Thread by @CZEdwards

#TailorSnarkWars

MetaBattle: Self-perception & Cognition: Toddler Narcs

I. Our own brains are out to get us
II. Dementia comes for us all
***III. Narcissism is an underlying feature/bug of consciousness***
IV. Try not look like a 40 year old vampire even if you are

Prior 2 threads in this series:

https://twitter.com/czedwards/status/1029094521798242304?s=21

https://twitter.com/czedwards/status/1029449327377174528?s=21

This is gonna be a continuing series, because it’s complex. How we think about fashion is just one aspect of how we think and perceive. I’ve been working on this for a while. It’s foundational. Per usual, I’m just articulating what you already know.

End of repetitive content.

To review briefly: we’ve talked about the nature of perception & memory, and how our brains lie to us. We’ve also talked about how the pattern systems & subroutines of behavior are pro-survival for the brain, even when they’re anti-social or contra-survival for the whole person.

Yesterday, we talked about the end of the brain’s life, when the hacker that runs all of our subroutines gets overwhelmed by hardware that’s wearing out and too many subroutines built to overlay each other. Starting in midlife, our brains start paring down what we work with.

When we pare down too much, or the wrong things, that’s early stage dementias.

But this stuff starts at the other end of life, just after infancy, when our lazy hacker is still acquiring new hardware, has tons of memory capacity available, and when the whole brain is flexible.

The important term here is neuroplasticity, which basically means our baby brains are Playdoh, and can be shaped, colored, wrapped, spun or squeezed into a lot of shapes. And them we start leaving them outside, in the sun. Where they dry out and become useful sculptures.

(Baby brains are NOT PLAYDOH. They’re very important & must stay in baby heads. And the fact that I have to say this worries me.

Playdoh comes from TARGET. Not babies.)

Now... why this matters? And how it relates to Donnie & Paulie & their fucked up clothes?

Remember upstairs, I made a throwaway comment about object permanence, & in #1 I talked about duality/triality & theory of mind? Here’s what happens when someone is around 24-30 mos old.

Anyone who has experienced a toddler knows that they’re little solipsists. The world revolves around them, they’ve little interest in the feelings of other people, human beings stop existing when they’re out of sight. This is also, at base, the developmental theory of narcissism.

Narcissists don’t fully believe that other people are really real. As far as they’re concerned, the rest of us are NPCs in their video games. We exist to provide them plot cookies, positive regard & loot. They get pissed off with us when we fail to provide that specific feedback.

This is FINE in 2 year olds. Developmentally and evolutionarily sound. At 2, what with being fairly mobile but having almost no camouflage, and no volume control, it’s in the kid’s best interest to be all about protecting Number One. That’s the tasty snack stage of development.

Most kids grow out of this. But a trauma in that stage can cause part or all of *emotional* development to stick. (Not cognitive) The trauma doesn’t have to be obvious to anyone else, or even objectively trauma. It just needs to alter how that single kid processes information.

The birth of a sibling can do it, but sometimes, we don’t know. Baby brains are delicate little monsters. Mid-century parenting was not exactly... generous to baby brains, between the corporal punishment and the massive toxins and lawn darts & plastic bags & gin for supper.

In the Donald & Paulie’s cases, it’s pretty clear they’re somewhere in the personality disorder band. Cluster B. Donnie is very much a narcissist (not Narcissistic PD because I ain’t Dx-ing that shit, and a Dx requires the patient to suffer; Donnie seems to enjoy his bullshit).

Paulie’s own family seems to think he’s somewhere around sociopath. I won’t argue with them; the material trappings of wealth motivate him to a degree that seems far beyond general insecurity.

But again, he doesn’t seem to suffer, so not technically disordered.

(My preferred working difference between sociopath & psychopath is a sociopath can maintain some relationships given sufficient incentive, even if a reward isn’t immediate. A psychopath can’t maintain even necessary relationships, even when the incentive is apparent & immediate.)

I personally think the birth of Donnie’s little brother & the loss of Mommy’s attention broke him.

His older sibs are significantly older, so he was, at least emotionally, both a first born and the baby of the family. And then that ended right when he was 28 mos old. On target.

I don’t think Manafort has siblings; for a Catholic kid from a big Italian family in 1950, that likely means oh-shit trauma.

Like birth trauma to mom or Rh factor incompatibility.

That points at dysfunction, because 1950s era shrinks sucked ass & were terrible for women.

And of course, both are privileged asshats from moderately wealthy arriviste families in the heart of Old Money snobbery.
This, specifically, turns many otherwise acceptable human beings into trash fires of selfishness. Too little money is bad. Too much causes widespread damage.

I don’t know for certain; per usual, I’m working on the general theory that people are more alike than different; our behavioral patterns are more predictable than random. I could be wrong.

If so, please inform me, because AFAIC, behaviorally wrong & unique is my personal crack

So lesson 3: narcissism is pro-survival in toddlers; is technically pro-survival if enough of the society is willing to tolerate asshattery.

But narcissism comes with a cast-iron sense of personal profile and minimal updating of subroutines until they start getting axed.

Why?

Glad you asked. Because narcissism is a broken subroutine. It’s a dongle so your new, expensive MacBook can also run the old, 500 pin proprietary video interface that your university developed for itself in 1968 & installed everywhere.

(AND YES, dementia & personality disorders do seem coincident, though I will bet it’s far more behavioral than biomechanical, because why would a narcissist take a doctor’s advice? That doctor doesn’t really exist, remember?)

Because here’s the real conflict of narcissism: it derives from a lack of approval & prosocial bonding at a critical moment. It happens when the baby of the family suddenly becomes Not a Baby & Mommy goes away. Or Nanny quits. Or the kid gets abused. Or has a resilience conflict.

At 2, the world revolves around the child. Everything positive comes from outside Kid, because kids can’t generate positive self-regard yet. If that gets disrupted, the kid spends the rest of their life seeking approval... & never finding it. They can’t generate it themselves...

...and a figment of your imagination can’t give you approval. Because the rest of us aren’t real, remember? But we’re also the only possible source of approval. And that conflict, like all software conflicts, takes up massive computational resources.

So the hacker inside a narcissist’s brain doesn’t update profile pics very often, if at all.

For one, why bother? The narcissist is the only really real person anyway, and is practically perfect in every way.

But also there just isn’t time. Because there’s an unfillable hole.

(Oh, and yes, narcissists can and do self-harm. Because it proves to themselves that they’re actually real, and because it draws the attention they desperately crave. Even if it is from NPCs who exist only to give attention. Also, harm others, for same reasons.)

Do I think Paul Manafort has dementia? Nope. He’s just a greedy, selfish asshole scrambling. Paulie knows what he’s doing; he behaves strategically. He is/was under pressure (financial & maybe blackmail); he acts/speaks consistently.

Over-confident & self-deluding, yes.

I do think 2Scoops is inside his dementia leading edge. His speech has become less complex, his actions more rote; he’s more bombastic & less innovative. He reverts to repetitive behavior & has become more a caricature of himself as he’s aged. Were he a Des Moines car salesman...

...on 3rd trophy wife & 5th kid, I’d certainly be calling a geriatrics consult & getting kids out of his direct orbit, while convincing them to secure his property asap.
If nothing else, Donnie is EXPLOITABLE. He lacks the cognitive spare capacity to analyze & resist flattery.

So, there’s a practical side to this: If you see behavior changes in an elder who still picks the same clothes they were wearing in 1985, AND has become more rigid & brittle in the past few years, AND rejects specific & general life feedback AND...

AND gets defensive or hostile when any of this is mentioned...

Send their doc a paper letter describing their personality changes. Ask their doc to refer them for an ultrasound of their neck & heart at their next appointment.

These are all behavioral quirks that can just mean asshat being asshat, but can be part of the long, leading edge of dementia, ESPECIALLY vascular dementia.

And here’s the GREAT thing about catching dementia early: it’s not exactly reversible, but it can be halted and greatly improved if you catch it before it breaks something really critical like executive function (do thing A first, then B) or motivation (get up, go pee).

Now... narcissism can also be life-long. Donnie is a very good example of that. He used to (in mid 80s) have more spare cycles to mask it & pretend he wasn’t completely transactional. So we also need to recognize it before we let it run something like a national government.

And on this one? Listen to people who grew up with shitty parents when they say they see similarities. Believe people.

The reason we have narcissism in our society is because it’s pro-survival at a specific developmental stage & not so completely antisocial we kill it with fire.

We’re not getting rid of it, we can’t cure it, there’s no reliable therapy for it except teaching everyone to identify it and treat those specific behaviors as unacceptable and highly transactional. Which is exactly as non-functional as it sounds.

Sorry.

Here endeth Battle III: Narcissism and the Perpetual Toddlers of Doom. Next up: 40 year old vampires, or strategic coping with a culture set on destroy.

As always, thanks!

(I have to actually go do shit today, so I may be slow to respond. It’s not you - it’s my adulting fail.)

And #Shameless #SelfPromo

I write fiction. If you like my commentary, the 1st book of my fantasy series is free at czedwards.com

(Psst: if I have to go *work* I won’t be able to screw off & write either fiction or Twitter commentary.)