Stephen Roney's Blog, page 133

When Amber Heard Speaks, Who Is Talking?

 

Amber Heard keeps educating us about narcissism.

The narcissist often betrays the truth inadvertently—demonstrating, for one thing, that they are not truly delusional. They know they are lying.

Asked by Savannah Guthrie whether she lost her defamation trial because Depp had better lawyers, Heard concedes “they were better at distracting the jury from the real issues.”

Which, if you think about it, is a backhanded admission that the job of her own lawyers was to distract the jury from the real issues. 

Heard appeals more than once to the fact that she is a human being—that the jury, the general public, and those on social media must remember this and treat her with kindness.

For most people, this ought to go without saying. That Heard feels she must say it implies that she sees others as humans like herself only with some conscious effort. She sees other people as “randos.”

Some listeners might feel she failed to treat Johnny Depp with kindness or consider his feelings.

Accused of faking emotion to the jury during her testimony; of, in the words of Depp’s lawyers, “putting on the performance of a lifetime,” Heard responds, “said by the lawyer for the man who convinced the world that he had scissors for fingers.”

This is how the narcissist thinks. The narcissist lies with ease because they deny a moral difference between lying and an artistic performance. This is why, in general, they cannot appreciate either art or jokes. You simply invent your “narrative,” and declare that it is true. Were this not the way Heard habitually thinks, she would have known how bizarre this comment would sound to others.

To the narcissist, everything they do is a performance, calculated for effect. They always only play themselves.

Asked if she ever instigated violence, Heard responds “I didn’t need to.” This is an inadvertent admission that the violence was her idea. If she did not always initiate it, she always provoked it.

Asked whether she herself was violent, Heard pointed out that, faced with abuse, one’s moral sense is distorted: one cannot see right and wrong clearly “as you or I can.”

This came so close to an inadvertent admission that Heard had not been abused that it was cut out of the final version of the interview, no doubt at the insistence of her lawyers.

Why are narcissists like Heard, in the end, so bad at lying? Why do they drop such clues?

This is the operation of the conscience, and proves that we all have one. Any narcissist is at war with themself, as if they have two distinct personalities. Hence the concept of demonic possession. 

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Forever Amber II

 

Amber Heard is helpfully giving us all a master class in narcissism. Predictably, she has not gone silent or backed away after losing her court case. This illustrates the common observation that narcissists are incurable, and cannot be reasoned with; that a narcissist will never change. Heard is actually risking being sued all over again for defamation. 

But a narcissist cannot let go. Failure of any kind cannot be acknowledged, or, in their own minds, all is lost. To them, it is kill or be killed.

This is why the generally recommended strategy, cutting all contact, may not work. It will not work unless you can effectively disappear from their consciousness; which is a hard thing to do, and necessarily highly disruptive to your life and livelihood. Once they have targeted you, the narcissist is likely to come after you; and to slander you to anyone they come in contact with.

The only exit for Depp is if and when the media lose interest in listening to Heard.

The incorrigibility of narcissism is no doubt why hell is understood in Christianity to be eternal. Once you have chosen self as your God, there may be no going back. 

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Canada's Shame

 

Monument to "Evangeline," Grand Pre, Nova Scotia.

Friend Xerxes speaks in his latest column of Canada’s “shame”:

“The difference between guilt and shame becomes relevant in our time, in the troubled relationship between white settlers and indigenous peoples. ‘We’ – that is, people like me – took their land. Incarcerated their children. Tried to wipe out their language, their customs, their culture.”

None of this is true. The relationship between white settlers and indigenous people in Canada was mostly harmonious; at a minimum, more harmonious than most relationships among the First Nations themselves. European settlers “took” no indigenous land. All was done by treaty and by consent. If there ought to be any corporate guilt or shame about taking land, try what was done to the Acadians. Yet for them, we make no “land acknowledgement.” Why no land acknowledgement to the King of France?

Indian children were not incarcerated. They were sent to school, like other Canadian children, and as requested by the Indians in treaties. There was no desire and no attempt to wipe out native languages, customs, or culture—aside from a few customs, like the potlatch or the sun dance, or torture, or cannibalism, which were seen to violate human rights. The schools were designed, perhaps unfortunately, to preserve Indian uniqueness.

This generally honourable part of Canadian history has been systematically falsified.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

A Prediction

 

I think Justin Trudeau will be out of power by Christmas.

His use of the Emergency Act has been revealed to have been illegal. Inflation and the economy are in a death spiral. Actual food shortages are predicted for late summer and fall. Trudeau is pig-headedly clinging to COVID mandates. Bill C-11 should hurt him; it is opposed not just by all the independent YouTubers, but also by Google and the like.  And he is ramming it through. These policies are self-destructive of him, but fit his adolescent mind set. Like a kid caught with his fist in a cookie jar, he is going to double down rather than pull back. It is going to be increasingly hard for Singh and the NDP to support him, and share the blame. If, as predicted, the Democrats go down in flames in the US midterms, that will have repercussions in Canada too.

Out of money or not, the NDP’s only hope of continued existence may soon be to turn fiercely against the Liberals, and belatedly try to claim credit for bringing that government down. They will have lots of opportunities for plausible cause.

After September, the Conservatives too will be at least as eager to have an election, with a groundswell of optimism behind their new leader; who is almost sure to be Pierre Poilievre.

In a campaign, I expect Poilievre to be an extremely effective campaigner for an electorate in a mood to throw the rascals-out. I think the Canadian electorate has already been in that mood for two election cycles, but the Conservatives did not offer them a clear alternative. Now there is tremendous pressure built up behind that dam.

It will be a historic defeat.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Racism in the Toronto Police Force

 

The Toronto Police have released a report that “Toronto police officers use more force against Black people, more often.” 

“Our own analysis of our data from 2020 discloses that there is systemic discrimination in our policing,” [Acting Chief of Police] Ramer said. “That is, there is a disproportionate impact experienced by racialized people, particularly those of Black communities.”

Acting Chief Ramer has issued a public apology, which predictably has not been accepted by any of the spokespeople for the local black community interviewed by the media.

In fact, the statistics do not prove discrimination. An important variable has been omitted: do blacks commit crimes in disproportionate numbers? Are they disproportionately likely to be violent? If so, they would of course have more dealings with the police. Yet nobody even mentions this possibility.

Let us suppose, for the sake of argument, that such a question is out of bounds. It must be accepted as an article of faith, on grounds of human equality, that specific demographic groups cannot possibly be committing crimes at higher rates. To suppose so would be racist.

Very well. Then we have a bigger problem than discrimination against blacks. Police are overwhelmingly more likely to confront and to use force against men than against women. 

How can we ignore this? How can we compound the offense by apologizing only to blacks, and not to men?

Or, if you insist, let’s admit that different groups might offend at different rates. If so, the evidence in the present report does not support the racism interpretation. If the problem is “white” officers being prejudiced against other races, why would the problem be for blacks specifically? Why wouldn’t they be equally or at least similarly prejudiced against other visible minorities?

The report does say other groups were also overrepresented in the statistics:

“If you are Indigenous, you were more likely to be subjected to a strip search, a highly invasive police practice; and members of the Latino, Middle Eastern and Southeast Asian communities were also more likely to have force used against them.”

But what about the Chinese? What about the Japanese? What about East Indians, aka South Asians? They are visibly not “white,” more visibly so than Middle Easterners or Latinos. And yet they do not seem to have been disproportionately harassed by police.

“Southeast Asian” presumably means Vietnamese; possibly Filipino or Thai. Are they really visibly more distinct from the “white” majority than Chinese, Japanese, or Korean Canadians? Having lived in Korea, China, and the Philippines, I can attest that the typical East Asian cannot themselves consistently tell the difference among these groups by physical appearance. How can the racist police?

I also doubt that a typical racist cop could consistently tell the difference in a brief encounter or an emergency situation between a Hispanic or Middle Easterner and someone from Bangladesh or North India; or between a black and someone from South India. If they did, it would be on the basis of speech and behavior, not on any racial characteristic.

This leaves greater levels of crime based on culture as the obvious explanation. Some cultures are more inclined to crime, and violence, than others. We all know, for example, of the Italian Mafia. So too ISIS and Al Qaeda, the Mexican drug cartels, the Vietnamese Triads.

Is the police chief, and are those in authority generally, too stupid to see this? One would hope not. 

But then, why are they deliberately promoting this slander against their own police department?

It has to do with class prejudice. This report and apology will make policing harder and more expensive, and increase the rate of crime. It will particularly be harmful to the working class, including the “racialized” poor, who must live in high-crime areas.

But it has one great advantage: it increases the power of the bureaucracy over the ordinary police officer, who is scapegoated. It increases the power of the ruling class over the working class.

Divide and conquer. 

God help the fools who fall for it.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

A Sinking Ship

 

Garner

One more sign that the Patrick Brown campaign is in trouble: Maclean’s magazine reports that Michelle Rempel Garner is considering running for the provincial Conservative leadership. Having supported Brown, and given his unprecedentedly sharp attacks on Poilievre, I suspect she realizes she has no future now in the federal party. Whether or not she runs provincially, she says she is no longer actively supporting any leadership campaign. This leaves Brown with the support of only one sitting MP. 

Meantime, the Poilievre campaign is accusing Brown’s campaign of buying votes, and calls for an investigation. I don't know whether they have a smoking gun, but I bet they’re right. Brown has a shady reputation, and I doubt there has been any groundswell of popular support for him, a relatively obscure candidate. More likely there has been some deal-making with ethnic voting blocs.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

The Times Are A-Changing

 

Times are changing. To begin with, the turmoil that began in early 2020 is continuing. 

Next up, famine. Credible sources say that crop yields will be poor this summer across the Northern Hemisphere, due to a shortage of fertilizer. Add this to the supply chain problem and the high cost of fuel.

Inflation will accordingly also get worse.

And Biden, Trudeau, and the left will get the blame.

There is a good chance that, in the turmoil, some governments and regimes may fall. Putin looks vulnerable. So does Xi. So does Boris Johnson. So does Justin Trudeau; people are assuming he’s safe until 2025 because of his coalition with the NDP, but actually, the NDP can pull out at any time, and it is in their best interests to do so as soon as possible—as soon as they think they can afford an election. If they keep supporting an increasingly unpopular government until the next election, they will be obliterated. 

Biden seems secure, due to the difficulty of removing a president, but will probably be presiding after November over Republican majorities in both houses. It could be a different world in a year.

Netflix went anti-woke recently. CNN has warned it will fire its partisan personalities. Twitter is going anti-woke under Musk. The solidarity of the left has broken. The Hunter Biden scandal is exposing Joe Biden. The Durham report is exposing Hillary Clinton. The Depp trial has exposed the Me Too movement. Black Lives Matter is being exposed as a scam. Zoom classes have exposed Critical Theory in the schools. Trudeau’s declaration of the Emergency Act is being exposed as illegitimate. Jeff Bezos has rounded on Joe Biden. The legacy media are being exposed on brief after brief: Depp, Rittenhouse, Covington, COVID, the Wuhan lab, the Russia hoax.

The dominoes have begun to fall. As with the First and Second Estates joining the Third at the outset of the French Revolution, this can all shift swiftly. Most of the madness we have lived with from the left is held together with intimidation. We are getting close to the point where people will no longer feel intimidated. Then the Bastille goes down.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Hunter Biden and Narcissism

 

It is wrong to think of a cause for narcissism. Narcissism is a personal choice. There are, however, circumstances that can tempt one to it.

One is having a highly successful parent. There are two relevant Chinese proverbs here: “Greatness costs a family three generations”; and “a happy family is one in which the son is smarter than the father.” 

The Chinese pay a lot of attention to family. They know.

Imagine the situation of a son of a particularly successful father. Imagine, say, Hunter Biden. What their father has accomplished looks beyond their abilities, so they give up trying early. And they may be right. Genius is rare; if their father is a genius, they may simply not have the mental powers to do as well as their father did. 

In Hunter Biden’s case, nobody can accuse his father of genius. But Joe Biden rose well above his level of competence through luck. Hunter Biden cannot expect to have such luck. 

In such a case, the son’s ego must suffer. Whatever they can accomplish, with their inferior mental equipment, it will look like failure, to them and to their parents. The bar is set too high.

The temptation then is not just to go limp and not try anything, but to retreat into a personal fantasy in which they really are brilliant and capable. This is narcissism: in addition to elevating the self, it assumes to the self godlike powers, to create “reality.” 

Such a person will also have an eternal chip on their shoulder, against all those who do not recognize their greatness, or seem to challenge it by their mere existence. They are likely to have a grudge against the impressive parent, in the first place; but a secret or concealed grudge, for the sake of their self-interest. They are likely to have a grudge against their children, who, carrying the same genetics as the genius parent, are liable to excel them. The mythological model here is Cronus, who castrates his father, then devours his sons. Three generations. The Bible too says, “the sins of the fathers are visited upon the sons unto the third or fourth generation.”

They will have a grudge against anyone who does anything impressive. 

I have seen this dynamic many times. It is not the inevitable origin of a narcissist; being spoiled seems more common. But it produces an especially malicious form of narcissism: an angry narcissism with a sense of grievance.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Send Out the Clowns

 

Graffito, Paris, 1968

Although she claimed on the stand that all she wanted was to put it all behind her, and she wished Johnny could do the same, Amber Heard refuses to put it all behind her. She continues to dog Johnny Depp on social media, claiming her defeat in court was a grave injustice to herself and for all women. Important elements of the legacy media, including the New York Times, seem to be taking the same stand. Ignoring the judgement of nine jurors who heard the evidence, and indeed of the vast majority of those who watched the trial online, they still insist that Heard was abused by Depp.

The problem is that, to the narcissist, the only definition of good and evil is that “good” is whatever is good for me, and “evil” is whatever is not. Accordingly, it is good to maintain that something untrue is true, if the lie is good for me. If it is best for women that we should believe all women, any evidence to the contrary must be declared evil and shouted down. And it does not matter what happens to any male as a result.

The issue is obvious to me because I grew up with narcissistic parents. I recall as late as my late twenties still trying to reconstruct, in light of my childhood, what “good” really meant, and what “real” meant. Any child of a narcissistic parent is bound to be confused on this, because what they have been taught is both wrong and, to anyone other than the narcissist, incoherent. What is good is whatever is good for my parent? What is real is whatever my parent says is real? Despite my senses, despite reason?

Living in the latter half of the 20th century, or the 21st, does not help. There is a narcissistic philosophy permeating society and its institutions, postmodernism or critical theory, sometimes called cultural Marxism. I can trace it back at least as far as the Frankfurt School. I think the Frankfurt School was a continuation in turn of a philosophy found in Nazism. A bit of graffiti seen during the Paris uprisings in 1968 read “Beware! Even the ears have walls!” The rebellion was against any concept of reality itself. Freedom meant freedom to invent and have “your own truth.”

Graffito, Paris, 1968

“Reality is a function of belief.” I remember that as a watchword back then; I thought it came from Kierkegaard, but perhaps not. Or Blake: “a firm persuasion that a thing is so, makes it so.”

It was seductive, and I was myself at least half seduced in grad school.

But thinking this is insanity, straight up; and sanity is being aware of the good and the true. 

We live today in a world gone mad.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Damn the Truth

 

A discussion with Terry Glavin about the delusion of the residential schools mass graves.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.