The mirror of Narcissus

Modern society, in our “collective West” but also in other parts of the world, increasingly has the traits of decadence and a veritable cult of its own degradation and self-destruction. It is as if a fatigue of living and growing has taken possession of modern people, who play around looking at themselves in the mirror in anticipation of a reset of the system in which they live, an Armageddon that they fear, of course, but perhaps also secretly yearn for.

The so-called “influencers” launch real fashions as incisive as they are ephemeral and seduce the weaker parts of our souls with their Youtuber-like homilies. Many people imitate them, believing that being and appearing are the same thing. This is not the case, but the filter of momentary gratification is very powerful and effective.

Are we in the presence of mass, pathological narcissism? Roberto Giacomelli, whom I have already interviewed a few times in the past (for example here and here), believes so and has dedicated his latest essay The Mirror of Narcissus, recently published by Passaggio al Bosco, to this aspect of our society.

1) Who is the narcissist, historically and in our contemporary society?

A) The narcissist is a subject characterized by poor psychic functioning and, on closer inspection, great historical figures fall into this category. Napoleon Bonaparte, a military genius and valuable politician, in his mother's account seems to have had narcissistic characteristics from childhood. In literature, Dorian Gray, the character in Oscar Wilde's novel, a beautiful young man in love with himself, is a narcissist. Real or fictional grandiose characters and grandiosity itself is a characteristic of narcissism, which in its benign version is characteristic of geniuses and great artists. In contemporary society, where narcissism has become a mass disorder, genius rarely appears, while the need to appear, the self-perception given by the judgement of others, and the lack of empathy describe a weak and highly problematic subject.

2) Why is this figure apparently so successful and even seems a 'winner'?

A) The disvalues of the society of terminal capitalism are perfectly embodied by the narcissist, so this figure is considered a successful subject to be admired and when possible emulated. Ruthless and unscrupulous managers, singers and film actors enslaved by alcohol and drugs, influencers devoid of values and dignity who sell their image, are the unfortunate heroes of a dying society. They represent, despite their spiritual emptiness and absolute lack of ethics, the perfect prototype of the homo oeconomicus, the one who has exclusive passion for his own individual and material interests. The citizen who does not live in and for the community, but is isolated in a sick individualism, characteristic of the liberalist society. Without ideals, without feelings, without faith, he lives as a one-dimensional being: that of profit and exploitation.

3) In your last essay, as in others, you speak of a “nurturing society”. Could you explain the meaning of these words of yours?

A) By nutritive society I indicate the historical phase in which pleasure derived from stimulation of the mouth dominates, a regressed sexual phase of the adult who concentrates libido, hence pleasure, in the oral area like a child. Distinctive features of the oral phase are passivity, dependence and egocentrism, eminent aspects of contemporary man enslaved to food and the compulsive purchase of objects, symbolic nourishment. Tendency to victimization, complaining, spasmodic search for protection and assistance, complacency about one's own weakness and frailty. Often tobacco addicts, drinkers, drug addicts and compulsive devourers, they become obese, embodying the somatic traits of the infant. Slaves to the “Pleasure Principle”, which demands the immediate satisfaction of every urge, because they are incapable of resisting being weak and devoid of will. A perfect narcissist, the sad protagonist of the time of dissolution.

4) So, what is the relationship between the narcissist and the nurturing society?

A) The relationship between the narcissist and the nurturing society is one of dependence, the weakness, the fragility boasted and practiced as a way of life make this disturbed subject the absolute protagonist of our society. The lack of values, of ideas, of spirituality, due to the absence of father figures, replaced by overprotective and domineering mothers, in a feminized society, which exploits women by investing them with male responsibilities and tasks, produces weak and fearful men. The narcissist has been at the centre of maternal attention, pampered and defended from contact with reality, succumbs when confronted with the difficulties and pains of life. He cannot stand abandonment and goes so far as to kill himself if left, fears loneliness and suffers from dependent personality disorder, a slave to partners he does not love but exploits for his psychic survival.

5) When did our society begin to outline the traits of this illness of the spirit?

A) Narcissism is born with the spirit of capitalism, in the mediaeval village, when the beating of the municipal clock replaces the ringing of bells, when the eternal bond between man and the divine is definitively dissolved. The prevailing emotion of the capitalist spirit is egoism and the primary drive is the compulsive urge to accumulate as a manifestation of continuity and conquest of eternity. It is the unconscious sublimation of the fear of death, felt as the final punishment, as the antechamber to that hell that held the men of that distant age in terror. Capitalism thrives with individualism, with the disappearance of spirituality and the loss of values and the consequent triumph of emptiness that will result in modern nihilism. Individuals isolated from their community, weakened, frightened, in order to feel accepted surround themselves with objects to exhibit, as the consumer society demands. The medieval merchant, lacking noble birth and the martial spirit of the knight, the wisdom of the clerics, the communion with nature of the peasants, finds social emancipation in the exhibition of his economic wealth.  First example of narcissism, showing off to others in order to be recognized.

6) How much do modern media influence our perception of ourselves?

A) The media heavily influence contemporary man by hammeringly promoting intrusive advertisements that propose an image of people who are always young, beautiful, happy thanks to the possession of often useless and expensive objects. These misleading images reinforce the need to possess in order to appear characteristic of mass narcissism, the more one has and exhibits the more one feels accepted and important. The narcissist's self-perception depends on the judgement of others, so embodying the winning models proposed by the media becomes essential to feel alive.

7) Narcissism but also transhumanism, Wokism and a certain fear of living, growing old and dying. All connected?

A) The stereotypical image of the modern narcissist is the eternal young person, because old age unconsciously brings us back to the idea of death, feared and exorcised by the nurturing society of the eternal young. The disappearance of the rites of passage of ancient societies leaves human beings without the fundamental initiatory knowledge that averted the fear of annihilation in the darkness of death. This passage once experienced as the continuity of life in a new dimension, in our time is removed and looms like a curse over contemporary man. Everyone wants to be young and live forever by cheating death. Transhumanism and the dominance of technology fuel the Promethean dream of immortality, achieved through unnatural grafts and hybridization with machines. Forgetting that immortality is achieved by overcoming the human dimension in transcendence towards the divine, a magical practice that has always been contemplated in esoteric disciplines.

8) To whom does this way of life, this society so heavily unbalanced, benefit?

A) The crisis of the modern world benefits those metapolitical forces that have always acted behind the scenes of History, using the economy and enslaved political classes as a weapon. Occult powers that have brought humanity to a point of no return, functional to the terminal phase of the cosmic cycle. It certainly does not benefit the people who struggle every day to survive in an increasingly dark and difficult world, where the environment is polluted, misery grows along with despair, wars slaughter civilians. The nurturing society of selfishness, individualism and narcissism is the ideal environment for the development of vices and addictions, which allow the dictatorship of money.

9) Sometimes we are prisoners of a hamster wheel. Is this really the case? What can we do to get out of this situation?

A) To break the shackles of the low-intensity dictatorship of authoritarian democracies, one must rediscover the identity of peoples, rituals and traditions. Strongly rejecting the woke, transhumanist and consumerist subculture of US origin. Recreating communities of destiny, new tribes to replace the families deliberately destroyed by the capitalist system. Practicing the sports of daring strengthens the will and courage to effectively oppose the globalist conspiracy that wants weak subjects and slaves to drugs and pharmaceuticals. Above all, return to the ancestral rites of European peoples, to the cult of the Gods of the lineage, whose eclipse caused the rise of exotic cults that generated the emergence of egalitarian ideals culminating in materialist ideologies. Salvation lies in the new spirituality of Europeans.