Now what had I told you about Botox Jeff’s and General Franco’s narcissistic personality disorder?
Published:
March 17, 2012 at 11:20pm
New research, published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, has found a direct link between the number of Facebook friends you collect and the degree to which you are a “socially disruptive narcissist”.
Individuals who took high scores in the Narcissistic Personality Inventory questionnaire had more Facebook friends on Facebook, tagged themselves more often and updated their newsfeeds more regularly. They also responded more aggressively to derogatory comments made about them on Facebook walls and changed their profile pictures more often.
Read the full Sky News and The Guardian reports in the links below.
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http://news.sky.com/home/technology/article/16190919
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/mar/17/facebook-dark-side-study-aggressive-narcissism
I do not have a fb account. I don’t really believe in intimate friendship with anyone except my family. My family are my friends.
People who collect as many “friends” as they can on Facebook, tag themselves ad nauseum on Facebook and people who spend too much time on social networking sites, can only be anti-social in real life.
In my case Paul, it’s my family and other animals.
To hell with those bastards at the customs.
The question our bright stars should be asking is, if there were no Facebook, what would they do?
It’s interesting how both Franco and Jeffrey recently restricted access to their Facebook pages, which were public and completely unrestricted. It’s as if they exchanged their political public role for the comfort zone provided by ‘friends’, albeit susceptible to leaks.
Must be quite a chore trying to guess which one of your 5,001 friends is giving your virtual semi-intimacy away. No wonder they’re always peering over here to check whether it happened again. So sad and gullible.
Didn’t you know that they don’t read this blog? They said so on Inkontri a few weeks ago, even as they were passing judgement, Holy Inquisition style, on what the lady of the house here was writing.
These two have seriously corroded and eroded brain cells.
Surely you mean these four? I came across a Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando III facebook page yesterday.
Mux qed naqbes ghalihom, but at least, Jeffrey and Franco are public figures, so people would probably send them “friend requests” left, right and centre.
What I can’t understand is their posting inane or infantile comments on Facebook. The same goes for non-public figures who have clocked up thousands of “friends”, and, to put it in ever-so-expressive Maltese, “joqghodu jikxfsu sormom” in everything they do.
I totally agree. This is a typical Facebook wall comment:
“Safe installed, 18th century repro painting vip, now more than ever *wink**wink**. Off to Sliema, coffee at Giorgio’s. Such a beautiful day, had to leave all windows open, fresh air at last!”
[Daphne – ‘Coffee at Giorgio’s’. No wonder that for years I’ve felt like an alien in in my own home-town. I walk past the coffee-shops, see not one face I recognise, and think who ARE all these people and what ARE they doing here? But the bit I really can’t believe is announcing that you’ve gone out and left your windows open.]
The person who put that comment on Facebook surely doesn’t know what keeping a low profile means. But again with sites like Facebook, how can you?
Like. And I am off to your apartment.
Daphne, I’m sure Mercury in his post is ‘exaggerating’ with his open windows comment, but it is not too far from the sad, real truth. I mean, to my mind, “Off for a long-weekend in Gozo with my family and kids” or “@MIA. itaLy here we come” have the same impact.
Could not help but post a comment with regard to the statement in another post that an increase in wages for the less well off would go on cigarettes and gambling. I think that’s a sweeping statement to make and coincidentally I’ve just finished reading “Chavs – The demonization of the working class” where the author opines that the media is populated by the upper classes hence they paint an unrealistic picture of the working class, propagating the Thatcherite myth that everybody can and should aspire to be at least middle class. Whilst some low earners as some high earners who spend beyond their means on drugs such as cocaine, do waste money and seek to live beyond their means, this blog is but the opinion of someone who by her own admission was born into and raised in an upper class environment. Hence it is biased and relects the experience and perspective of that class. We live in a world of inequality and it is a myth that earnings are commensurate with ability. During the credit crunch RBS availed itself of a government bailout, yet its head Fred the Shred still got a bonus running into millions despite the bank’s failure. The middle and upper classes will always have an advantage over the working class in terms of honing skillsk, extra curricular activities and doing unpaid internships, not to mention personal contacts that lead to higher earning occupations. The working class needs policies including economic ones that at least attempt to bridge this gap, not condemnation.
[Daphne – I take it you refer to my column in The Malta Independent on Sunday, today, not a blog-post. Claire, I speak from experience, having seen these situations widely with my own eyes, and having listened to first-hand accounts by people – mostly women – involved in these dire situations. No raising the minimum wage will not help. The real problems must be tackled at source. Unfortunately, people who are in a position to address these serious social issues are reluctant to do so because the first step is admitting to them, and they are unwilling to speak out for fear of receiving the same reaction as yours, here. A description of the facts is not ‘demonisation of the working class’. It is a description of the facts. To suggest otherwise is Orwellian. The same problem exists with the refusal to face the fact that there is by far a greater problem with obesity at the lower end of the socio-economic scale than at the higher end. For the sake of political correctness, public information campaigns and exercises in teaching nutrition and cookery are not targeted but just thrown out in general, with the result that a great deal of money and effort is wasted and the campaigns miss their mark. But to get back to the original subject: when you have two smokers in the house, burning up at least 70 euros of cigarettes a week between them, it is hugely irresponsible to suggest that the solution to their financial plight is to raise their wages. The solution is to help them cut out their habit. Nobody discusses what high earners should do with their smoking habits because if they can afford it it’s up to them. But when people can’t afford it, make no effort to stop it, and then exert pressure for employers to – effectively – subsidise their bad habits, that’s wrong. I think you need greater exposure to the strain under which many women, especially, live in working-class homes, knocking together scratch meals and making do and mending because they have been trained to think that the breadwinner is entitled to spend a proportion of the family income on distractions and bad habits.]
I read Daphne’s column, and I’ll wager that come Tuesday, Lawrence Gonzi will announce a new “skema” ta’ “personal skills” co-sponsored by Caritas, ETC, and the Ministry for Social Policy. Because that’s how their brain filters everything.
The solution is not to raise the minimum wage, but the median wage. Our ridiculous wages have led to nothing but further income disparity and the strengthening of the lower classes, when the aim should have been the creation of a real middle class with real disposable income. In the end, Mintoff still lives on.
Wait, wait. Why a new scheme?
Last year I remember Tonio Fenech and Dolores Cristina launching a training course for persons on the minimum wage. They were to receive 100 EUR a month, which I think is actually higher than Caritas’ proposed increase.
I’m under the impression that this scheme was a complete failure – not for lack of effort by the organisers – but precisely because very few minimum-wage earners turned up for these courses.
Which effectively means they were comfortable enough to ‘afford’ losing out on 100 EUR. That I guess would have covered at least the water and electricity bill.
I read this in The Times today:
“Speaking in St Paul’s Bay, Dr Muscat said that the minister could, alternatively, do the right thing and set a date for the debate and vote.
The country, he said, could not be kept hanging especially in view of the death of a person who had been recorded saying he had been beaten up by the police.”
Dr Muscat has a valid point here. I find it most disturbing and frightening that the minister of justice failed to sort out his police force.
It appears that suspects of sex crimes involving a minor are beaten up by the police before any proper investigation is held.
I remember round April 2007 a Pakistani young man was beaten up by arresting police officers, this came to light in court. The magistrate ordered the police commissioner to investigate. I wonder if he investigated the ill treatment of the suspect by his officers.
I recently heard of a man arrested for molesting young boys, during his arrest at home the police officers beat him up severely in his own house before taking him to the police HQ. Is this the correct procedure? As much as these crimes are repulsive, a police officer should be able to control his anger and sentiments.
I think that policemen do not have the right training and temperament in dealing with suspect of sex crimes against juveniles. There is a failure in the police force in this regard.
Suspects of sex crimes deserve to be treated with dignity irrespective of the gravity of their suspected crime.
The drama queen who thinks that lack of sleep leads to colds;
http://www.facebook.com/#!/engerer.cyrus
“Cyrus Engerer
Friday
Good morning everyone. Wish you all a nice sunny weekend. Hope I’ll be ok, lack of sleep is taking its toll and resulting in a cold .”
Careful Cyrus, if you believe in old wives’ tales. It is said that too much playing with oneself makes one blind.
Speaking about the fairy queen at the helm of Super One, this morning I was watching ‘Folji’ on that station and listened to a phone interview with ‘straitjacket-bound Franco’, blabbering about placing third in a survey about potential leaders of the Nationalist Party, and repeating that he came third even though he, unlike Simon Busutill and Mario Demarco, had no backing from the party, or he would have outshone them both, bla bla bla.
Then came the punchline when he said, and I quote,” to summer ice all this…”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kctOpTQtyUg
If Sigmund Freud was still around, he would probably tell us that a long list of friends on Facebook is one of the defensive mechanisms to make good for the small size in other departments.
Jeffrey on his Facebook wall:
WOULD CENSU HAVE A PLACE IN TODAY’S PN? George Borg Olivier used to refer to Censu as his ‘Minister for the Opposition’. He was the epitome of what a loyal politician should be-speaking out where he felt he should, for the good of the party and the country. WOULD HE HAVE ENDED UP SIDELINED AND….WORSE, TODAY? I hope that the Prime Minister, with the help of Simon Busuttil, manages to remold the P.N. back into the inclusive party which drew many of us to it in the past.
Can you imagine Censu Tabone behaving as badly as Jeffrey or Franco?
[Daphne – No, and not just in politics, either. That’s why the word used most repeatedly in his obits was ‘gentleman’, a word that will never be used to describe either Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando or Franco Debono.]
Borg Olivier referred to Censu Tabone as his “Minister of the Opposition” but certainly not in a pejorative way.
In one of the several documentaries I watched these last three days and where the same reference was mentioned, there was also a comment that Dr Tabone spoke his mind, was tough to convince, but that once he saw the merit in whatever was proposed, he supported the initiative with all his strength, always remained loyal to the leader and the Party. And here is the difference between the late ‘gentleman’ and the yahoos of today who place their pompous asses before Party loyalty and before the good of the country.
Sadly, this week we lost two great men. Great not because they had a Nationalist Party connection, or because of looks, status or wealth, but because of their huge tangible contributions to the Maltese society at large.
May both enjoy each other’s company for eternity, along with other all time greats .They certainly would have much to talk about!
The study was only carried out on college students and the conclusions don’t say anything about public figures. For someone to be happy with being a public figure they must be more narcissistic than the general population and there’s nothing wrong with that.
He keeps on pushing people’s buttons it seems…
Alan Deidun’s farewell note to Jeffrey on facebook:
TIME TO DRAW A LINE AND STOP THIS NONSENSE
Dear Jeff, I am de-friending you since it’s the only way to stop this nonsensical tit-for-tat as:
(i) I have already too much valid time, which I should otherwise be dedicating to my family or to work;
(ii) since, contrary to what some of your acolytes are saying, I have no appetite for becoming the leader of any local movement and I feel I have bored people enough with my hogging the limelight so far and
(iii) since I am deeply disillusioned with your actions over the past few days.
Namely, you try to come across as a moderate, level-headed individual who exposes all sorts of extremism in this country and you complain that during the Mistra saga you yourself were the victim of a concerted attack by the PN and others (incidentally I was at Nature Trust at the time when we bestowed the Green Politician of the Year upon you and I never joined the bandwagon in attacking you over the Mistra issue). At the same time:
(i) you recruit the services of Maltatoday and its trademark one-sided reporting in order to support your agenda – yesterday’s despicable piece, in which they relied solely on your claim that I accused you of being pro-abortion, without deigning to check with some of their journalists who had access to my fb wall, will remain in the annals of below-the-belt behaviour; incidentally, since you fit their liberal stance, Maltatoday never take you to task over your inconsistent immigration stance, which verges on racism, something they would surely have picked on if any other common mortal was involved; worth mentioning too is the fact that Maltatoday finally published one of my 3 online replies to their falsity of an article and this only when I threatened to take legal action;
(ii) you seek to instigate the reaction of your acolytes by deliberately twisting my words – for instance, you said yesterday that I referred to individuals whose marriage had failed as ‘spineless’ ones, whilst in actual fact I was referring to those who go with the flow and simply profess liberal views for populist reasons – you know this very well but you never retracted your statement;
(iii) a third signature tactic you resort to is scare-mongering, by harking back to dark ages involving Church-State strife; as a result, you have contributed in no mean way to the public in general being cynical about recent positive initiatives taken by the Curia – for instance, the Church Green Commission – (which has received very little public support so far), since you support the stereotype that being a conservative cannot mean being green at the same time (pigeonholing people at its best)
(iv) I fully believe that you are genuine when you state that ideologies are archaic, since your opportunistic views are neither here nor there, but simply amount to elastic principles which can be relaxed according to needs.
Bottom line Jeff – you love to be in the limelight and that is why I will gladly leave my share of it to you – back to the science now (the real stuff, you know)