break a deal just because it's gotten too quiet. And they have no interest in learning the rules of the game. They're more unpredictable in that way. (Their behaviors tend to be predictable, and what will provoke them tends to be predictable, but what trips their boredom/attention supply is less predictable.)

I don't know about Pence or Bush, but I do know they both have a track record of playing mostly within the political rules. It's the difference between Chaotic Evil and Lawful Evil, to use the DnD construction. Sociopathy tends towards the lawful side. And it's much easier to deal with someone who will agree to a set of rules, even if they negotiate the rules mostly to benefit themselves.

But I wouldn't even go that far, actually. Pence has maintained relationships. He is self-serving, without a doubt, and is convinced of his rightness, but that's true of a lot of his co-religionists and local culture. Is he a product of his dysfunctional culture? YES. But he's also tainted now, and any rehab he wants to do will rely on his adherence to the rules. He will have to prove himself utterly unlike the ^.

I am not going anywhere near Cheney. That's all sorts of license killer.

[starshine00]

38. the spectrum of sociopathy is very wide

I think they are found at the very top and very bottom of society. My mother is narcissist to sociopath, she mimics very well but she actually has very little capacity for empathy and can be extremely manipulative and diabolical while not ever being detected. It is not her fault but the fault of a very tragic childhood. If I have to deal with one I would choose a narcissist like Trump because there is no way of actually knowing if someone is a sociopath until it is too late (i.e. you have gotten too close to them) and even then you won't be believed by other people who know them less well. My experience with both types isn't clinical or texbook it is from dealing with them in my family (and reading Hare and Stout and spending years on forums for adult children of narcissists/borderlines &co-morbid dx's). I don't believe sociopathy tends toward the lawful side, I think lawful sociopaths are incredibly successful in life, but many gang members and certainly gang leaders are sociopaths as well as mafia etc (after re-reading I see where you are calling those types 'psychopaths'). People actually don't fit neatly into any of the human categories but sociopaths are some of the coldest scariest people there are are in the world, my brother was married to one for ten years and she turned our whole family upside down until he finally managed to get custody of his daughter and get divorced from her. My other brother is married to a borderline/narc type and she is a pain in the ass but you can see her coming a mile away. I have noticed that sociopaths are very reluctant to openly express anger, my sister in law and mother both almost never express anger because it is not a useful emotion to manipulate with. My parents were married for over 40 years, I believe it is a complete falsehood that sociopaths do not maintain relationships, and these characteristics can be very flawed in particular when applied to women. It is very easy for a narcissistic or sociopathic male to find an extremely broken and mentally ill woman like my mother who will literally tolerate anything (and by anything I literally mean ANYTHING, hence my PTSD) from a spouse as long as he does not leave. I don't believe there is any real difference in sociopathy & psychopathy from what I have read, they are different terms with the same meaning AFAIK.

[smirkymonkey]

32. K&R

[dalton99a]

36. When Trump said "Lock her up", he was referring to himself. He belongs in prison.

[DeminPennswoods]

39. Rep Tim Murphy is a practicing psychologist

Murphy is the only currently practicing psychologist member of Congress. He is also assigned to Walter Reed in his capacity as a Navy Reserve officer. It would be fairly easy for him to meet with Trump and give his colleagues at an initial assessment.