Family under the microscope | Life and style | The Guardian

Quote:

It's the season for the children to clamour on Saturday night to watch one or other of the reality TV "entertainment" talent shows, culminating in the Christmas final and anointment of yet another "star". Is it harmless fun or should you be trying to get them to watch something more wholesome? Should you also be refusing to fork out for the celebrity magazines and other commercial exploitations of the modern idols who clutter our media? The good news is that the studies suggest that most young people do not engage in celebrity worship. Three kinds have been identified. About 15% of young people have an "entertainment-social" interest, just chatting with friends about their celebrity and enjoying what they offer. This does not seem to do any harm, or be a sign of any. The 5% who feel that they have an "intense-personal" relationship to the celebrity may see them as their soul-mate and have frequent unwanted thoughts about them that border on the compulsive. They are at heightened risk of depression and anxiety. In the case of mid-teenage girls, they are also more liable to be unhappy with their bodies (often idolising a woman with a "better" one). The 2% with a "borderline-pathological" interest are liable to say they would spend several thousand pounds on a napkin or paper plate the celebrity used, or are willing to do something illegal if the celebrity told them to. This group are most likely to be seriously disturbed. On the whole, celebrity worship seems to be more an effect of prior difficulties than a cause of them. Perhaps more significantly, a remarkable study of the narcissism of celebrities themselves strongly suggests that our role models are far from desirable as people for our children to emulate. Although done in America, the study almost certainly would apply here. Full-blown narcissism is a state of "me-me-me" attention-seeking grandiosity. Feelings of worthlessness and invisibility are reversed and compensated for by exhibiting their opposite. The study measured narcissism in 200 celebrities, and in 200 young adults with MBAs. These results were compared with a nationally representative sample using the same questionnaire. Sure enough, the celebrities were significantly more narcissistic than the MBAs and the general population. There were four kinds of celebrity included in the sample. The most narcissistic were the ones who had become famous through a reality TV show (particularly high on "exploitativeness" and "vanity"), next came comedians (highest on "exhibitionism" and "superiority"), then actors and, least of all, musicians. Interestingly, the narcissism was not correlated with how long the celebrity had been famous, strongly suggesting that becoming famous was not making them narcissistic – it was already the case beforehand. The celebrities were significantly more narcissistic than the MBAs. These latter were chosen for comparison as a group known already to be that way inclined. Sure enough, in turn, the MBAs were significantly more narcissistic than the general population. People who get to the top or into the public eye tend to be narcissists. It is most unfortunate that they are the very ones who the young are strongly encouraged and inclined to emulate. Watching them cavorting about on TV (or, indeed, being bossed about by MBAs at your workplace) is a disastrous role model for the vulnerable. The sort of people who are ruthless, self-seeking and workaholic also tend to be desperate and lonely. If your child reads about their idols, they will have noticed how miserable or messy their lives often are. It can't hurt to point this out.

I always said that there should be an exemption from the Geneva Conventions for anyone who's got an MBA. That's why you want to hang out with them - it's like a licence to let your inner dominatrix off the leash. If you do that to some poor neurotic creature you feel like you're clubbing a baby seal; MBAs are made of rubber.

__________________
Standard disclaimer: the disgusting statements contained in this post are the views of the poster, and unless specified do not represent the views of the moderators or the site's owners.

Oi.

Wanna try your inner dominatrix on me and see what it gets you?

MBAs are more narcissists simply because they're told they're a smart and successful bunch with lots of options. I had some (optional) course offered which was called "Creativity and Personal Mastery". I could try and dig up the program. It sounded interesting but it felt quite heavily like "what do you want in life?" and "how to achieve your destiny" kinda stuff. Paulo Coelho's "The Alchemist" kinda stuff. And maybe in boom-times that's something successful people can worry about but to be honest, I was too consumed by just the idea of surviving and then being able to afford living like a proper human being...

__________________
Unless otherwise specified, I am posting as a regular poster. When I will act as a mod, I'll make sure you're in no doubt.

Originally Posted by Gilles de Rais

Oi. Wanna try your inner dominatrix on me and see what it gets you?

60 quid an hour, my love...

Also, just thinking, what's so bad about being a narcissist? Sure, you might be pretty boring to be around, but that's not your problem. You've got a hobby you'll never get bored of, at least.

__________________
Standard disclaimer: the disgusting statements contained in this post are the views of the poster, and unless specified do not represent the views of the moderators or the site's owners.

Originally Posted by Zichao

Also, just thinking, what's so bad about being a narcissist? Sure, you might be pretty boring to be around, but that's not your problem. You've got a hobby you'll never get bored of, at least.

Depends to which degree being a narcissist affect your social skills. Without social skills, you are likely to end up alone - Thus powerless. MBAs (to pluck an example out of nowhere) often encourage team spirit and try to teach leadership. Not for the greater good (although they might say so) but simply because being efficient in the world requires to bend people to your will by nothing more than your personality and capacity to persuade and inspire...

This is not entirely incompatible with narcissim but being aware of other people, if only as 'objects', is still required.

__________________
Unless otherwise specified, I am posting as a regular poster. When I will act as a mod, I'll make sure you're in no doubt.

Sure, but as you say narcissism isn't always a barrier to personal magnetism. Often it actually helps. And in any case, you can't just measure success in terms of... well... success. If you're happy then that should be enough, right..?

__________________
Standard disclaimer: the disgusting statements contained in this post are the views of the poster, and unless specified do not represent the views of the moderators or the site's owners.

Originally Posted by Zichao

Sure, but as you say narcissism isn't always a barrier to personal magnetism. Often it actually helps.

Sometimes, yes, for variation of the cult-following strategy. But cult leaders have a short life expectancy, imho. Or, otherly said, the results are pretty random. If I was charismatic/magnetic, I think I'd prefer a Talleyrand or Fouche-like approach to the issue. These two had no lost love for each others but they shared an uncanny, near god-like, ability to survive and thrive in ANY circumstances whatsoever. Now, THAT's absolutely awesome.

I am also referencing indirectly some stuff I did learn in MBA: There's some research done by a guy named Jim Collins & others on what he calls Level 5 leadership. "There is a direct relationship between the absence of celebrity and the presence of good-to-great results. Why? First, when you have a celebrity, the company turns into “the one genius with 1,000 helpers.” It creates a sense that the whole thing is really about the CEO. At a deeper level, we found that for leaders to make something great, their ambition has to be for the greatness of the work and the company, rather than for themselves. That doesn’t mean that they don’t have an ego. It means that at each decision point—at each of the critical junctures when Choice A would favor their ego and Choice B would favor the company and the work—time and again the good-to-great leaders pick Choice B. Celebrity CEOs, at those same decision points, are more likely to favor self and ego over company and work".

And his good-to-great classification is done on objective criteria of financial performance. For example, iirc, GE under Jack Welsh was only "good". The great ones were mostly unknown companies, with unknown leader. But, boy, had you invested in those, you'd be laughing all the way to the bank...

Quote:

And in any case, you can't just measure success in terms of... well... success. If you're happy then that should be enough, right..?

Yes. Forgot to mention another indirect reference. Managing with Power by Pfeffer (Managing with Power, Politics and Influence in Organizations. - book reviews | HR Magazine | Find Articles at BNET). The general truth is that being powerless make us unhappy as it means we cannot affect our circumstances and most human beings are distraught by that. Thus, most human beings seek power - over their environment, circumstances etc. And that is usually done via human interaction since few of us have a technical skill that is enough. Look at Edison vs. Tesla. Tesla did not die a happy man - He probably was crap at people/social skill and a geek's geek but still he resented being lonely and poor. It made him miserable and even more upset as he was unable to further invent stuff due to lack of capital...

__________________
Unless otherwise specified, I am posting as a regular poster. When I will act as a mod, I'll make sure you're in no doubt.

Quote:

Sometimes, yes, for variation of the cult-following strategy. But cult leaders have a short life expectancy, imho. Or, otherly said, the results are pretty random. If I was charismatic/magnetic, I think I'd prefer a Talleyrand or Fouche-like approach to the issue. These two had no lost love for each others but they shared an uncanny, near god-like, ability to survive and thrive in ANY circumstances whatsoever. Now, THAT's absolutely awesome. I am also referencing indirectly some stuff I did learn in MBA: There's some research done by a guy named Jim Collins & others on what he calls Level 5 leadership. "There is a direct relationship between the absence of celebrity and the presence of good-to-great results. Why? First, when you have a celebrity, the company turns into “the one genius with 1,000 helpers.” It creates a sense that the whole thing is really about the CEO. At a deeper level, we found that for leaders to make something great, their ambition has to be for the greatness of the work and the company, rather than for themselves. That doesn’t mean that they don’t have an ego. It means that at each decision point—at each of the critical junctures when Choice A would favor their ego and Choice B would favor the company and the work—time and again the good-to-great leaders pick Choice B. Celebrity CEOs, at those same decision points, are more likely to favor self and ego over company and work". And his good-to-great classification is done on objective criteria of financial performance. For example, iirc, GE under Jack Welsh was only "good". The great ones were mostly unknown companies, with unknown leader. But, boy, had you invested in those, you'd be laughing all the way to the bank...

True. I suppose it's an individual strategic decision - make one company your baby and do whatever it takes to keep it going through thick and thin, or just flit about wherever the money happens to be.

Quote:

Yes. Forgot to mention another indirect reference. Managing with Power by Pfeffer (Managing with Power, Politics and Influence in Organizations. - book reviews | HR Magazine | Find Articles at BNET). The general truth is that being powerless make us unhappy as it means we cannot affect our circumstances and most human beings are distraught by that. Thus, most human beings seek power - over their environment, circumstances etc. And that is usually done via human interaction since few of us have a technical skill that is enough. Look at Edison vs. Tesla. Tesla did not die a happy man - He probably was crap at people/social skill and a geek's geek but still he resented being lonely and poor. It made him miserable and even more upset as he was unable to further invent stuff due to lack of capital...

Also true, but you also have to factor in the levels of self-delusion that people are actually capable of attaining. Most people won't have nearly as realistic a view of their situation as Tesla.

__________________
Standard disclaimer: the disgusting statements contained in this post are the views of the poster, and unless specified do not represent the views of the moderators or the site's owners.