in which some nerd tries to call in a 4chan harassment raid

  • Frank [he/him, he/him]
    ·
    1 year ago

    Yeah, the way narcissist gets thrown around it's usually medicalizing selfish behavior or speech, or at least behavior and speech that the poster believes to be unusually selfish. But it's a word that gets thrown around very casually without much consideration.

    https://www.etymonline.com/word/narcissism

    Apparently it's always been a psychology term in English. There were instances where comparisons to Narcissus were used to accuse someone of excessive self love, but "narcissist", "narcissistic", and "narcissism" are all medical terms. And, of course, once someone has labelled you a narcissist there is no possible defense, because any attempt to defend yourself is ascribed to narcissism.

    I'm fine with it being banned. Being an asshole is not a psychological disorder and doesn't need to be assigned to an underlying psychiatric condition that essentializes the persona and positions them as incapable of self reflection or acting in good faith.

    • M68040 [they/them]
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Also serves to poison the well in cases where acting out of self-interest might genuinely be called for.

    • NewAcctWhoDis [any]
      ·
      1 year ago

      I always assumed it was a non-medical term first, that changes things.