Today’s word of the day, thanks to The Dictionary Project, is narcissist. According to The Dictionary Project, the noun means “a person who is overly conceited and self-centered or who has an exaggerated sense of self-importance.” The word is a combination of two linguistic elements: narcissism, a word that entered the language in 1905 (etymonline.com) from the German Narzissismus, coined in 1899 by the German psychiatrist Paul Näcke, and the word-forming element –ist, which designates a person who does or makes or believes something.

Narzissismus comes from the name of a character in Greek mythology: Narcissus (Gk: ). According to Wikipedia, Narcissus was known for his great beauty, but “rejected all romantic advances, eventually falling in love with his own reflection in a pool of water, staring at it for the remainder of his life. After he died, in his place sprouted a flower bearing his name,” the narcissus.

People use the term narcissist casually to refer to people who seem to be full of themselves, but psychologists have actually created a diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), which is, I suppose, a more extreme version of narcissism. It is one of a group of diagnoses called personality disorders, which “are a class of mental disorders characterized by enduring and inflexible maladaptive patterns of behavior, cognition, and inner experience, exhibited across many contexts and deviating from those accepted by any culture” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissistic_personality_disorder). The same wiki describes NPD as “characterized by enduring maladaptive patterns of behavior, cognition, and inner experience, exhibited across many contexts and deviating from those accepted by the individual’s culture.”

A longer description, according to the wiki, goes like this: “Egotistical, arrogant, grandiose, insouciant. Preoccupied with fantasies of success, beauty, or achievement. See themselves as admirable and superior, and therefore entitled to special treatment. Is a mental disorder in which people have an inflated sense of their own importance and a deep need for admiration. Those with narcissistic personality disorder believe that they’re superior to others and have little regard for other people’s feelings.”

A study done in the UK, which looked at high-level British executives and compared them to prisoners at Broadmoor Hospital, a hospital that houses people deemed criminally insane. The researchers found that these high-level executives demonstrated three personality disorders more frequently than the inmates of Broadmoor, and one of those personality disorders was NPD. Perhaps I should mention that the various personality disorders show comorbidity, meaning that a person with NPD will likely demonstrate the characteristics of other personality disorders as well.

But the scariest thing about narcissistic personality disorder is that narcissists are drawn to certain professions that provide them with a sense of authority and control over others. According to an article in Public Safety Magazine, “law enforcement tends to draw and attract narcissistic individuals or individuals with narcissistic tendencies due to the perspective that law enforcement officers are viewed as being authority figures” (https://publicsafetymagazine.com/narcissism-officer-precipitated-conflict/). Furthermore, “the narcissist can immediately satiate the desire to have control and authority over others…. Unfortunately, the narcissistic appetite and need for control and authority are never fully sated and eventually can lead to actions that lack in terms of civility, caring, and morals.”

People who are afflicted with NPD need counseling, and they should be treated with respect since they have a mental disorder. On the other hand, police departments and sheriff’s offices should carefully screen candidates because people with NPD should never, ever, ever be allowed to be police officers. If you have ever had an encounter with an LEO who was rude, overbearing, or conceited, you may have had an encounter with an LEO with NPD. It was probably not pleasant. I do not agree with the sentiment expressed by “ACAB,” but is probably true that most cops with NPD are. Narcissists should never be allowed to be cops.

The image is of “Narcissus, a painting by Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio, was created sometime between 1597 and 1599” (https://study.com/academy/lesson/caravaggios-narcissus-painting-history-analysis.html).