The Emperor's New Clothes

Narcissism and the normalization of dysfunction

This blogpost is inspired by a recent blogpost by one of my favorite data-nerds, truth-tellers, and social commentators, Toby Rogers PhD. He writes:

• Cancel culture is vaccine injury: The narcissistic insistence that others respect my difference while simultaneously demanding the cancellation of anyone who actually thinks differently is not ideology, it’s vaccine injury.

• Related: We live in a society that normalizes every dysfunction and criminalizes critical thinking.

I agree. It seems that today, in August 2022, critical thinking has been replaced by logical fallacies and narcissistic 'word salad.' However, this isn’t something new. It is just that it is so much more obvious today to anyone who wants to look. Problem is that the majority of people still don’t want to look. Allow me to elaborate.

Hubris

Bullies and dictators, who by definition are narcissists, have always behaved in a predictable way. They are inflexible in their convictions that everyone else has to abide by their rules or be eliminated, but they themselves live without constraint. They don’t follow their own rules when they are inconvenient for them, nor do they follow social conventions. Just think about all the incidences in the US and England where the architects and cheerleaders for the most draconian isolation policies were caught partying (Boris Yeltsin) and living a normal life complete with visits to the hair stylist (Nancy Pelosi).

Hubris is a word often used to describe insensitive leadership. Hubris is defined as the combination of arrogance with ignorance, both of which are broad terms which bear a little more examination.

• Arrogance is defined as “overbearing pride” which is manifested by behaviors that lack either insight into the impact on others or a lack of empathy for the effect of those behaviors. Lack of empathy is a defining trait of narcissism.

• Ignorance is more nuanced. A person can be willfully blind to truth and facts. Perhaps they metaphorically stick their fingers in their ears and refuse to listen to those inconvenient facts that contradict their world-view, and then disingenuously claim ignorance or rewrite history when caught out. A person can also live in a state of cognitive dissonance where they fully know the truth but publicly deny it in order to protect their image of themselves as a powerful, important or good person. In this second instance, truth is simply immaterial to their perception of themselves, which in narcissistic lingo is called the “false-self.”

Then there are the sociopathic player, the machiavellian, the liar, and the cheat. Not much is nuanced about these personalities. They are dishonest to the core. They may come to believe some of their own confabulated fables, but they know the score. In fact, the score is the one thing they always keep track of, because they play to win. Every game for them is a zero-sum game and they do not care who they destroy in order to win. They will even destroy themselves rather than admit defeat. They are the consummate con-men

The Emperor's New Clothes

The fable The Emperor's New Clothes was a clever description of con-men tailors, a hubris filled leader, and a compliant populace seeking to protect themselves by going along with the sanctioned narrative rather than testify to the obvious fact. The innocent child who spoke the truth represents the many voices who have been banned or throttled on social media, today. Unfortunately, it is easier to silence the many scientists and others in today's "town square" of social media than it was to ignore a single child in a village.

Notice that in the fable, the Emperor continues on unabashed after realizing he is indeed naked and was conned rather than admitting a mistake and taking action to rectify the situation by commandeering covering for himself from any of his guard. This was almost a silly little end-note to the fable, but it may be the most relevant part of the story for us in August 2022 with the CDC et al. claiming their only mistake was in not communicating better and for that they need more power and money. (Click here)

Twenty-first century hubris knows no shame. None. Just like the emperor.

Biden, Trump, Walensky, Fauci, etc.

Many, many scientists and doctors, like the crowds cheering the naked Emperor marching through the streets, kept their thoughts to themselves in the first couple of years of this pandemic because of the swift and harsh retribution brought down on the heads of those who dared, like the child, to speak the truth. This happened and continues to happen in both political parties as well as in the regulatory and scientific venues. Those truth-tellers lost their jobs like Aaron Kheriaty MD, had multiple hit pieces written about them in the New York Times and elsewhere like attorney Robert F. Kennedy Jr, and were forced to change their businesses to avoid government retaliation like Joe Mercola MD. Most were deplatformed or had their voices throttled by compliant technology companies. Their audacity to testify to verifiable facts and voice their expert opinion resulted in their criminalization by the media and by medical boards in proceedings that more resemble the 1616 inquisition against Galileo than 21st century American justice.

The compliant professionals in the field who kept their heads down and mouths shut naively may have believed that officialdom would admit their errors in judgement after a while. These doctors and scientists may have justified their silence as a necessary and temporary compromise to protect their own livelihoods, but officialdom didn’t self-correct. Even as the death toll from the vaccines and patterns of injuries mounted with additional evidence that the vaccinated were at increased risk of hospitalization, the advocates for disastrous policies and devastating medicines doubled down. Rochelle Walensky’s non-apology apology for the CDC not doing better is a case in point. Just like the Emperor, the CDC along with the other regulatory agencies as well as the Biden administration, mainstream media, and political structure (all of whom are heavily funded by Pharma) continue to march naked down the street demanding their subjects participate in the sham.

Critical Thinking and Word Salad

We cannot allow the continued normalization of the unthinkable.

1. It is not normal for school children and young athletes in their prime to drop dead on the playing field.

2. It is not normal for young children to be found dead in their beds.

3. It is not normal for healthy adults to suffer Sudden Arrhythmic Deaths (SAD), currently being relabeled as Sudden Adult Deaths while going about their normal day.

4. It is not normal for people to suddenly pass out, and it may be the reason for the increase in auto accidents in the past year. POTS is known adverse reaction to the Covid vaccine. (See Heather McDonald)

5. It is not normal for people to develop blood clots, autoimmune disease, tremors, cardiac irregularities, etc. within hours, days or weeks of being vaccinated. Neither is the pattern of aggressive cancers commented on by many oncologists and primary care physicians normal.

6. It is neither normal nor healthy for so many people to avoid others for fear of a virus that, although increasingly contagious, has a very low risk profile for most of us that is similar to or less than influenza and other respiratory illnesses.

Most importantly, it is not okay for anyone to cajole or coerce anyone into subjecting themselves to any medical procedure. The language used to do so is manipulative and psychologically abusive, as is the shunning of the unvaccinated.

The success of the over two years of relentless brainwashing by the CDC and friends is seen in the failure of many in the public to stop their enforcement of not socializing with the unvaccinated and/or insisting everyone (or everyone who is not up to date on the vaccines) to test for Covid before engaging in normal human activities even though the CDC backtracked on their guidance and echoed the Great Barrington Declaration which they had previously trashed.

The word salad full of faulty assumptions and dressed in logical fallacies that supports these unsupportable demands continues this month:

• I need to keep safe because we have babies in the family so we still live in our bubble

• I know vaccines work because my friend was vaccinated and hospitalized, but she would have died if she hadn’t been vaccinated

• I am doing my part to keep everyone safe by wearing a mask and not socializing with the unvaccinated

• Visitors to our AirBnB must be up-to-date on their Covid vaccines in order to protect our family and subsequent visitors

• My atrial fibrillation and wife’s shingles that both began the week after boosting were just coincidental occurrences because Dr. Fauci, Pres. Biden and the CDC told us that the vaccine is safe and effective.

Following the leader and ignoring the evidence in front of you is no different than following the naked Emperor through the streets while complimenting him on his beautiful new clothing. Don’t expect him to admit his nakedness. Leadership often get where they are because of their narcissism, and narcissists never admit they were wrong. Never.

Modern Times & Old Guides

The Emperor’s New Clothes is a parable that originated in feudal times. There are many who say our current corporate-government alliance has corrupted government and media to the point of creating a new global feudalism with totalitarian values. Author George Orwell and former Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower warned of this eventuality. There are many moving parts and interpretations, but nothing complex can’t be understood in some honest way on a single page.

To that end, I suggest that there are simply three things we must do to counter the damage done, begin done, and yet to come due to our narcissistic culture and the normalization of dysfunction. These three things are nothing new, but are lessons that each generation must learn for itself. We must think critically, behave morally, and have the courage to speak the truth:

1. CRITICAL THINKING: The unbiased analysis of factual evidence, observations of real world data, and careful consideration of hypotheses to form a judgement includes consideration the biases and agendas. Risk assessment, cost-benefit analysis and ethical determinations apply.

2. NUREMBERG CODE (Point 1): The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential. This means that the person involved should have legal capacity to give consent; should be so situated as to be able to exercise free power of choice, without the intervention of any element of force, fraud, deceit, duress, overreaching, or other ulterior form of constraint or coercion; and should have sufficient knowledge and comprehension of the elements of the subject matter involved as to enable him to make an understanding and enlightened decision. This latter element requires that before the acceptance of an affirmative decision by the experimental subject there should be made known to him the nature, duration, and purpose of the experiment; the method and means by which it is to be conducted; all inconveniences and hazards reasonably to be expected; and the effects upon his health or person which may possibly come from his participation in the experiment. The duty and responsibility for ascertaining the quality of the consent rests upon each individual who initiates, directs, or engages in the experiment. It is a personal duty and responsibility which may not be delegated to another with impunity.

3. COURAGE: It is not enough to know the truth. Neither is it enough to whisper it quietly. Like Bobby Kennedy and the Children’s Health Defense, Joe Mercola, Steve Kirsch, Robert W. Malone, Aaron Kheriaty, Jeffrey A. Tucker, Peter McCullough, Pierre Koury, and Toby Rogers, we must speak out courageously. It is the only way to check the normalization of dysfunction and the growing power of narcissists.

Maggie Russo is the author of “Dance with the Devil: Love in the Age of Covid”