Narcissism: Generation 'Me'
I just read an article by Sarah Kliff from Newsweek that provoked me to write about 'my narcissistic generation' that I am from. The generation of people that grew up with computers from birth and only think about me, myself and I. Our generation that is classified by many to be materialistic cry babies that are so infatuated with themselves that we stop and look in the mirror every chance we get. Or we are described as a heedless self-indulged generation of people who seek and want praise for every little thing we do, regardless of if it's taking a poop in the toilet at a young age or getting good grades on a report card. We seek the compliments and have no ends to our "self-love".
Now I personally would argue as well towards the fact that my generation is a narcissistic one, but as was noted by a close friend of mine, it depends on the definition of narcissism. Which one of the following definitions of narcissism are we using? 1) One is the clinical sense. And what I mean is the people who are very unhappy, deeply troubled human beings that have fragmented relationships, etc. So the actual mental illness known as Narcissism. 2) The second would be what most people would probably describe it as. Which is the exceptional self interest in oneself, the gratification derived from admiration of one's own physical or mental attributes, or more specifically the excessive self-love or vanity that one has.. [I have also stumbled upon this definition as well] 3) Narcissist are strong, independent thinkers searching for unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, and the ideal love.
So which one of these definitions are we talking about because it changes quite a bit depending on what way you are looking through the tainted glass. Which kool-aid is being drank?
I think that we all are narcissistic according to the second definition, it just depends on what varying degree we are. Are you in total love with yourself and will do anything and everything in your power to reach your goal? (the ends justify the means) Meaning you will walk over anyone to reach your goal, regardless of who you crush along the way. Or are you the other way and the means justify the end?
Answering this question will simply answer the moral side of narcissism though. (Do you already agree that we all have a bit of "self-love" in us. Not to be confused with confidence.. haha) More specifically should we look at narcissism in a positive way or a negative way? And I think you need to look no further than the question I posed above about how you want to get to the end. It's all relative. Do you want to get their at someone else's expense or in a truthful, honest way? That's for you to decide.
Now definition number 3 above is looking at narcissism in a positive way. It's simply saying that you have a lot of confidence and care far above anything else (I'm implying here) how far you go and how well you fair in this world. Key word being "you" in that last sentence. I mean if you don't worry about you and where you are going in this world who will? Are we not taught to be independent and seek success?
Now back to the article in Newsweek.
This article is actually a great way to invoke an all out battle royal between generations. And it has more connections that link our generation to the one that raised us than Martha Stewart has associating her with cooking books. This is plainly obvious as this article has over 25+ pages worth of comments. And the comments are distributed evenly from the baby boomers to generation narcissism or also known as generation 'me' in this article.
I don't want to dig too much further into it as I don't want to skew your opinion either way, but more challenge you to read it and weigh in on the topic. (Link at the bottom) Because this topic can go a million ways, from where did this narcissism start? (We can trace this back to circa 1550's with the "Reformation of the Catholic Church/Protestant movement" if you like? I have to give Kudo's to my friend for pointing this out to me..) All the way to linking our parents to helping create us like this. I mean it creates quite the cognitive dissonance in your head when you call the very children, YOU YOURSELF raised, a bunch of princess partying, "I am special" coloring book, over confident ego-addled spoiled brats eh?
Here.... check it out yourself.
Come back and tell me what you think in the comments section.
Posted in: evil, girls, guys, joke, men, narcissism, negative, random thought, women on Thursday, April 30, 2009 at at 3:09 PM
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It's one of my favourite pieces I've read of yours so far. Mostly because of the content; it requires much more analysis and forces you to examine (a) your own life (b) your upbringing (c) may challenge or reaffirm your ideas of child rearing (d) Begs us to decide which ethical/moral camp we fall into; the ends always justify the means OR the means must justify the ends (e) Perhaps most importantly for me, it demands that we critically question what type of society we live in. Why is out society constructed this way? How did society come to be constructed in this way? Does the current structure of society serve a specific group's or ideology's interests? Is this the best type of society for everyone?
I'm not sure if everyone will see it as such, however, for myself it provoked a lot of thought and questions.
I also think you've provided a solid supplement to the original article. I think you do a good job of provoking a reaction out of people by providing just enough information to take off with opinions, without however, allowing them to hijack your own.
This is one of the first times that you don't offer your concrete opinion, you provided competing discussions and view points while staying objective, thereby I think, successfully forcing your readers to make up their own minds.
I dont think there is anything wrong with a little bit of narcissism here and there. Its a crazy competitive world out there, and in reality, its how people get their way nowdays. Yeah, maybe its not that ethical, but its just how it works. Survival of the fittest per say. Just accept the idea, and adjust to it. If you are threatened or deeply bothered by narcissism of others, you need a good slap on the face to wake you up, and get back in touch with your own confidence and self-esteem. You need at least some to survive the pressure. So start loving yourself, people! Get up in the morning, look in the mirror, kiss it, tongue it if you really have to..BE better than everyone else!! who cares!!??anyway.. if THAT doesnt give you a little self-esteem boost.. you're f***ed!! :) :) :)
I completely agree "xxxRay", I think that we need a bit of confidence as to not get ran the f*** over in this world. You need to have a bit of self-love, because if you don't even love and respect yourself than who will?
I like the look at this topic in the way of the 3rd definition I mentioned. I think our generation is filled with more confident people that are go-getters in this fast moving world. I think we have taken all the undue debts of "having to go" to college in stride. We have to deal with more new technology than any generation before, and the list goes on.
In some sort of conclusion to this, I think "generation me" will do just fine. :)
Narcisstic is not all bad, but just like anything, if it is in the wrong person, it turns into a complete beast.
@Nikki: I agree, just like when it comes to money, if u give a bunch of it to a good person , they will do a bunch of good things with it. And if u give it to a bad one, they will do some ultimately bad things with it. It just all depends where the person is on the narcissism scale and what they intend to do with it. Too much of anything can be outrageously annoying though, even if u go the opposite way IMO
I agree that ultimately you cant generalize and you need to look at each person as an individual and not as a collective group of people. (like per say a WHOLE generation.. haha)
However I realize that it is extremely time consuming to judge each person one by one.. and its even hard to generalize by race which is horrible to do, etc, because of racism..
Anyways, thanks for weighing in guys/girls... I appreciate your insight. :)