McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld

Posted on March 11, 2020 by Luke Ford

Misha Glenny writes in 2008: “When the Russians came, they forced the new Bulgarian mafia out of Hungary and into Czechoslovakia,” explained Yovo Nikolov, Sofia’s leading expert on Bulgarian organized crime. “It started off with car smuggling but then the
guys noticed something else.”

That something else was the silnice hanby, or Highway of Shame—the highway that linked Dresden and Prague via the heart of Czechoslovakia’s heavy industry complex, northern Bohemia. In a depressed and chaotic economic climate, young Czech women began selling themselves on the E55 for pocket money. For the price of a modest meal, the teenagers would satisfy the desires of the ceaseless column of sweaty BMW drivers and overweight truckers cruising between Bohemia and Saxony. “People are coming from all over Eastern Europe to the ‘affluence border’ in order to offer young prostitutes to aging German men,” noted Der Spiegel at the time. The national aspect to this sexual Drang nach Osten gave the sordid trade an added frisson, as many punters were East German (so there were a few sweaty Trabant drivers among the BMWs). Women working on the Highway of Shame were, on the whole, exercising choice—to be sure, their economic circumstances compelled them to work as prostitutes, but they were not physically coerced. A minority was forced into the trade by individual pimps, but a majority worked voluntarily in order to earn a living in this way. A large percentage was made up of young Gypsy or Roma women who faced a double dose of prejudice as prostitutes and as Roma.

The Bulgarian heavies milling around Prague and northern Bohemia noticed the virtual absence of any effective policing of this spontaneous sex trade. The potential market was huge—it was well known how thousands of German men traveled every year to Southeast Asia and the Caribbean to indulge in sex tourism. Why not take advantage of that demand by offering them beautiful young women at low, low prices just over the German border, in slightly more relaxing surroundings than the rest stops of the E55? So Bulgarian gangs bought up, built, or rented cheap motels in north Bohemia. With the aim of maximizing their profits,
they sought out pliant women who were not so well connected with the local community. So they sought out their compatriots. In contrast to the local Czech women, however, these Bulgarian women did not enter into the trade voluntarily—they had no idea what awaited them.

* Women are attractive as an entry-level commodity for criminals. They can cross borders legally and they do not attract the attention of sniffer dogs. The initial outlay is a fraction of the sum required to engage in car theft; overhead costs are minimal; and as a service provider, the commodity (a trafficked woman) generates income again and again.

* The Russians were indispensable for the transition from socialism to capitalism.

Despite the murders and the shoot-outs, the Russian mob actually ensured a degree of stability during the economic transition. Of course, by normal standards one might perceive extortion, kidnapping, and murder as constituting a rather harsh policing regime; and most people would probably find it hard to approve of car theft, narcotics, or sex trafficking as a legitimate business enterprise. Yet Russia was not in a normal situation.

No societies are free from organized crime except for severely repressive ones (and although North Korea has undoubtedly very low levels of organized crime, its state budget is decisively dependent on the trading of narcotics to criminal syndicates in neighboring countries). But when you replace one set of rules (the Five-Year Plan) with another (free market) in a country as large as Russia, with as many mineral resources, and at a time of epochal shifts in the global economy, then such immense change is bound to offer exceptional opportunities to the quick-witted, the strong, or the fortunate (oligarchs, organized criminals, bureaucrats whose power is suddenly detached from state control) that were absent hitherto. It is certainly true that the Yeltsin government made some appalling errors. But they were under considerable economic pressure at the time, as the
crumbling Soviet system was no longer able to guarantee food deliveries to the people and inflation (even before the freeing of prices) had hit at least 150 percent and was still rising. Something had to be done. By the mid-1990s the Russian government estimated that between 40 and 50 percent of its economy was in the gray or black sectors, and it is within this context that Russia and the outside world needs to understand the phenomenon of organized crime: it emerged out of a chaotic situation and was very brutal, but its origins lie in a rational response to a highly unusual economic and social environment.

* b) Unlike the traditional American and Italian mafias, members of the gangs were not strictly bound by family loyalties. The codes of the thieves’ world (which conferred honor and recognition on the vory) only survived a matter of months in Russia’s primitive capitalism.

* c) Third, in contrast to the five families of America’s Cosa Nostra, there were thousands of these organizations in Russia.

* The oligarchs’ rape of Russia’s assets enjoys pride of place in the boom of the global shadow economy during the 1990s. Not only did these men succeed in turning Russia upside down, but their actions had a huge economic and social impact on the United States and on countries throughout Western Europe, in the Mediterranean (above all Cyprus and Israel), in the Middle East and Africa, and in the Far East. Unable even to claim that they were helping to police the transition to capitalism (as protection rackets undoubtedly were), they have had an overall influence more destructive than most of Russian organized crime.

* different branches of Russia’s security service would find themselves fighting against each other on behalf of warring oligarchs.

* The oligarchs understood instinctively that Russia was a capricious and dangerous environment and that their billions of dollars were not safe there. They overestimated their ability to control President Putin, the man whom they chose to replace the weak and easily manipulated, alcoholic president Yeltsin. Yet their instincts served many of them well—as an insurance policy, they needed not just to get their money out of the country. They needed it to be clean once it arrived at its destination. So did the organized crime groups. Everybody needed to launder his cash. But before they could establish a worldwide launderette, they all—oligarchs and mobsters alike—needed to establish themselves abroad. The criminal groups now entered the most challenging stage of their development: phase three—overseas transplantation.

* Organized crime and corruption flourishes in regions and countries where public trust in institutions is weak. Refashioning the institutions of Kafkaesque autocracy into ones that support democracy by promoting accountability and transparency is a troublesome, long-term process. The task is made doubly difficult if economic uncertainty accompanies that transition. Suddenly people who have been guaranteed security from the cradle to the grave are forced to negotiate an unfamiliar jungle of inflation,
unemployment, loss of pension rights, and the like. At such junctures, those crucial personal networks from the Communist period become very important. The Red Army evacuated its bases in Eastern Europe, but the equally effective yet more seductive force of favors owed and promises once made stood its ground to exert a strong influence over the transition.

* Apart from when Stalin had a vicious anti-Semitic spasm just before his death, being Jewish in the postwar Soviet Union was not usually much worse than being anything else. As a Jew, one’s professional ambition was often circumscribed in a way that did not affect Slavs and some other minorities, but in many respects all peoples in the Soviet Union were shat upon in equal measure. From 1989 onward, however, the Jews of the former Soviet Union enjoyed one valuable and exclusive privilege—they were eligible for Israeli citizenship and could get the hell out of Belarus, the Caucasus, Siberia, or wherever else with no questions asked.

And many didn’t wait to be the victim of an assassination attempt like Gentelev. They took the passport and ran. Soon hundreds turned into thousands, thousands into tens and hundreds of thousands until within a decade 1 million Russian Jews had pitched up in Israel, amounting to more than 15 percent of the total population.

* But the Jews from Russia and Ukraine were very different—they came in huge numbers in a short space of time, and they had a strong Russian cultural identity that was often more ingrained than their Jewishness. In the profoundly secular Soviet Union,
Judaism and Zionism remained a minority interest at best among Russian Jews. “The former Soviet immigrants perceive themselves as the bearers of European culture in Israel, and 87% of them would like cultural life in Israel to be similar to that of Europe,” noted one study on the sociology of the immigration based on extensive surveys. “However, only 9% believe that this is indeed the situation in Israel.”

Israel, it seems, was a foreign country for these Russians. “The immigrants perceive Russian culture and language as superior to Hebrew. 88% of immigrants evaluate the impact of immigration on cultural life in Israel as positive or very positive, while only 28% evaluate the impact of cultural life in Israel on the immigrants as positive or very positive…” And then there were economic issues. “In addition to its size, another unique aspect of the Russian immigration was that many of the Russian immigrants were highly educated,” the economists Sarit Cohen and Chang-Tai Hsieh have written. “About 60% of the Russian immigrants were college-educated, compared with only 30 to 40% of native Israelis.” This led to social tension and real resentment between the indigenous population and the newcomers—Russian professionals wanted to muscle in on the labor market in large numbers. Not the dirty, poorly paid jobs traditionally reserved for immigrants but the well-paid posts for highly trained men and women.

* It was the police who first noticed something odd happening. “At the time, I was head of the intelligence in Jerusalem,” said the retired police commander Hezi Leder, “and we started getting reports from my colleagues in Haifa and the north of Israel of a dramatic rise in the amountof criminality among young people. These were kids who were thirteen and fourteen, maybe fifteen years old, but they seemed to be outside the education system. And they were almost all Russian.” By the mid-1990s, there were more than 700,000 Russians in Israel. Most were entirely honest…

* police started to observe an increase in murders and assaults involving unprecedented brutality. The crime wave centered on Tel
Aviv—or Sin City, as the tabloids refer to it—but almost always contained within the Russian-speaking community.

* “Their parents pack ’em off from the Upper West Side to Israel with a book filled with the phone numbers of synagogues, rabbis, and shuls, and a wad of cash. And then the minute they get here, they head for the whorehouses.”

* Since the last intifada, the Palestinians no longer carry out the dirty and dangerous jobs that are the preserve of immigrants elsewhere in the industrialized world. Their places have been taken by Romanians, Uzbeks, Thais, Filipinos, Turks—you name it. The
importation of labor into Israel is a corrupt business in which organized crime also engages: globally, the International Migration Organization has identified the trafficking of indentured or slave labor as the fastest-growing sector in the industry.

* For their part, the oligarchs and organized crime bosses started colonizing Israel for a number of reasons. It was an ideal place to invest or launder money. Israel’s banking system was designed to encourage aliyah, the immigration of Jews from around the world, and that meant encouraging their money to boot. Furthermore, Israel had embraced the zeitgeist of international financial deregulation and considerably eased controls on the import and export of capital. And, like most other economies around the world in the 1990s, it had no anti-money-laundering legislation. Laundering money derived from criminal activities anywhere else in the world was an entirely legitimate business.

* The main reason for Israel’s popularity was the simplest—many of these iffy businessmen were Jews, and in Israel they were not treated like dirt but welcomed as valuable and respected additions to the family. A disproportionate number of the most influential Russian oligarchs and gangsters were Jewish. Before the huge wave of immigration to Israel, Jews made up only about 2.5 percent of the population of Russia and Ukraine. But they were hugely influential in the vanguard of gangster capitalism during the 1990s. A cursory search of the Internet will reveal countless racist sites fueling the theory that the pillage of Russian assets during decade was borne of the World Jewish Conspiracy, once so beloved of the Nazis and (when it suited him) of Stalin. By contrast, many liberal commentators simply overlook the issue of Jewish involvement in Russia and Ukraine’s chaotic transition, presumably to dodge accusations of anti-Semitism. In fact, by avoiding any mention of the elephant in the living room, they facilitate its portrayal by anti-Semites as a jackal.

* Although the Soviet Union was renowned for its antipathy toward most national identities that threatened its idealized image of homus sovieticus, it did construct one specific barrier for Jews—the glass ceiling. In virtually all the central party and state offices, in almost all industrial branches, and in most places of learning, Jews were systematically prevented from reaching the top. There were exceptions to this rule—Kaganovich (one ofStalin’s unloved Politburo colleagues) and, in the 1980s, Evgeni Primakov emerged as an extremely influential political figure, having prophylactically discarded his birth name, Yonah Finkelshtein. But on the whole, if you were Jewish, the key promotion would elude you.

In consequence, there were a lot of smart Jews who felt frustrated in their pursuit of intellectual challenges and entrepreneurial opportunities. Where better, then, to exercise those skills than in the world’s toughest market (which officially didn’t even exist!)—the Soviet planned economy. Over seventy years, they honed their business skills in this grim totalitarian world where huge industrial behemoths would seek to produce goods without regard to the laws of supply and demand. Instead, enterprises would follow the targets (or norms, as they were known) set down every five years by the State Planning Commission. These rarely bore any relation to the available materials, raw or processed, and so each factory would be engaged in a relentless and exhausting struggle against shortages. Factories were often reliant on suppliers based thousands of miles and several different time zones away and with which there were no functioning communications. The only way to meet those targets was to employ wheelers and dealers who could hustle the right materials from any source anywhere. These people were known as tolkach, and without the ingenuity of the tolkachi in sustaining the wobbly edifice, the Soviet Union may have buckled earlier than it did. And just as there were a disproportionate number of Jews among the oligarchs, so there were among the tolkachi.

* This ability was not restricted to the Jews. It is no coincidence that among organized crime bosses, the other two chronically overrepresented nationalities in Russia were the Chechens and the Georgians, whose talent for overcoming the daily consumer misery of the Soviet Union was similarly the stuff of legend. The criminals and oligarchs emerged from communities who inhabited the twilight periphery of the Soviet Union—although usually denied access to the central institutions, they were not pariahs. Instead they were compelled to seek out the possibilities of social and economic activity that existed in the nooks and cracks of the state. This experience was invaluable for many when negotiating the roller coaster of post-Communist Russia. For the Jewish oligarchs and gang bosses, Israel was both a retreat and, by dint of its passport, a door to the outside world.

* The Palestinian issue is simply overwhelming in Israel. At times, it almost seems that Israelis have willingly diverted all their intellectual faculties into consideration of this one matter. Everything appears illuminated by the torch of the Arab-Israeli conflict, obscuring in the process the fascinating and dynamic nature of Israel’s own society, especially since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the advent of globalization.

* The Russians had agreed at the 1995 El Dan meeting in Tel Aviv to avoid acting in an ostentatious criminal manner within Israel. Now Israelis were about to discover that the years of champagne and excess in the 1990s had spawned a new phenomenon—indigenous Israeli organized crime. And unlike the Russians, these people cared very little about their public image.

* “The Russians were very careful. And were able to impose discipline because they were based on an organization. The Israeli crime groups were families.” This meant that in structure they were much more like the Sicilian Mafia than the Russians were. “When you have crime based on families, then issues such as honor and vendettas come into play,” Professor Amir continued. The existence of family feuds may result in the occasional innocent victim, as in the Rosenstein case, but in another respect they assist police. The bloodletting enables intelligence officers to monitor what is going on in the crime community, “which means that the Russians and similar organizations are more effective and more dangerous.”

* And lest we fall into the error of thinking that Israelis or Jews had a particular penchant and ability for engaging in organized crime, it is worth remembering that the center for the global money-laundering industry was a few hundred miles away in a very different country—the United Arab Emirates.

* Lev Timofeev, the former Soviet dissident mathematician turned analyst of Russia’s shadow economy, has written one of the most comprehensive economic studies of the drug market. His conclusions are stark:

“Prohibiting a market does not mean destroying it. Prohibiting a market means placing a prohibited but dynamically developing market under the total control of criminal corporations. Moreover, prohibiting a market means enriching the criminal world with hundreds of billions of dollars by giving criminals a wide access to public goods which will be routed by addicts into the drug traders’ pockets. Prohibiting a market means giving the criminal corporations opportunities and resources for exerting a guiding and controlling influence over whole societies and nations. This is the worst of the negative external effects of the drug market. International public opinion has yet to grasp the challenge to the world civilization posed by it.”

From an economic point of view, a person’s decision to enter into the drug trade as a producer, distributor, or retailer is entirely rational because the profit margins are so high. This is all the more compelling in countries such as Afghanistan and Colombia where chronic poverty is endemic. Time and again, narcotics traffickers have demonstrated that their financial clout is sufficient to buy off officials even in states with very low levels of corruption, as in Scandinavia. In most countries, traffickers can call on combined resources of billions of dollars where national police forces have access to tens or hundreds of millions (and are further hamstrung by a complex set of regulations constraining their ability to act).

On the whole, governments do not argue that drug prohibition benefits the economy. They base their arguments instead on perceived social damage and on public morality. On the contrary, it distorts the economy because it denies the state revenue from taxes that might accrue from the purchase of a legal commodity (not to mention the immense costs of trying to police the trade and the incarceration of convicted criminals). This huge financial burden is one reason that so many economists, like Timofeev, and indeed one of the great organs of the British establishment, The Economist magazine, are adamant in their support of the legalization of drugs.

* Rio’s favelas produce some of the finest documentary films in the world, a testimony to the openness of the culture. This was the only country I encountered in which not a single person asked me to turn off my tape recorder when I spoke to him or her. Brazilians are fanatical communicators (witness the huge success of Orkut, an equivalent of MySpace in Brazil), and so it is easy to learn a great deal about the country (the dark and light sides) in a short space of time, especially in Rio.

SANDY EMAILS:

I gave up watching McMafia like 4 episodes in.

I watched a couple of your streams today. I liked what you had to say, it was refreshing the other day you were open enough to admit what many of use porn for.

To watch some lady getting humiliated so we can “let off steam”, and feel superior for a few minutes, ending with the 4 second orgasm.

I find it remarkable how often I’ve ejaculated, and within milliseconds, the browser tab is closed and I’m back to reading some article, completely moved on from the several minutes of hate-fucking porn.

One of the worst parts of porn is the minutes spent browsing for something you ad hoc decide will be a suitable clip to watch, the endless browsing.

You’re reading about narcissism, be careful I do know a bunch of morons who interpret the whole world through name-calling people ‘narcissists’, it becomes a kind of astrology. These videos on youtube by Gannon and Vaknin and HG Tudor, it is a cottage industry. Most of their followers are middle aged women looking for a catch-all explanation for their breakup or divorce.

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Jews, Non-Jews & The Corona Virus

Posted on March 10, 2020 by Luke Ford

What are the biggest differences between how Jews and non-Jews deal with the Corona Virus? Christians seem more serene, Jews seem more kvetchy and preppy.

Every Jew knows the best doctor and they will happily tell you about him because Jews love to educate.

I notice that Jews tend to have stronger opinions on the virus and what should be done (their prescriptions are all over the map) than non-Jews. Jews are all about this world while Christians and Muslims think more about the next world.

It seems like every Jew in LA has a guy named Victor who advises him on the stock market. I hear Jews analyzing stocks this week with the fervor the goyim reserve for sports.

PS. Is the Trump administration subsidizing the energy and farm sectors because they primarily vote Republican?

PPS. People say the Fed has shot its wad. I don’t buy it. Surely there are more bonds and things they can buy to inflate the economy? If the Federal government wants to do something, if it wants to convict you of something, it can.

David Pinsen: “Yes, they have unlimited ammo and could buy corporate bonds or even stocks if they wanted to. But fiscal stimulus would be more effective.”

Arnelsmom: “It’s hard to stimulate spending when people aren’t going shopping because of a lethal pathogen rather than a lack of liquidity. The only way to stimulate the economy is with intelligently targeted wage and welfare packages to help marginal families and industries make it through.”

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Will The Last Luke Ford Viewer Please Plug In The CPAP?

Posted on March 10, 2020 by Luke Ford

I don’t like failing, but it doesn’t bother me as much as it used to (if it is not vital to my life). I don’t think I need to feel special as intensely as I used to need this (still need it some or else why would I blog?). To err is human, ergo, I accept my flawed humanity. I’ve made peace with being a worker among workers, an addict among addicts.

I can’t pretend that I have ever fantasized that one day I’ll be speaking before a crowd of 15 people. My father, who died a year ago tomorrow, used to preach to thousands, but after the 1980 Glacier View controversy, his live audience went down to about 10% of what it was. Did that bother him? Definitely. My father was a lonely unhappy man after 1980.

For the past few months, my Youtube show has not worked more than it has worked. My views over the past month are a third of what they were the previous month (which were less than half of what they were in the Spring and Summer of 2018). I often feel my failure on these days to connect with my best audience and with my best self. But is it humiliating? No, because I haven’t made any grand claims about my numbers or my relative success with livestreaming.

So I’m trying to tap into subjects and books that fill me with energy, to make notes of things I want to expound on, and to stay open to what works and what doesn’t. I want to face up to how much I need other people to make my show great, and to have the courage and fortitude to do what I can on my own to improve.

My self-esteem does not depend upon my view count and I have made deliberate choices to do shows on important topics that will not draw as large an audience as more sensational stories. I’ve also become much more discriminating about who I stream with. Unfortunately, most people who have the time and inclination to come on my show are anti-social.

As I keep trying things, I know that the show may get worse before it gets better. I want to feel free to fail and free to learn from that.

So how should we deal with failure? It seems like a good idea to admit it. It is good to accept reality before we try to change it. If various approaches have not worked, we can open ourselves to something new. It is good if our sense of self does not depend upon winning. If we can fail and still like ourselves, that’s good.

A large reason my show has failed over the past few months is that people I need on to make great shows are no longer available. So it seems like facing up to reality to admit that I need those people, to accept that they have other priorities, and that while I may not be able to get the band back together, I can create a new band.

I realized Sunday that my sound settings were not working, so I spent an hour researching the topic and then another hour experimenting with new settings in OBS. And now that I listen back to my latest show, I realize I’ve made my sound quality worse.

I should adapt Mayor Koch’s question — how am I doing (with my audio levels)?

How many people have hated their job, hated working for their families, quit to try something new, failed, and had to come crawling back? Change is not always good. Friends of mine have spent up to a decade trying to do stand up comedy, earn a living from teaching Alexander Technique, and other quixotic ventures that saner people told them would not work out financially, and they have utterly failed (at earning a living in their desired field). Not everyone is cut out to work for themselves. Most people are probably better off working for others.

The Luke Ford Show is where dreams come to die.

Friends and therapists have noted that I am not flexible (a typical trait of narcissists), and that may make my working well with others an above average challenge.

This would be a good time to acknowledge my enormous debt to Kevin Michael Grace for the 415 shows we did together. Kevin now has his own channel.

Cuachalango: “​Will the last Luke Ford viewer please plug in the cpap?”

I like the moral and cognitive challenge of livestreaming, even when few people watch. Some people like to work out their body at the gym or their soul at church. I like to work out my mind on Youtube.

When does my show work? When I’m connecting. When does my life work? When I’m connecting. But I don’t want to connect with anybody at any level. I want to connect with what is best in people and to reduce my tendency to trauma bond.

So what separates humiliating failure from regular failure? Humiliation is the result of being out of touch with our relative importance in an interaction, and basing our sense of self on feeling special and making public declarations about how special we are that are shown to be bogus.

One of the turning points in my life was when my sponsor told me that I did not need to beat myself down any more over having an emotional addiction and all the embarrassing behavior that goes with that. I don’t have to trash myself because of bad decisions I made in the past. I didn’t ask to have these addictions. I didn’t choose such misery. Instead of regretting the past, I can face the past, face myself, face others, clean up my side of the street, make amends to those I’ve hurt, and use my experience to help others.

If someone does not answer your letter, do you automatically assume you did something wrong or that the other person did something wrong? That seems like a good litmus test of your sense of self and your sense of reality. It seems to me that one would not want to fall into either camp of blaming yourself or others but accepting that reality is complex and frequently has nothing to do with our choices.

Where else am I failing in life?

* I am a bachelor.
* I have nothing saved for retirement.
* I often don’t sleep well. Probably no one thing would improve my life like consistent quality sleep.
* My income has stayed flat since June of 2018.

Everybody dies disappointed, ergo everybody fails much of the time. It is where in our lives we fail and how we deal with failure that matters. It is easier to learn from failure if you live in reality and have clarity about what is important.

In late 1998 or early 1999, a Seventh Day Adventist Bible scholar deconstructed me and my father:

You father “knows” too much for me to tell him anything. Including about you. It will never happen.

…Knowing too much, summarizing too fast, summing up too quickly, is a weakness he has. It’s a way that you and he are terrifically alike.

…By the way, you enjoy controversy and driving people nuts way too much. Both of you. What is the blessing in “Blessed are the peacemakers.” (Jesus knew at least as much about Judaism as you do….) Part of what makes you ill at ease in the self/world dichotomy is this approach toward the outside world as the enemy to be debunked.

Hiding behind “journalism” as the reason for this cynicism just won’t do. I ain’t convinced! There are lots of “journalists” who do have the same problem with their approach, but there are lots that don’t. It’s not endemic to journalism to have to drive people nuts, to be cynical, and to print what MAY be someone’s screwup and assume it’s true until proven otherwise. The theory of the law, “Innocent until proven guilty” would help in your approach to your journalism. But of course you became this sort of journalist as a result of an already existing cynicism, not the reverse. You have charm and intelligence and good looks, and I can see that it is dangerously easy for you to mislead people about yourself–even when you know you’re doing it. Careful, this can make for a hollow feeling and dis-ease.

…Now, what your father [two Ph.Ds in Christianity] was exposed to was “readings” in the British style. Not the original materials, but readings of not-very-good European writers, whose writings couldn’t even be taken seriously (since they’re relatively ignorant of the details) in American Biblical Studies. Out of this study of generally poor secondary sources your father got the impression he was something of an expert in theology. From this weak background, with most of his questions unanswered, he launched into doing what only someone who didn’t know what he didn’t know would do: he tried to write a commentary on Daniel. It was a terrible mishmash of preterism, historicism, and futurism without any understanding of how these systems complement and clash. There was no understanding of their history, of the sameness and difference involved in them.. And much of the book was unedited quotes from other sources strung together in ways that didn’t fit at all. It became apparent to me after only a few minutes that your father didn’t have the foggiest notion of the Book of Daniel, and shouldn’t even be teaching an academy class on the subject, much less writing a book about it. That a Seventh Day Adventist publishing house published this mess, virtually unedited, and with even the Hebrew title screwed up, showed the blind leading the blind.

You write very much in the style of your father. Like him, you tie together long quotes, with rather poor segues and transitions. This is so evident in your website that I marvel that I didn’t get it sooner. And you’ve gotten the same kind of accurate and strong criticism your father got for what passes for writing. And the same kind of “this guy really didn’t take the time to know what he was talking about before he became a legend in his own mind” criticism.

My livestreams suffer from the same problems as my blogging.

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The Choice Between Life & Death On Social Media

Posted on March 9, 2020 by Luke Ford

I love Deuteronomy 30:15: “I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction.”

Here are my thoughts on what choices in our social media use promote life:

* You develop habits and form neural-pathways that serve you in life
* When you’d be proud to see your contributions featured on the front page of the NYTimes
* You build connections, develop friends, go into business or date people you meet who share your values
* You feel good afterward
* You display an accurate sense of your own importance and expertise
* You contribute and help people
* Shared vulnerability judiciously chosen
* You strive to be accurate
* Your social media use meshes with other parts of your life
* Your social media use promotes coherence in your life, what you share works through all parts of your life
* You exercise care and discretion
* You lift up people
* You seek win-win solutions
* Your self esteem does not depend on how much engagement you get
* You don’t sacrifice your values to pursue engagement

Choices that promote death:

* You develop habits and form neural-pathways that hurt you in life
* When you’d hate to see your words on the front page of the New York Times
* You destroy your friendships, you piss people off so they want to hunt you down in real life and hurt you
* You feel lousy afterward
* You lack an accurate sense of your own importance
* Look at me! Your use is to primarily emphasize that you are special and not subject to the ordinary rules of human relationships
* You primarily want to tear people down
* You pursue feuds
* You’re reckless
* Your social media use threatens the rest of your life
* Your social media use promotes splitting your life
* You hurt people
* You’re morbid
* You seek I win, you lose
* Your self esteem depends upon how much engagement you get
* You violate your moral code to pursue engagement
* You worry that the wrong people will read it
* Your use makes you feel degraded and disconnected

Richard Spencer’s famous rant is an example of what not to do: “I am so mad. I am so fucking mad at these people. They don’t do this to fucking me. We’re going to fucking ritualistically humiliate them. I am coming back here every fucking weekend if I have to. Like this is never over. I win. They fucking lose. That’s how the world fucking works. Little fucking kikes. They get ruled by people like me. Little fucking octoroons. My ancestors fucking enslaved those little pieces of fucking shit. I rule the fucking world. Those pieces of shit get ruled by people like me. They look up and see a face like mine looking down at them. That’s how the fucking world works. We are going to destroy this fucking town.”

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Rethinking Narcissism: The Bad – and Surprising Good – About Feeling Special

Posted on March 9, 2020 by Luke Ford

Craig Malkin writes:

* narcissism is a learned response, that is, a habit and, like any habit, it gets stronger or weaker depending on circumstances.
Narcissists bury normal emotions like fear, sadness, loneliness, and shame because they’re afraid they’ll be rejected for having them; the greater their fear, the more they shield themselves with the belief that they’re special. Unhealthy narcissism isn’t an easy habit to break, but people can become healthier by learning to accept and share the emotions they usually hide. And their loved ones can help them shift to the healthy center of the spectrum by opening up in the exact same way.

* At the heart of narcissism lies an ancient conundrum: how much should we love ourselves and how much should we love others? The Judaic sage and scholar Hillel the Elder summarized the dilemma this way: “If I am not for myself, who am I? And if I am only for myself, then what am I?”

* [Heinz] Kohut believed that children gradually learn that nothing—and no one—can be perfect and so their need for self-perfection eventually gives way to a more level-headed self-image. As they witness the ways healthy adults handle their own flaws and limitations, they begin coping more pragmatically, without the constant need for fantasies of greatness or perfection. At the end of their journey, they acquire healthy narcissism: genuine pride, self-worth, the capacity to dream, empathize, admire and be admired. This, Kohut said, is how any of us develops a sturdy sense of self.

But when children face abuse, neglect, and other traumas that leave them feeling small, insignificant, and unimportant, they spend all their time looking for admiration or finding people to look up to. In short, Kohut concluded, they be- come narcissists—vulnerable, fragile, and empty on the inside; arrogant, pompous, and hostile on the outside, to compensate for just how worthless they feel. People, in their eyes, become jesters or servants in their court, useful only for the ability to confirm the narcissist’s importance.

* Narcissism only becomes dangerous, taking us over and tipping into megalomania, when we cling to feeling special like a talisman instead of playing with it from time to time. It all depends on how completely we allow grandiosity and perfectionism to take us over.

* Otto Kernberg agreed with Kohut that healthy narcissism provides us with self-esteem, pride, ambition, creativity, and resilience. But he diverged sharply with Kohut’s theory when it came to unhealthy narcissism. Whereas Kohut viewed even grandiose narcissism in a somewhat benevolent light, Kernberg saw it as inherently dangerous and harmful. Likely due to his exposure at an impressionable age to Nazism and Hitler (one of the most dangerous megalomaniacs who ever lived), Kernberg believed in the presence of evil in the world. His experience during psychoanalytic training reinforced his dark views of human nature—Kernberg cut his teeth professionally working in hospitals and clinics with severely mentally ill patients prone to aggression and psychosis, while Kohut arrived at his theories treating privileged patients in his luxurious private offices. In Kernberg’s view, narcissists, at their most destructive, are masses of seething resentment—Frankenstein’s monsters, crudely patched together from misshapen pieces of personality. They’d been failed so horrifically as children, through neglect or abuse, that their primary goal is to avoid ever feeling dependent again. By adopting the delusion that they’re perfect, self-contained human beings (and that others are beneath them), they never have to fear feeling unsafe and unimportant again.

Kohut’s and Kernberg’s competing theories were battled over through conferences and papers, with neither side gaining ascendancy. But after Kohut succumbed to cancer in 1981, Kernberg was left alone in the spotlight and his views, particularly of malignant narcissism, spread widely. They were helped into public consciousness by historian and social critic Christopher Lasch’s popular 1979 book, The Culture of Narcissism, which drew heavily on Kernberg’s frightening image of destructive narcissism. In most people’s minds, narcissism became synonymous with malignant narcissism.

* The NPI, on which Twenge draws so heavily, is a deeply flawed measure. Under its design, agreeing with statements that reflect even admirable traits can inch people higher up the narcissism scale. For example, picking “I am assertive” and “I would prefer to be a leader” counts as unhealthy even though these qualities have been linked repeatedly in decades of research to high self-
esteem and happy relationships. People who simply enjoy speaking their mind or being in charge are clearly different from narcissists who enjoy manipulation and lies. But the NPI makes no distinction. More people checking these salutary state-
ments could easily account for millennials’ rising NPI scores through the years, and that’s what some studies indicate has happened.

Second, numerous large-scale studies, including one of nearly half a million high school students conducted between 1976 and 2006, have found little or no psychological difference between millennials and previous generations (apart from a rise in self-confidence). In fact, one study of thousands of students suggests that millennials express greater altruism and concern about the world as a whole than do previous generations, prompting psychologist Jeffrey Arnett, of Clark University to call them “GenerationWe.” The results of a 2010 Pew Research Report, surveying a nationally representative sample of several thousand millennials, also stands in stark contrast to Twenge’s findings. Millennials, the Pew authors concluded, get along well with their parents, respect their elders, value marriage and family far over career and success, and are “confident, self-expressive, and open to change”—hardly the portrait of entitled brats.

But there’s another far more troubling problem with using the NPI to declare an epidemic: we have no way of knowing whether or not people scored as “narcissists” remain so over time. No study has followed up on these thousands of college students after they graduated. Furthermore, just about every theory of adolescence and early adulthood presumes that the young are only temporarily a self- absorbed bunch, and research seems to support that view. We used to think that was a good thing: the bright-faced idealism of youth. The young believe themselves capable of anything; they’re ready to take over the world and make it a better place. Most of us, in our less cynical moments, appreciate their ostentatious energy. But just as with other temporary bouts of narcissism brought on by specific life stages, such enthusiasm eventually fades. As we approach our thirties, most of us come back down to earth, and our self-importance, and yes—self-absorption—give way to the realities of life.

* Most models of human behavior consider flexibility to be the hallmark of mental health. We adapt our feelings and behavior to fit the circumstance. When it comes to narcissism, similarly, only the most extreme echoist or narcissist becomes fixed at one end of the scale. Healthy people generally remain within a certain range on the spectrum, moving up or down a few points throughout their lives. Nevertheless, we’re all prone to climbing even higher on the scale if something provides a big enough push.

Narcissism spikes dramatically, for example, when we feel shaky about ourselves: lonely, sad, confused, vulnerable. In adults, major life events like getting divorced or becoming sick in old age often trigger a large surge of self-centeredness as we struggle to hold on to our self-worth. In younger people, narcissism tends to peak during the teen years. Adolescents often betray a staggering sense of omnipotence, as if they’re somehow above natural and man-made laws (fatal accidents might happen to others who drive drunk, for instance, but certainly never to them). Teens are well known for elevating even the act of suffering to great heights— prone to fits of despair, convinced no one can fathom the pain of their unrequited crush, or the searing humiliation of not owning the next cool smartphone. Nothing else—and often no one else—matters more than the anguish they feel.

* Societies that prize individualism and fame, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, are apt to produce uber-extroverted narcissists who raise navel-gazing to a high art. In contrast, cultures that prize altruism and group harmony, such as Japan and many other Asian nations, tend to create communal narcissists who pride themselves on being the most patient, loyal, and polite people on the planet.

* Chad had become so uncomfortable sharing normal worries or fears or sadness that he’d largely given up trying, turning instead to the high that comes from feeling special—that is, smarter, more talented, and sexier than others. He saw, in glimpses, that he’d made mistakes in his relationships or that his anger had become a problem. But instead of seeking comfort or help from others, he soothed himself with fantasies of being a great lawyer or an amazing lover. Chad rarely felt good about himself without puffing himself up. Seeking help became difficult for him because the impulse to depend on anyone made him uncomfortable. Any time he looked to someone for real support, he ended up feeling alone and invisible. His father couldn’t see Chad at all unless he saw him as his amazing son. So that’s the only way Chad could see himself.

* Subtle echoists like Mary reflexively focus on other people’s needs. It’s an unconscious strategy to keep people from rejecting them; in their minds, the less “room” they take up with their own demands and worries, the more likable or lovable they become. People in this range aren’t allergic to all attention. Being noticed is fine, as long as they’re noticed for what they do for others—being a supportive partner, a productive worker, or an attentive listener. And people like Mary can have wonderful, loving relationships.

* Unhealthy narcissism on the right isn’t always obnoxiously arrogant or openly condescending. Instead, subtle narcissists are often merely bad listeners, endlessly preoccupied with how they measure up to everyone less. Since winning is an easy way to feel special, they obsess over their numbers at work or compare themselves to anyone who exceeds them in looks or talent or achievement. They’re constantly consulting some imaginary scoreboard in their head.

* If [entitlement] surges don’t bring in the needed emotional reinforcement, they can become so frequent that entitlement tips into exploitation. It’s the hallmark of the move from dependence to addiction. Escalating entitlement turns out to be one of the key indicators in the difference between healthy and extreme narcissism. In fact, as entitlement peaks and becomes more relentless, people enter the territory of illness, near 9 on the spectrum.

* Exploitation is a pattern of doing anything necessary to get ahead or stand out, including hurting other people. Extreme narcissists may suffer incredible withdrawal—periods of anger, sadness, fear, and shame—until they can sneak, demand, borrow, or steal their next dose of attention. If feeling special means taking the credit for someone else’s work, so be it. If they have to criticize others mercilessly to feel superior, even if it means throwing their partner’s self-esteem under the bus, they will.

Exploitation and entitlement are closely linked. If I truly believe I deserve to be treated as the smartest or most beautiful or most caring person in the room, then I’ll make it happen. I won’t wait for good fortune or goodwill on the part of others to give me what I want; I’ll simply take it.

* the toxic blend of entitlement and exploitation (called EE, in the research) leaves people at 9 or 10 so blind to the needs and feeling of others that empathy begins to vanish. Among the “narcissists” on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI), the people high in EE cause the most damage. Here’s where esteem begins to crumble whenever grandiosity fails, where rates of depression and anxiety and even suicidal ideation begin to rise. These are the narcissists who tend to show up in therapy, often vacillating rapidly between nearly delusional fantasies of greatness and devastating episodes of shame. No matter how puffed up they might be at times, their fragility has begun to show. Their puffery feels like the frantic efforts of the Wizard of Oz: vulnerable, frail human beings, hiding behind a bombastic empty show, all in an attempt to distract us from just how small and
powerless they feel.

* You should think of NPD exactly the way you would any full-blown addiction; recovery’s a tough road, but it’s impossible when the person denies the problem and refuses help…people with NPD, like Roger, have a strong need, in every area of their life, to be treated as if they’re special. They’re also driven to act special. They’re entitled, exploitative, and unempathetic. They tend to be extremely arrogant and condescending, but they can also be shy and full of shame. More often than not, they vacillate between the two stances—feeling special one day and worthless the next.

Either way they demand attention, admiration, and approval or special consideration because they have little sense of who they are apart from how they’re viewed by others. And they fight tooth and nail to ensure the impression they make is a “good” one. For the person with NPD, people are simply mirrors, useful only insofar as they reflect back the special view of themselves they so desperately long to see. If that means making other people look bad by comparison—say, by ruining their project at work—so be it. Because life is a constant competition, they’re also usually riddled with envy over what other people seem to have. And they’ll let you know it.

* Extreme narcissistic entitlement, not surprisingly, eventually crowds out not only empathy, but ethics and morals as well; the most coldly unemotional narcissists may also be psychopaths. (Note: not all narcissists are psychopaths, though all psychopaths are narcissists.) Psychopaths have a much lower level of fear or concern or regret than most people; at their most extreme, they seem totally devoid of sadness, anxiety, guilt, or remorse.

Psychopaths’ capacity to treat people like means to an end far surpasses that of narcissists’ ordinary entitlement. A boastful narcissist might lie, claiming to be a graduate of Harvard when he’s really a high school dropout, but it wouldn’t dawn
on him to steal. A psychopathic narcissist, however, embezzles funds without giving it a second thought if it helps him advance in any way.

* Are there signs that can alert you early on that you’re keeping company with a narcissist?

Yes. One crucial sign: narcissists dodge normal feelings of vulnerability, including sadness, fear, loneliness, and worry. In any relationship, we’re bound to make mistakes and hurt others. On a bad day, when our patience is exhausted by problems at work or squabbles with our kids, it’s easy to lash out over an innocent question from our spouse like, “Did you pick up the milk?” Or, lost in our own worries, we may neglect to greet our loved ones with a kiss or even say hello. Minor slights like these can be easily repaired if we say we’re sorry and acknowledge the hurt we’ve caused—accidental or intentional—and most people can do so after they calm down. But narcissists often seem incapable of showing contrition or remorse because, as with any kind of vulnerability, connecting with loved ones in this way demands sharing all the feelings that unhealthy narcissism is meant to
conceal. And that’s precisely what gives narcissists away: they resort to a number of predictable psychological strategies to hide normal human frailties.

* WARNING SIGN: DISPLAYING EMOTION PHOBIA

Human interaction poses a scary problem for narcissists who are, deep down, extraordinarily insecure people. One of their favorite methods of shoring up their self-confidence is to imagine themselves as perfectly self-sufficient and impervious to other people’s behavior and feelings. As a result, they don’t let on when they feel shaky, or hurt by something you’ve done or said. Instead, they lash out in anger, which is something we all do when we’re upset enough. But narcissists combine it with a show of superiority. They become condescending. They might even point out all the ways you’re lacking. Their main goal, in all the bluster, is to hide that you’ve affected how they feel. Some narcissists won’t even admit to their anger, claiming, “I’m not yelling,” while they’re in the midst of a terrifying tirade. That’s how far they’ll go to avoid acknowledging emotion.

* Whereas emotion phobia signals a deep discomfort with feelings, emotional hot potato is a way of getting rid of those emotions. It’s a more insidious form of projection, in which people deny their own feelings by claiming they belong to someone else. A friend, for example, might wander up to you, after days of not returning your calls, and ask “Are you upset at me about something?” Given her refusal to respond to your messages, odds are good she’s the one who’s angry. But instead of recognizing the feelings as her own, she accuses you of harboring a grudge.

In emotional hot potato, however, people don’t simply confuse their own feelings with someone else’s. They actually coerce you into experiencing the emotions they’re trying to ignore in the first place. In this case, a spouse might launch into a rant, laying into you for “being so angry all the time.”

* WARNING SIGN: EXERTING STEALTH CONTROL

Another warning sign is the constant need to remain in charge. Narcissists generally feel uneasy asking for help or making their needs known directly. It confronts them with the reality that they depend on people. For that reason, they often arrange events to get what they want. It’s a handy way of never having to ask for anything.

* WARNING SIGN: PLACING PEOPLE ON PEDESTALS

Mia displayed another common habit of unhealthy narcissism—she placed Mark on a pedestal. And in fact, Mark hadn’t been the first to enjoy her panegyric, nor would he be the last. Two months into his therapy with me, Mark learned that Mia had been seeing another man—and he, too, seemed to meet her every requirement for the perfect guy.

Why should this be a warning sign of narcissism? For one thing, when people compulsively place their friends, lovers, and bosses on pedestals, it’s just another way of feeling special. The logic goes like this: If someone this special wants me, then
I must be pretty special, too.

WARNING SIGN: FANTASIZING YOU’RE TWINS

It’s fun feeling like you’ve found a soul mate, with all the same passions, fears, ideas, and interests. It’s a bit like looking in the mirror. Having a twin provides us with a constant source of validation. With a twin at my side, I can tell myself my
ideas make sense, my desires are important, and my needs matter. I don’t even need unique talents or beauty to stand out. I can distinguish myself from the masses with a uniquely wonderful relationship. The twin fantasy doesn’t demand an illusion of perfection either. We can wallow in—even celebrate—our failings and flaws and still feel great about ourselves.

Narcissists often pair up and wreak havoc under the intoxicating glow of twinship. It’s mutually beneficial; even the faintest stars seem to light up the sky when they come in pairs. Perhaps this is why adolescents, struggling with their sense of
importance in the world, often buddy up or form groups of nearly identical friends. It helps them feel important in the midst of an adult world that makes them feel in- significant. In a similar manner, young lovers often gaze into each other’s eyes,
amazed that they’ve found someone who sees the world just as they do.

Twinning dodges feelings of vulnerability in two ways. First, if you and I are perfectly alike—if we’re one mind in two bodies—all fear disappears. No difference, no disappointment. We want the same things. We love, and long to be loved, in exactly the same way. Second, the twin fantasy effectively sidesteps any risk associated with being dependent on someone: since you and I see eye to eye on everything, I never have to worry about you refusing to meet my needs.

As thrilling as it is, the twin effect can’t last. No two people, even identical twins, are ever exactly alike. After a time, when differences become apparent, reality sets in.

* be very careful if you’re in your thirties and you feel pressure to be just like your friend. Twinship creates a powerful emotional bond, just short of romantic love—and subtle narcissists often thrive on just that kind of intensity. It’s more common in women than men, but male narcissists “twin up” from time to time, too.

Twinship, though rarer on the job, isn’t unheard of. Sometimes, supervisors find a sycophantic assistant willing to dress and act like them. Or you might catch a coworker “kissing up” to the boss, placing him on a pedestal. But the most com-
mon tactic at work, by far, is hot potato.

Our bosses and coworkers are often looking for ways to feel more competent. What better way to accomplish that than by questioning your every move? Work is all about performance, which provides plenty of opportunity to undermine people’s ideas and feelings of competence. Your boss or colleague might ask incessant questions about everything you produce. Or they might suggest an ill-conceived course of action, then blame you when it fails. None of this requires getting to know you, and that makes it even easier to pull off. Like snipers, extreme narcissists often prefer to keep a distance from their target. You’ll rarely get close enough
to witness their allergy to feelings or hear about their perfect childhood. More often than not, you’ll just feel their potshots. But that’s also what gives their position away.

* Recent studies indicate that the bleak “once a narcissist always a narcissist” view doesn’t necessarily hold true. If narcissists are approached in a gentler way, many seem to soften emotionally. When they feel secure love, they become more loving and more committed in return.

* Always remember that unhealthy narcissism is an attempt to conceal normal human vulnerability, especially painful feelings of insecurity, sadness, fear, loneliness, and shame. If your partner can tolerate sharing and feeling some of these emotions, then there’s still hope. But you can only nudge narcissists out of hiding if you’re willing to share your own feelings of fragility. As simple as that sounds, it isn’t easy. We’re all a bit squeamish about revealing our softer side, especially when we feel threatened.

You’ll have to dig deep into yourself first. Our most obvious emotions—the surface ones—are rarely the most important. The frustration or anger (or numbness) we feel in the face of a narcissist’s arrogance and insensitivity protect us; just below these feelings, however, are the far more potent ones we’re usually reluctant to share. We’re sad that someone we love has become so hurtful. We’re terrified they might leave or betray us. We’re ashamed that they’ve found us lacking (or claim they have). But instead of showing this, we throw on our protective armor. Tears stream down our cheeks, but our voice is full of rage. Or we apologize incessantly, hiding our pain beneath mea culpas, even though, secretly, we feel profoundly hurt. We need to remove this protective armor to give people a chance to understand—and respond—to how we truly feel. It’s by doing this that we help narcissists emerge from their emotional bunker and reach for deeper intimacy.

* Make a list of the strategies you use to get your special high. Are they arrogance, boasting, or put-downs? How about brooding or rage when you feel “misunderstood”? In the subtler range, do you rely on idol worship or emotional hot potato? These are your protections—each and every one is a vulnerability dodge. If you notice yourself using them, that’s your clue: you’re feeling insecure in some way.

Ask yourself: What’s the source of the insecurity? Sadness that your partner doesn’t seem to think you’re good enough? Fear that your friends might look down on you? The most likely suspects are fear and shame of being unworthy in some way, and sadness and loneliness over being rejected. Whether you realize it or not, the feelings are there; all evidence suggests they’re part of being human (barring severe neurological deficits). So as soon as you catch yourself falling back on old narcissistic habits, take a moment to look for the fear, sadness, or shame lurking underneath. Then take a breath and share these feelings.

Remember: anger and frustration are a cover. If you have even a hint of these feelings when you’re speaking to someone who cares about you, you’re not taking the risks you need to. The goal here is to test your own capacity to depend on people you care about, to move to a place where mutual support and understanding become a way of life. That’s what replaces the chronic need to feel special with genuine caring and closeness. You can keep the big dreams or self-assured attitude; just add a healthy dose of empathy and aspire to life at the center of the spectrum. It’s the space where you’ll not only feel genuinely great about yourself, but also proud of how you treat others.

* You have two choices with a friend: you either accept the relationship for what it is, limitations and all, or you end it. The first option means lowering your expectations. You’ve accepted that you can’t truly count on your friend—he or she’s a workout buddy or someone you share a drink with. These kinds of friendships can be fun in a limited way, but you have to ask yourself what they add to your life. And be honest. If you have to find other people to turn to in times of need because they’re more reliable or understanding than your friend, who are you staying for — you or your friend?

* Confrontation doesn’t seem to improve these situations either. Criticizing an extreme narcissist’s manner (“Stop interrupting people!”) or pointing out their mistakes (“That slide’s completely wrong”) usually makes things worse. They can’t absorb honest, accurate feedback; instead they become more angry and aggressive, and the already mistreated worker is bound to face a verbal lashing. Besides, where power differences exist, as they did between Jane and Drew, such frank feedback might not even be possible. Few people feel comfortable correcting their boss, let alone an insufferably conceited supervisor or CEO.

* According to research by psychologists Gary and Ruth Namie, of the Workplace Bullying Institute, the most common bullying behaviors are:

•Blaming mistakes on other people
•Making unreasonable job demands
•Criticizing a worker’s ability
•Inconsistently applying company rules, especially punitive measures
•Implying a worker’s job is on the line or making outright threats to fire
•Hurling insults and put-downs
•Discounting or denying a worker’s accomplishments
•Excluding or “icing out” a worker
•Yelling, screaming
•Stealing credit for ideas or work

* PROTECTING YOURSELF

Document Everything

Remain Focused on the Task

Instead of challenging the bad behavior directly, question its relevance to success-
fully completing the task.

Block the Pass

If you’re feeling helpless or overwhelmed after an interaction with anyone at work, you’re likely at the end of an attempted hot-potato pass. You’ll need to block it. In this approach, you encourage the narcissist to speak directly about the insecurities
they’re trying to get rid of, but again, in a collaborative tone.

* Nudging narcissists to center means focusing on moments when they show some capacity for collaboration, interest in other people, or concern for the happiness of those around them—in short, whenever they behave more communally.

* What changes are you hoping for in your workplace? Make a list. Successful
outcomes might include:

•You’re no longer afraid to go to work
•You’re sick less frequently
•You feel more creative
•You feel more valued
•You can stand up for yourself
•You feel emotionally safe (less likely to be unfairly criticized or insulted)

Alternatively, your measure might be more specific: having your work recognized, experiencing more reasonable job demands, or getting more consistent and fair compensation. Many people just want to be free from put-downs and yelling.

* If you’ve tried interventions at every level and the supervisor or system is unresponsive to your needs, you’ve truly done all you can, and you’re in much the same position as the partner or friend of a narcissist who can’t break their addiction. Your needs aren’t likely to be met. The system, itself, may be stuck in an addictive cycle, which means the narcissist is merely a symptom of a larger problem. Leaving a job can be as painful as leaving a relationship. And in troubled economic times, it can feel impossible. But if you’ve tried to make things better and still feel miserable, choosing to stay likely means continued misery. That’s because your happiness isn’t in your hands anymore, but the company or employer you work for. That’s when it’s time to take control—and leave.

* Based on what we know about human behavior offline, anything that takes us further away from authentic relationships is more likely to feed narcissistic addiction. That holds true in the digital world as well. It’s all too easy to hide our vulnerabilities and trade empty show for true sharing—and that pushes people toward both ends of the narcissism spectrum.

* When people feel important enough to pay special attention to their deepest desires and needs—and honestly share them—those who care about them learn something new. They finally get to meet the person they love, a truly thrilling moment for all involved. It’s a privilege that even narcissists and echoists can enjoy once they move closer to the center of the spectrum.

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