Don't Narcissists Care About Hurting You?

 

"Mom Does Not Love. The Things Not Said"

Do narcissists care about hurting you? No. 

Is the reason why narcissists don't care about hurting you have to do with their lack of empathy? Yes.

Is the reason why narcissists dont care about hurting you have to do with their inability to form deep connections and sometimes prioritize your feelings over theirs? Yes.

Is the reason for narcissists' inability to have empathy for you have to do with atrophied parts of the brain, particularly the anterior insula and prefrontal cortex? Yes. 

When you feel distressed, do narcissists interpret your feelings as a nuisance for them? Yes (or a burden, an imposition, or inconvenience). What this link reveals is that your distress fails to trigger a comforting response from them, so you often feel alone with your feelings, that they aren't important to the narcissist. 

   What this link also reveals is that they can also respond with anger or invalidation to your pain. Common responses are also dismissal and minimization, blame and playing the victim so that your attention reverts to them. 

Do narcissists sometimes punish you for feeling hurt? Yes. Reasons why include feeling they are being criticized (narcissists are typically emotionally highly dysregulated, often with rage and indignation, when they feel they are being criticized resulting in narcissistic injury), a feeling that they are losing control of what you do, what you say and how you express yourself which can also trigger narcissistic rage in them, especially if they feel it is hurting their ego or challenging their superiority or ego-inflated narrative, and if you feel hurt because of something they did (because narcissists refuse to be held accountable for anything). 

What are types of punishments narcissists indulge in when you are feeling hurt by them? From the link: they escalate hurting you more as opposed to comforting you. They often stonewall or give you the silent treatment. They often gaslight and then blame-shift. They withold affection. They guilt-trip. They bait you to try to get you to react with anger or shame so that they can call you "the problem". 

What are types of punishments that malignant narcissists indulge in when you are feeling hurt by them? From the link: They often escalate abuse to regain dominance. They do the same kinds of things run-of-the-mill narcissists do, but they tend to be much more destructive, weaponizing everything they think they can, to get you to stop talking about being hurt by them. Escalating rage is common and dangerous in the hands of malignant narcissists.  

Do narcissists ever do double-takes later in terms of abusing you because you felt hurt by them? No. From the link: They are not capable of it because they do not make a point of being perceptive of your perspectives and why you might feel the way you do, plus they don't want to consider it because they find remorse and double takes as a weakness which would compromise their feelings of superiority. 

When you feel you can no longer tell a narcissist how you feel, working out resolutions is not possible. What that link reveals: meaningful dialogue about how you feel requires respect from the other person, and narcissists do not respect people who are hurt by them - they will not consider their own accountability, or any form of perspective-taking to understand where you are coming from. You will get blame-shifting, lack of empathy, and a competition where the narcissist will make it clear that they have to win at controlling you and controlling the narrative, and that your being hurt by them is trying to control them to feel guilt, and a "flawed perspective" of their intentions, the former being another "gaslighting attempt". 

Do narcissists understand that they hurt others, even egregiously? Yes, but they just don't care, and they refuse to react to the harm they cause in a way that is helpful or healing. From the link: they justify hurting you. They put up defenses right away, failing to recognize or verbalize any harm they have caused you. They minimize the impact. They often tell you that you are "over-reacting" or are "too sensitive" or that "your perceptions are flawed" (a type of gaslighting). They may rewrite the narrative and blame you for being hurt by their actions. Some narcissists pretend at feeling remorse to hoover you back or to get you from leaving, but most often they don't mean it. In fact, they refuse to feel any remorse if they feel they can get away with it, and instead of feeling remorse, they may escalate abusing you if they think you are trying to make them accountable. "You need to be punished", "the consequences are --" and naming something that will hurt you, threats to take something from you, would be signs, but that tends to be a malignant narcissist's or sociopath's way as run-of-the-mill narcissists are more careful not to label their punishments, threats, consequences, retaliations, abuses, rages, smear campaigns, discards and silent treatments as punishments, or desires to hurt you, so that they can deny they punished you or tried to hurt you at all if they want you back in the future - it is the ultimate gaslighting and hoovering trick: "Why would you ever think I'd want to punish you or hurt you!? Who do you think I am? You must be crazy to think that!"
   They have little to no capacity to respond in a healthy manner to you being hurt by them, and eventually discussing how they treat you becomes unproductive, if not dangerous for you.  What that link reveals: you are never likely to get an apology and any abuse, punishment or retaliation that you are receiving as it relates to them hurting you is likely to escalate. 

How do covert vulnerable narcissists act when you tell them they hurt you? What this link reveals: Covert vulnerable narcissists overreact to criticism to the point where even mild constructive feedback is perceived as a "humiliating, ego-shattering attack". They can also perceive a criticism as an "absolute rejection." However, most people don't know this because narcissists feel so free to criticize others. 
   How they deal with criticism is different from the way grandiose overt narcissists operate. So it becomes impossible to talk to covert vulnerable narcissists about the slightest hurt or issue you've received from them without severe consequences. Some of those consequences include the DARVO tactic, passive aggressive consequences like the silent treatment, deliberately feigning forgetfulness that it's your birthday or other holiday event, or deliberately slacking on promises they made to you, feigned helplessness, feigned victimhood to avoid accountability, guilt-tripping, trying to make you totally responsible for their moods, the attacks they perpetrate, and their well-being.
   Covert vulnerable narcissists operate from a victim mentality, and the more covert narcissists hurt you, the more they play the victim. This manipulation is to get you serving them, just as it is with all narcissists.
   The manipulation tends to work remarkably well, especially since most people are likely to get into "a rescue mode" and are empathetic. However, it does not work long term, especially as you begin to realize they use the victim card any time you have an issue with their behavior. It becomes more like "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" (seeing the manipulation behind claiming they are a victim). 
   However, they actually really do feel victimized in the moment when you have trouble with their behavior or put boundaries in place, however if they are highly critical of others, they don't believe they are doing any damage to the other person - or they believe it is justified, a pre-emptive self protection, or a justified retaliation for any resistance you may have to their control. 
   With malignant vulnerable narcissism, there tends to be a marked bully-victim cycle as well as a more sudden shift from "nice" to "punishing", from calm to blinding rage, more sadistic consequences for the slightest sense that you may be criticizing them or putting up a boundary, quite a bit more projection (blaming you for all of the sins they commit), and since many of them are violent, they can go from being violent towards you to victim stances ("Why don't you help me?", "Why don't you care about me?"). Malignant vulnerable narcissists can be dangerous.
   It can be hard to tell the difference between vulnerable narcissism from malignant vulnerable narcissism because they both act covertly, but the differences are spelled out HERE. The main way to tell the difference is that there is an element of cruelty, sadism and a definite punishing retaliatory mindset to the malignant type. At any rate, it can be exhausting trying to figure out what type they are without counseling or without researching the different types. If you feel they are trying to punish you or destroy you in some way (career, financially, self esteem, in belonging to a common family or friendship group, or resorting to crimes to hurt you), you are probably dealing with the malignant type (and no, malignant narcissists do not, and cannot change - the chances for "genuine" change are extremely, extremely  low - if they attend therapy, they are likely to revert back to the way they were before with new tools for more destructive behavior).
   Therefore, talking to any form of covert narcissist about anything interpersonal does not make sense, and especially talking about how you feel, or how they have hurt you. We do make mistakes sometimes because we don't always know we are talking to narcissists, but if you get a strong reaction and a victim mentality, you can usually make a bet it is due to covert vulnerable narcissism or malignant vulnerable narcissism, and decide how you will discuss things going forward. 

If a narcissist cannot hear you or treat you with respect after hurting you, who do you talk to? What the link reveals: Mental health practitioners, specialized support groups, trusted friends or family members. 

Is the only thing that keeps narcissists from hurting you more is their image and reputation? Yes, but it is not the only thing that holds them back. What that link reveals: Image and reputation management often come first and are part of every narcissist's obsession, but they also don't like losing the steady stream of narcissistic supply and the role you supply. If they hurt you too much, they realize they will lose you and the control of what you say and reveal about them, and since they are terrified of shame and the exposure of their abusive rageful side, they often opt to not go too far into hurting you. For some narcissists, fear of legal and financial repurcussions can also be part of the picture. 
   Having hesitations about hurting you is not part of a sociopath's make up however, so if they deeply and swiftly escalate hurting you, they are likely to have some Antipersonality Disorder traits. And note: narcissists can go sociopathic, especially if they are deeply enabled by others. One way you tell if you are dealing with a malignant narcissist (a person with both narcissistic and socopathic traits) is that they get narcissistic supply out of raging, frightening, and threatening you, and they tend to show sadism in either speech or deeds. They also let you know they hate you and that you deserve the worst treatment if you do not follow their orders. 
   In other words, be careful, as not all people who show the major traits of narcissism hold back on hurting you, especially if they feel their reputation, as well as the control and domination they have over you, is at stake. 

Narcissists don't care if they hurt their children either, right? Right. What that link reveals:
   Some of the hurt they cause to their children is intentional, and some of it is unintentional. The unintentional hurt they cause comes from being unempathetic, extremely self centered, and egocentric.
   Affection is given as a reward for compliance, and not for who the child is.
   Children feel they are only loved when they perform duties for their narcissistic parent.
   Narcissists will still balk at accountability when their child is hurt, and the narcissistic parent will still alter reality (gaslight their child), blame-shift, mock or rage at the child for being hurt.
   This often means that a child's safety, emotional needs and a child's milestones and accomplishments are often ignored unless the parent can use the milestones and accomplishments to make themselves look good and infallible to others.
   The consequence for a child being parented by a narcissist is that they often feel their feelings and emotions are invisible to their parent, and that they must sacrifice these parts of themselves to serve to their parent. What this link reveals: children often try hard to suppress their emotions and authentic selves, or adopt a "false self" to feel safe with their parent. Note: adopting a false self or mirroring the narcissist's opinions, abuse tactics, ways of relating, and prejudices can create narcissism in the child.
   Children also often adopt hypervigilence and fawning to keep safe.
   They also often feel trauma bonded with their parent too.
   Chronic attempts to reach the parent's perfection standards in deeds and emotions causes deep anxiety, and if they find they can never please their parent, they can develop CPTSD. Once a child develops CPTSD, suppressing emotional expression effects the nervous system and can produce either dysregulated emotions ("emotional storms"), living with emotions alone, dissociation, or emotional numbing (unreactive). 

How about narcissistic leaders of nations? Do they care if they hurt their own populace and the populations of other nations? Not really. What that link reveals: They look at it as "a necessary byproduct or collateral damage in the pursuit of their personal goals." 

How about if you tell a narcissist that it won't make your relationship better to punish you? Will they think about what you said? No. What that link reveals: It will rarely lead to changed behavior or self reflection. They typically believe you need to do the self reflecting, and change your behavior because they look at themselves as "the superior" in most relationships (i.e. the one who controls, dominates, is in charge of telling you what to do, and defining what the relationship is and what they determine are your responsibilities towards them, and any deviation from that is looked upon by them as "your moments of insanity or incompetence" or insubordination).
   They are not out to build a healthy relationship. They are out to control you, and if you tell them that they will make the relationship worse by punishing you, and the trust you have in them disappear, they will use what they know about you in this regard to inflict more pain. 

If you ask the narcissist kindly not to punish you or hurt you, what do they usually do? What that link reveals: they rarely stop the behavior. Instead they view your request as a vulnerability and will generally use DARVO and gaslighting tactics, plus increase the punishments (they look at the request as a boundary you are trying to set with them, and it can lead to narcissistic rage and narcissistic injury, as they feel entitled to control you - as in the scene above, the superiority complex they have assumes that they have a right to control you and dominate your decisions, even about personal boundaries).
   Obviously this can be a major issue for us if they are a malignant narcissist who is a domestic violence offender, a criminal narcissist, a paranoid narcissist who believes everyone is out to either compete with them or hurt them, and narcissists in public offices. 

What do narcissists think they get or achieve when they hurt other people? What that link reveals: They hurt other people to regain or maintain control of you, and to restore their self esteem.
   However, psychologists Dr. Ramani Durvasula and Dr. Les Carter have remarked in their videos that they hurt you to make themselves feel they are better than you, that by making you feel worse, they feel better in comparison. Narcissists are always in some sort of competitive frame of mind, so if they feel better than you do, even if they had a hand in making you feel worse, they feel they have won a "happiness competition". This is also referred to in psychology circles as a "zero sum game". 

Do narcissists ever put in the effort to stop hurting others? It is extremely rare, so no, on the whole they do not. What that link reveals: If they try, it's never really a genuine and sustained effort. They have litlle motivation to change because of their defense mechanisms, lack of emotional empathy, and because they are often deeply enabled by people around them. They also believe they will always get their own way, and that they have the upper hand in most situations. 

Does a narcissist hurt a lot of people during their life? Yes. What that link reveals in terms of who gets hurt the most: romantic partners and spouses, their children, their siblings, and their co-workers. Most narcissists know they cause pain and distress to others, but their makeup is such that they almost always prioritize their own satisfactions and desires over the well-being of others. 

Is it wise to try to leave narcissists who punish you for feeling hurt by them? Yes. What that link reveals: Even though narcissists cannot communicate about issues regarding their hurting or abusing others without resorting to negative reactions like rage and punishing (narcissists know they hurt others, but they aren't in the habit of ever admitting it), leaving narcissists over issues like this can present dangers.
   Initiating a split takes careful planning (I usually suggest domestic violence services to assess the dangers of the particlar person you are trying to leave, like whether they are the malignant brand, and the types of things you should take with you when you leave, as every person's situation is different). Narcissists can't even admit to themselves that they drove you away because you were continually hurt by them, instead resorting to smear campaigns like: "She left because she's crazy and a constant basket case", or "He left because he's selfish and never cared how I felt" (which is a type of DARVO), or "She left because I got tired of listening to her problems". They will never recognize the pain they caused you verbally, but if you return, they will punish you for leaving over the pain you felt (image preservation takes precedence). In other words, they thought you should "shut up and endure the pain without complaint". 

How about when it comes to narcissists feeling pain over something you did? Do they expect you to care about causing them pain when they don't care about causing you pain? Quote from Google AI: "Yes, narcissists expect you to care about their pain while ignoring yours."  Another quote from the same article: "They often demand that you prioritize their feelings, validate their struggles, and comfort their distress while giving up your own." - says it all.

After I came across the answer to the last question, I personally am done with this section, but you are free to pursue your own questions.

SOME FURTHER REPERCUSSIONS OF
NARCISSISTS NOT CARING IF THEY HURT OTHERS
APART TO WHAT IT DOES TO THEIR REPUTATION
AND THEIR ABILITY TO OBTAIN POSITIVE FORMS OF
NARCISSISTIC SUPPLY

What I have written in the previous section mainly has to do with narcisists in relationships with spouses, partners, and children, but when we take this into other types of human-to-human contact, it presents a serious problem. For instance:

* Let us say that a narcissistic person causes a serious car accident. They may not care enough about the occupants of the other car enough to call an ambulance. They may instead, be focused on trying to make the accident appear to law enforcement to be the occupants of the other car at fault entirely.  

* Another situation: A narcissist with sociopathic traits (a malignant narcissist) rises to power and starts an invasion of a neighboring country. Since he does not care about hurting other people, and since with the sociopathic traits he doesn't particularly care what it does to his reputation either, he commits war crimes by killing civilians, even children and babies. 
   However, he does care a great deal if people want to hurt him, so he kills people who he fantasizes want to kill him.
   He has a bunker built that he and his comrades can hide in. Eventually, the war ends because there are too many casualties. The soldiers either defect to the other side or march home despite what some of their commanders tell them to do. In fact, even the commanders start marching home at some point, refusing to fight for the malignant narcissist. 
   Most of the public wants the malignant narcissist out of power. When he is caught in his bunker, he acts like a victim and cries for mercy. 

* Another manifestation: A narcissistic person in the heat of an argument kills his mate in a rage. He didn't mean to kill her. He just wanted to hurt her (and frankly, he went too far in hurting her because his narcissism means he doesn't care if he hurts her). 
   He feels persecuted when a judge holds him accountable. 

Narcissists aren't just bad for their mates and families. They can be parasitic in society. 

FURTHER READING:

Do Narcissists Feel Guilty About Abusing Loved Ones?

It can be hard for people to realize how shallow narcissistic love is. - by Elinor Greenberg for Psychology Today

3 Phrases Narcissistic Partners Use During Conflicts

Words that let them withhold empathy, inflict guilt, and shift blame. - by Erin Leonard, Ph.D., for Psychology Today

SOME VIDEOS ON THIS TOPIC:

Do narcissists know they hurt you? - by psychologist, Dr. Ramani (You Tube)

Proof narcissists KNOW their behavior is unacceptable - by psychologist, Dr. Ramani (You Tube)

Unbound: Why Narcissists Need to Hurt You - by psychologist, Les Carter for Surviving Narcissism (You Tube)

The next two videos are from a Facebook public account (called "No More Narcissists"), and require you to sign into Facebook to see them, but they explain a lot of the issues you will encounter succinctly: 

4 Reasons Why Narcissists Feel Nothing After Hurting You

5 Insane Behaviors That Instantly Identify a Narcissist

FOUND ON FACEBOOK:

The Difference Between Narcissists and Those With Antisocial Personality Disorder: Narcissists Feel Shame and Regret for Hurting Others Even When it Doesn't Have to Do with Empathy, and Antisocial Personality Disordered Do Not

this is part of the series on Shaming

In one of my last posts, I was challenged in the comments section about whether narcissists had any shame, and from there I felt that I needed to write this post, and to feature other posts by other authors and researchers (below), that differentiate between Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Antisocial Personality Disorder. 

In fact, as the title suggests, that's where the dividing line is between the two disorders: Narcissists can feel quite a bit of shame, and can even feel much more of it than other people, and their tactics and abuse don't help them diminish their shame, which increases their shame even more, but the Antisocial (i.e. sociopaths and psychopaths) don't feel regret or shame at all when they hurt other people.

Or they might feel it a little when they are being incarcerated, but it's more like they'll be telling themselves that they committed some act of abuse "stupidly" and that they'll plan it out better next time.  

Why is this significant? Because people with Antisocial Personality Disorder are quite a bit more dangerous and menacing. These are people you should not directly confront - they will never accept, or even hear with an open mind, what you have to say about their behavior. They don't care what you have to say, and they don't have the empathy to care if they hurt other people either. For most of these folks, empathy died for them in their childhood. There are a number of factors that go into why their empathy is so dead, but to keep this post relatively short compared to others I have written, I will be focusing on the difference between them and the narcissists.

One major difference is that they aren't driven by morals or ethics. While your run-of-the-mill narcissist may be low on ethics, most of them don't commit crimes against others, while the Antisocial Personality Disordered folks have no ethics at all, and are likely to be dangerous and hurt people with impunity, with no regrets because of that fact. They are driven by self-serving agendas always, period, and as simplistically as I stated it. Most of them are basically con-men or con-women through and through, exploiting who ever they think they can exploit with as little effort as they think is necessary. They don't care what other people are going through at all. 

In order to make it easier to talk about the Antisocial Personality Disordered types, I will refer to them as psychopaths. Why? Well because Antisocial Personality Disorder has subtypes: primary psychopaths and secondary psychopaths. To confuse you more, secondary psychopaths are often referred to as sociopaths. Primary psychopaths are born with their disorder, and have different autonomic nervous systems (which boils down to the fact that they don't feel fear or trauma when confronted with dangerous situations or of being overwhelmed by the enemy in a battle) and sociopaths are much more influenced by home life and the environment they grew up in, but have the same autonomic nervous systems as the rest of us have. 

Then there are sub-categories of sociopaths, mainly the functional sociopath and the dysfunctional sociopath, but even there, psychologists keep coming up with even more subcategories. 

And to confuse you even more, there is a brand of narcissist called the malignant narcissist. Malignant narcissists have a combination of Borderline Personality Disorder, Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and Antisocial Personality Disorder. They aren't likely to feel much regret or shame either if they hurt other people, though they may pretend to. And that's the problem; they are big pretenders, and they can appear very, very functional except for their rages, manipulations and very commanding, demanding natures. It is hard to tell the difference between malignant narcissists and the psychopaths, and sometimes the difference between malignant narcissists, the run-of-the-mill narcissists, and to some extent, one of the sub-types of Borderline Personality Disorder. Malignant narcissistic traits tend to stand out more than run-of-the-mill narcissists, and like the psychopaths, they don't feel much remorse for hurting others (they tend to engage in domestic violence, some crimes and bullying) and they over-react to anyone who questions their self-appointed superiority and grandiosity with incredible amounts of rage. 

Even with malignant narcissists, there are subcategories: the overt malignant narcissist, the covert malignant narcissist, the vindictive narcissist, the sociopathic narcissist, the dark triad, the dark tetrad, and the dark empath.

In some of my explanations, including the malignant narcissist, I'll be calling them psychopaths. For the malignant narcissist, it's not all that accurate to proclaim them psychopaths, only that they have psychopathic tendencies to a large or small degree, depending on the person. However, like purely psychopathic individuals, they do have traits and proclivities to do harm to others.

But I'm trying to simplify it so that you can be aware of the differences between them as opposed to the run-of-the-mill narcissists who do carry around quite a bit of shame inside them. 

THE DIFFERENCES
(simplistically covered)

Narcissists: primarily ego driven. They put enhancement of their ego above just about everything else and anyone else. A need to appear perfect and superior to others. High need for power, control and domination in personal relationships, a high need to be in powerful decision-making situations or professions. 
Tends to be emotionally abusive or dismissive of anyone who stands in their way of their agendas, including people in their personal lives.
Fairly charming. 
Feels shame and regret, but not in an empathetic way. The shame and regret comes from people finding out that they are not who they are making themselves out to be. It is expressed more as paranoia, and rage at the person who exposed them (so that the person doesn't expose them further).
While you can't appeal to them to be empathetic and to care about the feelings and life situations of others, you can appeal to them in terms of how what they are doing might destroy their reputation since they are reputation oriented. 

Psychopaths: primarily driven to take from others by force, or to bully people into submission. Some psychopaths only target people who they think are "easy" or who they deem to be weak: children, women, the disabled, the elderly, etc. 
Exceptionally charming. 
Feels no shame or regret. They are so driven to take from others, or over-power others, that regret would short-circuit their ambitions. Their attitude is that people are to be used. 

Malignant narcissists: a combination of both agendas.
If male, tends to be domestic violence offenders and child abusers. Very menacing and cruel if they don't get their way. 
Exceptionally charming, two-faced, Jekyll/Hyde personality, can fool others easily, can act the part of being fawning to get what they want.
It is very rare for them to feel shame or regret. Attaining power, control, domination, wealth, and an air of superiority is so overwhelming that they rarely, if ever, consider the feelings of others. If someone tries to get them to consider the feelings of others, they may rage like a narcissist, or punish and get violent like a psychopath. 

THE CHILDHOOD BACKGROUNDS
AND BELIEF SYSTEMS THEY ADOPTED
(simplified)

Narcissists grew up in traumatic environments where there was a lot shaming and blaming going on, and there was likely to be emotional abuse in those environments too, as well as emotional neglect at the very least, if not other forms of neglect. In other words, they tended to have a narcissistic parent with authoritarianism at the center.
     Now narcissists can be plenty exploitative of their children too, just like the psychopaths, because of entitlement issues. Both disorders display entitlement.
     But narcissists are driven by different ambitions than psychopaths. Their ambition is to be thought of as a "superior being" compared to other people around them, to be thought of as "special" with special attributes that only other special people can decipher. Narcissists want to be spoiled with constant praise. They feel they need to compete with others in terms of who can win at beauty or handsomeness, who can win at arguments and debates, who can win at "wealth games", who can win at "head games", who can win at "phoniness" (most of them believe others are as phony as they are), who can win at fooling others, who can win at work through work place bullying, or triangulation, or sweet-talking a boss, and who can win at being thought of as the most charming upstanding citizen, who can win at being thought of as a victim if they don't get their way in their relationships.
     Narcissists are basically in competition all of the time. They wake up with manipulating others in mind, and they go to sleep with thoughts of manipulation in mind too. They don't like the thought of "letting things be". The agenda, in other words, is primarily social: looking and acting superior, trying to get people to listen to them with baited breath, getting lots of positive attention. It is exhausting for the narcissist to put up this front all the time, especially in front of people or children who they deem to be weaker or voiceless compared to themselves. "The mask" falls, and they become abusive to take off steam, especially if they feel that their superiority is being questioned, and they worry that they'll get caught at being abusive, at being phony, that people will see their perfection and superiority as phony too, and that they might have to deal with community shame. 
     Narcissists in their early environment were much more likely to be expected to "fawn to power and control." If you watch them carefully, they will be exceptionally fawning to anyone who has wealth, popularity, fame, and who they believe is "superior" to them. Whereas, they will tend to be abusive to children, the disabled, females, people in poverty, people of a minority race or religion, people who have weight issues, and so on, especially in their close personal relationships. They are very dependent on societal disenfranchisements to tell them who they can pick on and who they have to look up to.
     And because they fawn to power, and were expected to fawn to power when they were children, they expect others in their close personal relationships to fawn over them too when they insist on being dominant and bully others.

As I said above, the psychopath is driven by different agendas. Again, they are con-men through and through, and usually learned to take from others or to impose themselves on others in their childhood environment.
     They tend to grow up in environments where parenting was spotty, or neglectful, or where they had to parent themselves. While some of them are taught ethics, it may have been a situation that was inconsistent, or where the rest of the environment was not particularly ethical (growing up in environments where there is gun violence, war, little adult supervision, a lot of crime, and so on). 
    They can also grow up to be a golden child, where anything they do is enabled, including hurting other people, or being violent.  
     Malignant narcissists and psychopaths tend to be very, very exploitive of children especially, expecting them to do things which take away a child's maturation process, and their dignity and individual selves, to serve the parent. They must be a pretty close version of a mini-me version of their parent to not be abused. The malignant narcissist or psychopath has the fantasy that they are a tyrant king or queen, and that their children are to be either submissive little helper servants or to be abused (and they more or less infer or say outright: "take your pick").
     For malignant narcissists, it is to make their children into narcissistic supply, to puppet them into spouting unequivocally that their parent(s) are "the grandest of the the grand", the all-superior, the all-knowing, the all-wonderful, all-superior beings. And they must promote the idea that they are the all-helpful doting parent(s) too. Or again, the child will be punished. It kind of reminds me of the Turpin family who were unchained and put in matching outfits in public and to smile for the camera, even though they were being starved, lying in their own excrement and abused at home.
     The malignant narcissist who tends to want both social acceptability and to exploit others (having others do work for them while taking credit for it, lying about workers in the workplace to get them fired so that no one will stand in their way of getting to be the boss's only reliable and knowledgeable source, winning a race by disabling their opponent, the extremes of being brought up by a narcissistic parent who put competition before anything else) will manipulate others through terror and rewards to take control of the narrative, to get others to believe them.
     Neither the malignant narcissist nor the psychopath are interested in child welfare, "good practices in parenting 101", treating children with dignity and respect, treating them in age-appropriate ways, encouraging their own personalities and interests to come forward, and unconditional love (they wouldn't even know what this is, and if they did, they wouldn't want it anyway - a mind set on exploitation can't love unconditionally).

Narcissists and malignant narcissists manipulate their children and grown children through rewards and punishments as a way to temper the behaviors and speech of those closest to them, particularly compared to those they feel hierarchically superior to.

I have talked in other posts about how fawning is incredibly unhealthy and traumatic, especially when the fawning is done because of the threats, punishments, blackmail, silent treatments, coercive control, and other forms of abuse by narcissists and malignant narcissists. It is particularly traumatic for children because children learn over and over again that they have to fawn to abuse, any abuse. With normal healthy families, children are taught to have good boundaries and self respect instead, to keep safe, to leave people who abuse. Narcissists teach their children the opposite, and many children are even exposed to narcissists who expect them to apologize to other abusers. They are also at risk of other predators: child molesters, rapists, kidnappers, child abductors and child murderers.  

In the case of the two kinds of narcissists, note that rewards are not benevolence. Benevolence is giving because someone needs help, or is hurting, or is overwhelmed with a life situation, and it requires empathy. Rewards are a manipulation: "I'll reward you for x, y, and z , but if you slip up, the rewards go away." In other words, it's transactional and dependent on something: for scapegoats, whether they can be used for blame, shame and abuse in return for rewards, and for golden children, whether they can uphold a perfect, superior image of the parent (this is what they are rewarded for). Narcissists learn early on that people, and especially young children, can be manipulated and molded very easily with the reward/punishment tactic, and they use it for the entire life of that child, into old age if necessary. This can and is of detriment to themselves, and often their images are at stake because of it too, so there is a backfire built in to all of it. Rewards and punishments are used by them for self-serving purposes only, and not for their children.

In contrast, psychopaths tend to manipulate through terror primarily. They also tend to choose victims who they deem to be more powerless than others, who are hurting, vulnerable or alone than others because they feel they are easier to prey upon, and get things from. They aren't going to reward if they can, at all, help it. They don't care about impressing unless they feel they have to in order to exploit, and take advantage of. 
     Their agenda also tends to be less about shaming than just taking, unless they are malignant narcissists. In contrast, run-of-the-mill narcissists love to shame because their agenda is more social than material, to appear as someone to worship, look up to, to have power and control so that they don't ever have to fawn to power and control themselves as they did as children. They get the feeling that power and control is all that matters. 
     Psychopaths get the feeling that only money, material things, property and forcing themselves on others are all that matter, and that they don't have to work for them because others who work are an easy mark. "They have too much and can share, so I will take ..." 

In fact, all narcissistic, malignant narcissistic and psychopathic parents will have a "me first" agenda and attitude when it comes to how they relate to their children. The psychopathic parent will just be more "me first" than the others (i.e. all of the time) than narcissistic parents.
     If you are a child who grew up with any of these parent types, you are either going to be a "hurting mess", feel trauma-bonded and imprisoned by your parent, and have trauma symptoms, or you are going to have the coping skills of another Cluster B, one being another "rewarded" immature narcissist who fawns to power, and abuses the powerless.

One reason why psychopaths become so dangerous is that they believe that by hurting others, or threatening others, that it will bring the reward of submission of the other person they are abusing every single time. They don't think of any other ways to deal with others other than to "charm and harm." And if they don't get submission, they keep hurting the other person, and escalating the pain that the other person is in, more and more and more, sometimes to the point of outright torture. 

We see this in leaders of countries who invade other countries without provocation too, who commit atrocities in order to make a population submit (i.e. fawn to being overtaken). 

They don't worry about accountability, or of getting caught, or paying for their aggressions, or even concern themselves with a societal reputation because they are so arrogant and really do believe they will never get caught, ever. They believe they will get away with their abuses and terrorizing over, and over, and over again, indefinitely. Some of them play "catch me if you can" games and cat-and-mouse games with police to assure themselves they will never be caught, that they can even win with law enforcement hunting them down, surveillance, DNA evidence, and teams of agents brainstorming where and when they will make their next move.

Likewise, tyrannical invading psychopathic leaders who commit atrocities also do not believe they will ever be held accountable either, that they can wear any opposition down. Most will always believe they have more power and destructive capabilities than anyone who confronts them.

But it is also their arrogance and the feeling they have rights to aggress upon people, and their property, that cause them to make blunders. 

Here is an illustration of what can go on:

The psychopath: "How can I get money and material things, and wealth, and servitude from this situation? How can I fool people out of what they have?"

Malignant narcissist: "How can I get money and material things, and wealth, power, control, domination, and most of all, most everyone's attention on me, and get the admiration from the rich and powerful? How can I make others serve me to these ends? What connections do I have to have, and how much do I have to lie about my status to ensure that this happens? How much lying do I have to do to remain on top at all times, or at least give the appearance that I'm on top? How much blame-shifting and gaslighting do I have to do to keep my status as 'top dog'. How much fawning do I have to do to the rich and powerful? How much threatening of the peons do I have to do?"

The run-of-the-mill narcissist: "How can I get attention, admiration, get to be known as a superior likeable charming person who would never harm anyone or compete with anyone? How can I get power, control and domination over others? How unselfish do I have to appear to be? How much of myself do I have to hide, how much fawning do people expect of me, how much do I have to reveal about myself to get what I want, how much empathy do I have to pretend to have, how many people do I have to lie to, how many people do I have to pretend to be empathetic towards, to be accepted as one of them, how many people do I have to reward for putting me on a higher hierarchy or pedestal, how many people do I have to discard or hurt to get what I want?" - you can see that this kind of narcissist would care a lot about how other perceive him or her, and why they are vulnerable to shame and regrets, and why the other two types aren't as much.

The shame and regrets, by the way, have nothing to do with empathizing. It has to do with their standing in social circles and in society, and how much their standing is rising or falling. They feel they cannot manipulate people if it is falling.

One of the reasons your plain envelope narcissists hate their scapegoats is because scapegoats are usually not so quiet and they know first hand that the grandiosity is false, and that there is an abuser underneath. Some of them do not have the incentive to stay quiet either. They know that no one ever had a law changed, or helped the abused, disenfranchised and downtrodden by being quiet. They know they aren't going to help themselves by being quiet either. Societal changes, in large part, mean going against what narcissists and psychopaths want, and are getting away with, and getting rid of their loopholes including coercive control, corporal punishment of children, silencing the opposition to abuse, and reducing or eliminating assault weapons (mass murders are overwhelmingly committed by young collapsed narcissists, malignant narcissists who are negative on others and have significant prejudices, malignant narcissists who also have other personality disorders like Paranoid Personality Disorder, obsessed psychopaths, and Paranoid Schizophrenics, none of which can easily be detected, even the paranoid schizophrenics because most of them don't get symptoms or show mental illness until their twenties at the earliest). 

Anyway, the narcissist, the malignant narcissist, and the secondary psychopath learned in childhood (from it being modeled by a parent or other authority figure) how to be this way. The likelihood that they will pass this down to at least one child is very high. 

This is very simplistic, but when I get to adding to the list of the rest of the Cluster B personality-disordered (I only have the primary psychopath at the present time), I will talk much more about how childhood influenced them.

BREAKING THE LAW

All of the types I mentioned will break traffic laws, and they tend to be obnoxious entitled drivers. Speeding, going significantly over the speed limit cutting other cars off, making dangerous moves like going from a third or fourth lane to make a quick exit on to an exit ramp, speeding on bumpy country roads where there are children and farm animals, aggressive driving, and blaming accidents on other drivers is usually par for the course, especially when they are in their twenties, thirties and forties, but it tends to still be their mode of operandi when they are older than that too, if less so. 

Run of the mill narcissists tend not to break the law when it comes to hurting other individuals. They are rarely violent, choosing to use emotional, psychological, proxy, and financial abuses to achieve their ends. If they are accused of abuse, they will usually tell others that their victims are crazy. When it comes to breaking the law, they will break laws that won't incarcerate them. Instances are: carrying illegal drugs, going swimming on beaches that have "No Swimming" signs, smoking in designated "no smoking" rooms, jay walking, purposely ignoring "no trespassing signs", nude swimming on beaches that are designated for swimsuits and families, the smaller illegal activities and crimes in other words.
     When they abuse, it is usually ego driven. They want flattery, even when other people are having issues with them. 
     They tend to be hypocrites, and will not treat others the way they demand to be treated. 
     They are "terrible listeners" because everything you say will be filtered by them in terms of how your message will influence them, what it will do for their ego and what it won't do, what is in it for them, and some childhood background issues: not believing in the truth because the truth was not practiced in the childhood home, not believing in what you say because they are so agenda driven to get power and control and figure everyone around them is too, and so on. So whether you are silenced by them, or whether they listen to you, they aren't going to hear what you have to say regardless, even if you try to get them to understand you. They live in their own reality, and they also don't care what you have to say beyond how things effect them. If you feel like you are talking to a dense brick wall, it has to do with the narcissist's selective hearing.  

Male malignant narcissists tend to be domestic violence offenders. They get in your face, they rage in your face, they grab you, they can push you around without your permission, and otherwise aggress upon you in a physical manner, which very often leads to physical attacks: punching, tripping, slamming you into the wall, and so on. They think that if they are in enough of a rage or angry, that they have a right to act in this manner even though it is against the law and you are both adults.
      If they do commit domestic violence and are confronted by authorities, their favorite thing to say is: "She made me do it."
     Some of them engage in false imprisonment or trying to isolate you from the empathetic people in your life. If they can't do it through persuasion, they will try to do it financially, or disabling your car, or losing your keys on purpose, and other kinds of motives to keep you in some sort of state of bondage to them.
     If this is a partner relationship, they are very suspicious of you, where you go, what you tell others, if you are trying to escape, if you might be thinking of an affair, and so on. This is especially true if they have had affairs on a partner themselves. Malignant narcissists cheat on you as a way to ensure they have another love relationship to go to if you aren't acting like a puppet, or if you leave. It's just one way they like rubbing your nose in the fact that they don't need you as their partner, that you aren't special.  
     Child abuse tends to be more severe than the run-of-the-mill narcissists too, with child exploitation, lots of gaslighting, absurdly long and pointless silent treatments and infantilizing lectures (lectures meant for a child much younger than the child is), and "child discipline", a lot of it lasting well past childhood, and almost always accompanied by shaming, and verbal abuse. Tearing down a child's self esteem is mostly part of the picture too with at least one child (usually their designated scapegoat child).
     Children are often "silenced" when the malignant narcissist does not want to hear anything that is not in line with how they want to see things, and what they want to believe, or that alters their perception of other people or phenomenon. They like to be the authorities on speech and knowledge, and that goes for what "the truth is" too, even if what they believe or are spouting isn't the truth. This is one reason they are prejudiced, either on a personal level against a number of people, or on a societal level. It tends to be both, each influencing the other.   
     Like all narcissists they insist that they appear faultless, except with a capital "F". They will not tolerate being blamed for anything, even when they commit illegal acts. They can and do react with violence to being blamed, especially if the one confronting them is their child or partner. You are "supposed to" believe what they want you to believe, and you are pressured via rewards and punishments to go along with their beliefs in every facet of life. And we wonder why therapists, psychologists and psychiatrists tell their patients to get away and stay away from malignant narcissists as soon as they can.
     The "you have to's" don't end there, however. Malignant narcissists also often tend to be micro-managers, and don't ask you permission to be that, even if you are both adults. They just aggress themselves upon you in that way. "Take out the garbage! Do this, do that!" If you counter them, they go into a rage. Let's say that you feel sick during one of their micro-managements, they are likely to shout, "You aren't sick! Get out there and do it now!" - and from that you can also tell that they don't deal with reality. They make it pretty clear that they can't deal with excuses, no matter how relevant the excuses are. 
     They are bullies, using their status, or power to order you around. If they fail miserably at ordering you around, they treat you with contempt or violence or a discard. 
     This means that relationships with malignant narcissists aren't really relationships. They are a drill sergeant or terrorist ordering you around, and for you it is a test of endurance only, until you either break from the trauma bond, or if you leave, or if you call authorities. 
     It is common to have trauma symptoms or PTSD if you relate to malignant narcissists in any long term way.  
     They very rarely confess their wrongs unless there are some social benefits for them in doing so. For instance, some of them start channels on You Tube because You Tube pays them if they have enough of an audience. But aside from that, most of them do not admit to any wrong, and if anything, will blame their victims time and time again.
     They tend to break other laws and codes of conduct because they are also driven by what psychopaths are driven by, plus what narcissists are driven by. If they have more psychopathy than narcissism, they will insist that joint property be theirs entirely, or mostly, and if property or money belongs to others, they will insist to themselves that they have to have it. They don't have the ethics to care how these attitudes effect others, or the empathy to care how it effects others either. They'll say things like, "All that you care about is stuff and money!" (showing projection of how they behave) or "You need to stop thinking about what you've lost and enjoy life!" (trying to persuade you not to notice what they are taking from you).
     Home invasion is not out of the question for malignant narcissists, even though it carries huge risks. It's part of the psychopathy part of malignant narcissism.
     On the world stage, malignant narcissists love to invade other countries, including invading citizens' houses, and taking their belongings and farm land. It's usually a "bloody war" where they try to take over as much as they can by killing as many people as they can too. If they succeed, they are often on to invading the next country on their list of "places to own". They really feel that this will catapult them into a "great memorable leader status."   
     They have little to no regret for hurting other people, believing that people should fawn to their authority. They will keep hurting others if they feel they can get away with it, depending on how much psychopathy they have compared to narcissism.
     They also won't care too much what their reputation is if the psychopathy is more pronounced than their narcissism. One way to tell is if they are more "loner" than wanting to be around others, and to impress others.  

Psychopaths are a lot like malignant narcissists, except that they don't really care about their reputations that much, unless having a reputation can help them acquire more property, wealth, sex and material things. Either way, they tend to be more secretive, master-minding plans to achieve more and more wealth. They are extremely driven to take from others, and to get others to serve them, with the more functional psychopaths using more societally acceptable means to get there, and the more dysfunctional psychopaths resorting to petty theft, and sometimes graduating to home invasion, grand larceny, burglary, assault, aggravated assault, rape, etc. 
     It's hard to get people to part with their money, children, property or things without crimes being committed. So the functional psychopath has thought of ways around those loopholes. And what profession attracts functional psychopaths the most?
     Venture capitalism. There are a lot of psychopaths who are venture capitalists. When big companies fail or start to falter, one of the reasons they start to falter and fail is that they have capital shortages. The owners or CEOs of these companies look to venture capital firms to keep the company going. But most often, venture capitalists try to take them over and force huge "discount sales" of inventory to raise cash. In some instances they sell merchandise at such a discount that it costs more to make the merchandise than what they are selling it for. Then the venture capitalists have a liquidation sale and close the business. The venture capitalists walk away with millions, and occasionally billions. 
     And all kinds of sectors are played with to enrich a few while destroying otherwise sound and needed businesses, and can include loaning institutions, housing, consumer goods and supplies, banks (credit default swaps, quantitative easing, and other tactics including lobbying for less regulation) ... in other words, the emphasis is on money much more than on society, relationships, and taking care of relationships.
     All psychopaths sacrifice relationships, and even benefits for the society they are living in, for an insatiable appetite for more money and property for themselves.
     So many of the shows out today glorify psychopaths including The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, Billions, and Yellowstone to name a few. I really liked Outlander until the main character, a man in this case, was tortured and raped over a few episodes by a psychopath. Television is actually so flooded with shows about psychopaths, and their sadistic acts, that you can't possibly watch all of them, even if you wanted to. And in those shows, the victims are barely considered, barely a character. Even if we look at history shows like Ken Burn's The American Buffalo on PBS, it is likely that psychopaths killed the herds down to only 27 buffalo from hundreds of millions of them through what is now known as The United States (murder and making money are very much a psychopath's calling - they don't have ethics; they don't have compassion or empathy; they don't care who it effects or if it leaves people starving; they are always going to justify taking in ways that are purely destructive, and in this case their excuse for such destruction was "to solve the American Indian problem" - horrible!).
     How can featuring and glorifying psychopaths to the extent that our media companies are, going to  lead to peace, such that invasions are intolerable, that school shootings and other mass murders are intolerable, that money mixed with murder is intolerable? Are we becoming numb to what psychopaths do to us and just accept them and their deeds forever?
     On a personal level, psychopaths threaten or practice egregious forms of abuse against their siblings while at the same time spouting false narratives about their siblings so that the parents will believe the psychopath is the victim, and leave their entire inheritances only to the psychopath. They tell bosses false narratives about anyone who they feel threatened by, in terms of dedication and talent, so that the boss is left with no one but the psychopath to lean on in making sure the business runs smoothly (but it won't). They steal money from businesses if they can get away with it. As bosses, they are tyrannical and expect people to be total puppets. They tend to fire a lot of people. They tend to be divorcees unless a spouse lets them order them around. They try to make everyone except themselves seem like money grubbers, only obsessed with what they can gain out of a situation, because they are like that.
     Psychopaths rarely tell the truth about anything because they are so focused on "getting something" out of every situation that truth is inconvenient to that ambition. 
     Are psychopaths charming? Yes, they are, probably a lot more than any of the other Cluster Bs. But again, whether it is charm or harm you are getting from them, every single conversation and encounter is going to be "me" oriented, or it is going to be fluff or fawning that they feel they have to endure until they can get "the goods". 
     
You can see why the secondary types of psychopaths might be produced by narcissistic parents who try to exert power and control via constant rewards and punishments. The rewards and punishments don't end in childhood either. 
         

LYING

Run-of-the-mill narcissists primarily lie about things that will prop their ego: that their IQ is higher than it actually is, that their school grades were more admirable than they actually were, that many men asked to marry them when only two of them did, that they received awards for good citizenry when they actually didn't, and so on. 
     They are going to be lying for ego-related reasons. 
     And they will hate and often reject anyone who finds out otherwise. This is how narcissists are exploitive. They demand flattery, and if you don't give it to them, you're "out". However, they are hyper-critical of others, and often like breaking the self esteem of others. Go figure. That kind of entitlement is part of the disorder, and everyone who is close to them will see it eventually. 
     They will lie about what great parents they are, and sometimes manufacture events that never happened. Often they put down their spouse, even when they aren't an x, to make themselves look like the hero in every situation. 
    They can't stand to be in any kind of relationship where the other person isn't flattering them constantly, or at the very least, isn't doing enough to prop them up into some superior position, whether that is at work, at home giving them power and control over you, or in their friendship circles. 
     They are so focused on that, that hardly anything else really matters to them, even their own children and spouse unless their children and spouse are acting like the flattering marionettes they were trained to be through rewards and punishments. 
     These standards were probably multi-generational. Children of narcissistic multi-generational families aren't valued or loved for intrinsic reasons (i.e. for who they are), only for extrinsic values (whether they can make the family look good, whether they have admirable professions, whether they are wealthy, whether they flatter authority figures, and so it goes down the generations).
     Most narcissistic families are also authoritarian families who tell the younger generations what to do with themselves and their lives, what to say to whom, and who to accept and not accept in terms of their relationships, and it is life-long, even if it is not in the best interest of the member. If the member doesn't go along with the authoritarian, and tries to explain why it is not a good idea (perhaps they are being abused by another family member, or do not want to be part of the family business), they can be marginalized or ostracized to teach them a lesson as to what happens if they don't go along with what an authoritarian wants, including a false narrative that an authoritarian is trying to get many others to believe. Very unhealthy, very heartbreaking, if not totally toxic. 
     So budding narcissists who are still children learn that they have to be "special" and "superior" because of those circumstances, or they won't be accepted or acceptable, thus all of the posturing, lying about their credentials, lying about how much money they have, lying about how prestigious their job is even if it is not, lying about being good friends with whoever is rich and famous, pretending to be much more than they actually are. They were not accepted by an authority figure for themselves in childhood, or their sibling wasn't, so they try to be accepted through distortions, false narratives and outright lies. 

     Narcissists are quite vulnerable to psychopaths, as psychopaths can, and do flatter them to get what they want. And since narcissists are known to need a lot of flattery, and reward for flattery, they can be caught unawares when they "get taken" and the psychopath leaves them high and dry.  
     They tend to lie less than the other two types I discuss next, however. 
     

Malignant narcissists lie out of habit to get what they want socially and in terms of wealth and property. 
     Again, it depends on whether they are more narcissist or more psychopath as to what they will lie about. 
     One favorite phrase of malignant narcissists and psychopaths is "I would never lie to you." 
     Since they are such phonies (while tearing up people behind their backs), they sincerely believe that everyone is a phony, and they often accuse others of being phonies. 
     Thus no one can get very close to them because "no one is home" in terms of them having a reliable personality type. They have drives certainly, but they use others' personalities and mirroring to get what they want. As children, they may have felt that they had to do it to survive, and when it worked to get them what they wanted, they kept using it. 
     Flattery won't necessarily work on malignant narcissists; they don't trust anyone. However, they may not show their distrust. 
     It is possible that malignant narcissists grew up in a similar style to run-of-the-mill narcissists, but I bet you anything that someone in that environment was being threatened and terrorized, whether it was another child or their other parent.
    To illuminate your understanding of malignant narcissists and their ties to how secondary psychopaths grow up, the dysfunctional types of psychopaths usually are exposed to quite abusive, traumatic, crime-ridden, or war-like environments, so this would be the added element to the way run-of-the-mill narcissists grew up. Perhaps they felt they needed to steal food, or others' belongings to sell.
     Secondary functional psychopaths can grow up in environments where "money is everything" to the point where how you attain it can be unethical. For instance, they commit white collar crimes. Or they are 22 when they inherit money, and they buy a slum apartment building and live off of the income and become quite wealthy from other people's poverty. The poverty, of course, would be blamed on the tenants solely, rather than looking into whether the culture or society contributed to it. They become anaesthetized to the suffering of others, and they learn to be unempathetic in all relationships to the suffering of others. 
     Malignant narcissists lie to aggrandize themselves, to sully the reputation of others, to get money, property, power, control, and domination over others. And they tend to lie a lot. They lose people in the process of doing all of this and move on to the next person to take advantage of them without remorse too, and without empathy for the next person's life they have destroyed. 
     Malignant narcissist men are known for committing domestic violence, and even if they have put someone in the hospital they will lie about how their partner fell down the stairs, or crashed into a tree, or hurt themselves in some manner, anything to keep from being accountable. 
     They use people, lie about people, lie to people, all with a lot of deadly charm. They can sadistically laugh at everything they are getting away with, and do. They can come across as huge fawners, flatterers, sensitive little boys or girls who cry for show when others have had enough, whereas when they are with people who they deem to be weak, they act like terrorists, bullies, tyrannical bosses, micro-managers, and insulting contempt-filled megalomaniacs, and in close personal relationships can graduate very fast into being physical abusers. 
     They don't have regrets about hurting other people because they have been brought up in a hierarchical way where the weak get abused and the powerful are the abusers. If they think they can get more power, control and wealth by being a bully, they will keep escalating bullying to get ever more power, control and wealth. Again, it doesn't matter how they get it; it only matters that they attain it.
     That's why they don't care about anyone but themselves: their whole system is about getting rewards from bullying and disenfranchising, period, by pretending and lying to get others to go along with them, including how to get help bullying others. 
     On the larger scale, this is why malignant narcissistic tyrannical leaders can go into another country and commit atrocities. It only matters that they "get" what ever property and wealth that exists in the countries they invade. They do not care about the people, or populations they destroy in the process, not even the number of people they are hurting and traumatizing - the psychopathy part of them gets off on the acquiring of other people's property and territory, and the narcissistic side believes they will be worshipped and held up as great fearless forceful leaders who got their country more territory, more wealth and who crushed a population of rebels. 
     And all of how they "get" it is based on lying about the people they are invading, and false narratives to soldiers in the trenches as well as their own country-men, and self aggrandizement that is left from their deeds. 
     Like the run-of-the-mill narcissists, they will only listen to fawning sycophants and flatterers. 

As for the psychopath, the loner types of psychopaths who don't trust people who flatter, or who fawn ...  These psychopaths know they aren't trustworthy when they fawn, so they don't trust others who fawn either. 
     "What are you trying to do here!? Are you trying to get something from me?!" - this is how some of them think, if they are flattered. So if you flatter someone and get an aggressive hostile response, consider that they may be a psychopath. 
     The dysfunctional psychopaths can be loners and tend to be alone when they plan their misdeeds or crimes because they assume they aren't liked. 
     Dysfunctional secondary psychopaths tend to grow up in abusive homes, and in crime-ridden neighborhoods, or in full time traumatic situations. Often there is very little parenting, ethics aren't enforced or introduced; it's like a free-for-all where they do what compels them to do. Without an adequate background of care and concern for their well-being, or the well-being of others that the psychopath is pursuing, they are going to choose the easiest path to obtaining money, wealth, and property. 
     The more functional psychopaths, however, who grew up in financially stable situations, but who were neglected or ignored in other ways, can also grow up with the feeling that they can do anything that compels them to acquire wealth, or what ever they want including sex by force. They are also not likely to grow up with ethics either, or they were modeled unethical behaviors so much that they don't care about how their behaviors impact others. 
     They also lie and plan to obtain what ever it is they want to attain, no matter what it does to the lives of others.  
     Because they are so singularly driven to exploit, if you confront them, and try to stop their aggressions towards others, they will project it all back on to you and use shame, contempt, rage, manipulation, abuse and sometimes even violence to get you to stop confronting them. Any time you  confront a sociopath, you will "pay" (as in their revenge against you) for having confronted them, challenged them, or questioned them and their motives. You are not supposed to see their motives or agendas, so their retaliations will be pretty extreme. 

That is all I have to say on this subject for now. I will discuss fawning to abuse more in other posts, as it causes much more trauma than other forms of trauma reactions ... It is necessary to know about in terms of healing, in terms of holding those who traumatize accountable for causing it, and hold politicians accountable for passing laws that protect its citizens from violence and abuse, so that we can all live in a world of more peace and empathy.

The further reading section below goes more thoroughly into the differences. The posts in the "recommend" categories explain some things that I have not covered in this post.  

FURTHER READING

Recommended: Sociopath Vs. Psychopath Vs. Narcissist: What Is the Difference? - by  Hailey Shafir, LCMHCS, LPCS, LCAS, CCS, and reviewed by Rajy Abulhosn, MD for Choosing Therapy

My note: this is a thorough article, and more importantly tells you how to deal with people with personality disorders: avoid, talk about "information" types of topics, choose public spaces, stay off of personal topics, etc. 

Recommended: Narcissist or Psychopath—How Can You Tell? (We hear the terms all the time, but what is the difference?) - by Joe Navarro, M.A., and former FBI Counter Intelligence Agent, reviewed by Jessica Schrader for Psychology Today

Recommended: Is There A Psychopath, Sociopath, Or Narcissist In Your Life? How To Know - by Brianne Hogan for the Scary Mommy website (includes interviews with Sterlin Mosley)

Recommended: Sociopath vs. Narcissist: What's the Difference? - by Elizabeth Plumptre, medically reviewed by David Susman, PhD for Very Well Mind

Sociopath Vs. Narcissist: Understanding the Difference - by Renee Skedel, LPC and reviewed by Kristen Fuller, MD for Choosing Therapy

Basic Differences Between Psychopathy & Narcissistic Personality Disorder [Part I] - by Rhonda Freeman, Ph.D. for Neuroinstincts

Married to a Narcissist or a Psychopath? - by the administrators of Rich in Relationship

Psychopath, Sociopath or Narcissist — How To Spot The Difference (No — they’re not all serial killers the way they are portrayed in movies.) - by Kim Mia for Medium.com

Antisocial Personality Disorder - by the administrators of the Mayo Clinic

How to Tell If Someone Is a Psychopath - by Laura Dorwart and medically reviewed by Michael MacIntyre, MD for Very Well Health

Recommended: The #1 Myth About Psychopaths and Malignant Narcissists: What People Get Wrong About These Types - by Shahida Arabi, MA, for Psych Central

Recommended: Why psychopaths cannot love their own children, according to a psychologist - by Lindsay Dodgson for Business Insider

Real-life psychopaths actually have below-average intelligence - by Jessica Hamzelou for New Scientist

How to Stay Mentally Strong When You're Dealing With a Psychopath at Work (Working alongside a toxic person will take a toll on your psychological well-being. These strategies can reduce the damage.) - by Amy Morin for Inc.com

8 Common, Long-Lasting Effects of Narcissistic Parenting (What happens when you live in the shadow of a narcissistic parent?) - by Craig Malkin Ph.D., reviewed by Kaja Perina for Psychology Today

Narcissistic Obsession with Attention (The most important person in the life of a narcissist is the narcissist.) - by Kristy Lee Parkin Ph.D., reviewed by Gary Drevitch for Psychology Today

Narcissistic Men and Their Mothers (Why selfish mothers tend to raise selfish sons.) - by Berit Brogaard D.M.Sci., Ph.D, and reviewed by Kaja Perina for Psychology Today

Subtypes of psychopathy: proposed differences between narcissistic, borderline, sadistic, and antisocial psychopaths - by by Carolyn Murphy and James Vess

Why Do Narcissists Feel So Entitled and Why are They So Rebellious?

ENTITLEMENT

According to the Help Guide article Narcissistic Personality Disorder:

Sense of Entitlement:
Because they consider themselves special, narcissists expect favorable treatment as their due. They truly believe that whatever they want, they should get. They also expect the people around them to automatically comply with their every wish and whim. That is their only value. If you don’t anticipate and meet their every need, then you’re useless. And if you have the nerve to defy their will or “selfishly” ask for something in return, prepare yourself for aggression, outrage, or the cold shoulder.

Entitlement is one of the major signs and symptoms of Narcissistic Personality Disorder (that whole article is worth reading if you are new to studying narcissism).

If you have a disagreement with the narcissist, expect that they will leave you with a list of demands that they expect to be fulfilled. If you don't fulfill them, you will be given the cold shoulder and they will try to smear your reputation and character. While it is extremely hurtful, don't take it personally - realize that it is part of their disorder.

Dr. Ramani Durvasula (whose video I have inserted below) makes a very good case that a narcissist's sense that they deserve entitlements that others do not deserve, has a deep connection to why they are not empathetic. I recommend it even though it's for narcissist's ears to hear, not their victims.  

In most relationships with narcissists, make-ups aren't a mutual effort. They expect you to make all of the efforts and overtures (that's often the first time you see their entitlement). If you don't do it, most of them just give you the silent treatment and try to sully your reputation. It is their way of showing you contempt for not doing as they please. Most of them go on to someone new who they think will better serve their needs. Usually that is as far as it goes. 

However, it can go much further where they are dangerous to you: stalking, threats, threats of physical or social harm, sexual abuse, financial threats and financial abuse, demands that put you in danger, kidnappings or false imprisonment, murder. 

You won't know how dangerous they are. It depends on their personal make-up and how distracted they are with their new source of narcissistic supply. It also depends upon whether they get similar narcissistic supply that they used to get from you. And it depends on how enraged they become over time about the contact or lack of contact you give them (a warning: they usually aren't happy with either so it is usually a no-win situation).

When they are "supply deficient", when their grandiosity is going through incredible challenges, when they are being called upon to deal with any kind of shame-related or illegal activities that they perpetrated, when they have expressed violent behavior in the past (with peers, or children, or animals), they can become dangerous. If you don't know enough about the violence or illegal activities they perpetrated in their past, the advice is to usually plan an exit, to stay away from them and keep law enforcement in the loop by keeping a record of aggressive texts, e-mails, conversations and actions. Talk to a domestic violence counselor and to police if you think you may be in danger.

Which is to say that their entitlement to initiate punishments and afterwards to receive apologies, attention, for you to be obedient towards them and their wishes, to put up with their abuse can become quite harmful and happen in ways you do not expect.

But ... while they seem fine without you, and even try to promote a separation, there can be a double bind: they usually hate to be ignored. According to the Healthline article, What Is Narcissistic Rage, and What’s the Best Way to Deal with It?

Narcissistic rage is an outburst of intense anger or silence that can happen to someone with narcissistic personality disorder ...

... We all desire attention and admiration from the people around us.

But people with NPD may react with narcissistic rage when they aren’t given the attention that they feel they deserve.

This rage may take the form of screaming and yelling. Selective silence and passive-aggressive avoidance can also happen with narcissistic rage.

Most episodes of narcissistic rage exist on a behavior continuum. On one end, a person may be aloof and withdrawn. Their goal may be to hurt another person by being absent.

The next article I'll present to you basically says the same thing with the caveat that it's a no-win situation for you if you ignore them (when they go silent and you accept the silence between you) or when you engage with them (which is likely to bring out their overt rage and the demand that you give into them): What Happens When You Ignore a Narcissist? According to 8 Experts by the editors of Up Journey: 

How will a narcissist react to being ignored:
If you ignore a narcissist and deny them their source, they may become enraged and try even harder for your attention – especially in ways that can be toxic or abusive. Ignoring a narcissist will enrage them because of their fragile egos. They’ll feel humiliated and lash out against you to protect themselves.

So for all intents and purposes, narcissists who hurt you by rejection and moving on to have a relationship with someone else, who forget about you or don't bother with you any more are a blessing compared to narcissists who become continually enraged that they didn't get what they wanted or expected to get from you (who are more likely to become dangerous). By the time you are discarded and they have moved on, perhaps you are exhausted from trying to please the impossible-to-please narcissist anyway. It certainly won't seem like a blessing at the time, but it can certainly be one later on as you realize that they were only in the relationship with you to attain more and more power, control and domination over you, and basically run your life.

However, if you are involved with a narcissist who is continually becoming enraged (or conversely hoovering and stalking you) over being ignored, what do most domestic violence counselors suggest that you do? 

Most domestic violence counselors will be making suggestions that will keep you safe. A good domestic violence counselor will always make that their first priority. So the general advice is to accept the silent treatment, move on with your life, and if they become enraged to the point where they "punish you" for not giving into them (giving them what they want), these counselors tend to advise getting law enforcement involved. Stalking, harassment (including unwanted communications from them), threats, stealing, slander (smear campaigns), restraining you, financial abuse, false imprisonment, attempted murder, attempted violence and physical abuse are all illegal. Eventually all states in the United States are likely to have coercive control laws to add to this list too. You have rights to peace, boundaries and safety and to not be controlled and manipulated by someone else. Note: people who are controlling in a close personal relationship usually have narcissistic traits. I encourage you to look at the other traits they tend to exhibit (some of them are listed on the right side of this blog) to make a determination if that is who you are dealing with.

A lot of blogs having to do with narcissistic abuse (like the one I found here that is a great blog in terms of what happens when narcissists try to dismantle your reputation and life, but not a good one in terms of keeping safe). These kinds of articles will tell you to keep ignoring the narcissist as he or she ramps up the attacks via smear campaigns, however ignoring them also means they are ramping it up without resistance - quite abusive and dangerous. Abuse always escalates, and most of the time it continues to escalate whether you are talking to them or not. Smear campaigns are just abuse-by-proxy. So resorting to a strategy where you are just ignoring them and their aggressive behavior (or their passive aggressive behavior) and the problems and attacks they are perpetrating in your life are often not a great idea. Always remember that ignoring them (even if they are the ones who originally initiated a silent treatment or discard) can mean that their narcissistic rage is deepening into an obsession, to the point where they have to do something to you to get relief from the rage.

They are often thinking ahead on how to do destruction to you or your life, so you have to think ahead too on how to handle it. Being proactive in terms of reporting is a great way to achieve a record, and to get legal help when you need it. There are many other things to do, and for that a domestic violence counselor should be sought. 

Be aware, however, that victims tend to downplay the abuse and violence they are receiving. "It's not that bad", "He (or she) loves me", "He has a hard day at work, so I give him a little leeway", "She has to take care of all of our kids and I understand why she goes off the deep end sometimes", "I can put up with it", "He (or she) wouldn't be doing this if I had apologized more" and so on. Under-reacting happens because you are overwhelmed (and cognitively in a fight or flight mode), so it's natural to diminish abuse (but it is also dangerous).

Most of the people I know who are continually exposed to narcissistic abuse (including abuse-by-proxy) eventually feel they have to move, go no contact, contact a lawyer, get police involved, to get some sort of relief and legal protection to totally avoid the narcissist and the destruction they are trying to wield. However, moving is not always your preference, or do-able. But sometimes moving and going "no contact" is the best strategy with the present laws and types of protections we have in the United States (where there are too many loopholes in the laws and not a consistent form of training when it comes to police enforcement and protection).

As far as entitlement goes, abusers in general feel entitled to abuse you. They will make all kinds of excuses for why they have a right to abuse and to be emotionally dysregulated (i.e. rage off the charts). The excuses run the gamut:
- "I was abused too as a kid. It was all I ever knew" - while it may be true, they have an obligation to clean up their act.
- "I fed you and took care of you! I was a much better parent than my parent!" - it may be true, but they have an obligation to seek help to stop abusing you. 
- "It's just the way I am! I fly off the handle! If you don't like it, leave!" - good advice. Leave.
- "I'm sorry you're upset. I have a right to rage if I want to. I'm not obligated to be 'Mr. Smooth Emotions' around you." - this shows lack of empathy for what their rage is doing to you (one of the definitive characteristics of narcissism is lack of empathy). While technically rage isn't against the law, it is a form of intimidation that tends to get worse over time. Raging at you a lot is a power and control move: they count on their rage intimidating you enough where you will give in to what they want. It should be a deal-breaker in terms of trying to maintain a healthy relationship.
- "I'm sorry I insulted you so much, but you brought it upon yourself" - very typical phrase among abusers, and a sign of blame-shifting.
- "If you had vacuumed the room perfectly, I wouldn't have gone off on you like that.", "If you had taken all of the dishes out of the dishwasher when I told you to do it, I wouldn't have smashed up the kitchen" - perfectionism in an adult-to-adult relationship is a common expectation among abusers, and they use it as an excuse to abuse. Notice how imperfect they are and stop trying to reach their absurd standards of perfection ( I suggest the movie "Sleeping with the Enemy" as that movie demonstrates the absurd levels of perfection that can be expected over time). 
- "Stop crying, or I'll strangle your scrawny little neck!" - they feel entitled to tell you when you get to express emotions. Most narcissists do not have empathy when you cry, and they find it irritating. Plus they get enraged when other people cry over how they are treated by them. It puts the abuser in a shame-rage spiral (when narcissists feel ashamed, unlike the rest of us, they rage - they also do not feel you have a right to shame them, which is another reason they rage). Also, believe them when they make threats of strangulation. They definitely feel entitled to threaten, abuse and rage when they are feeling ashamed by anything, including your crying.
     However, just to put this in perspective, look at how much they shame you and others - probably a lot. Shaming is a form of abuse. Don't take any of this behavior personally and don't put up with their hypocrisies. 
 
Some of the other common entitlements they expect:
- they often feel entitled to tell you what you think and what you feel and will often resist being corrected by you.
- they feel entitled to break your self esteem to teach you that they are more superior than you are, and that you should always be be their student.
- they feel entitled to teach you "behavior lessons" (i.e. to treat you like a child who needs to learn lessons from them on how to behave in ways that will make them happy and where they can feel emotionally regulated enough not to go into a rage)
- they feel entitled to shame you continually (to wreck your self esteem so that they can be in charge of what you do and what you say) 
- they feel entitled to meddle in your career or job. Some of them don't want you to work at all, especially if they are jealous (boss, co-workers, people you have hired, the type of work you do, etc)
- they feel entitled to pit your spouse, siblings, children, grandparents, nieces and nephews, friends, co-workers, and boss against you. 
- they feel entitled to treat their children like little slaves

- they feel entitled to break promises any time they feel like it
- they feel entitled to ignore your feelings

Need I go on? Narcissists can feel entitled to get everything they want, whether they hurt other people or not. The higher they are on the spectrum, the more entitled they will be.

WHY ARE NARCISSISTS SO REBELLIOUS?

One of the telling signs of a narcissist is road rage, going way past the speed limit, passing on the solid line, not letting you merge with traffic, hitting your car with their car and telling you that it was "all your fault". 

If you are riding with them and you get into an argument in the car and you aren't responding the way they want you to, they can threaten to drop you off in the middle of nowhere and make you walk. 

Some of the other things I have noticed personally:

* swimming in reservoirs (for drinking water) where there are clear signs that say things like "no swimming and no boating"
* on the Long Island ferry there are clear signs everywhere that cars should not be started until the boat docks and comes to a complete stop. But invariably the "entitled people" start their cars up anyway, sometimes way before they see land (to keep the heater on, to listen to music - gassing out the people in the car behind them). 
* during the mask ordinance, a lot of the people who didn't wear masks felt that they had special immune systems, or special medications, that they could dodge the virus while watching the rest of their countrymen die or get sick (because, they reasoned, the average citizens had "inferior immunity", and lack of knowledge about medical or herbal "cures") 
* break laws about nude swimming
* stealing
* if they are "financially challenged", and a car is unlocked with a wallet in the front seat, they might feel entitled to take it
* having affairs despite their marriage vows to stay faithful
* abandoning their children, and because they don't want to be embarrassed by that fact, they tell others that their children abandoned them instead
* they are caught cheating and to not be embarrassed it, they tell the person who caught them that their spouse is a domestic violence offender and that their new lover is saving them
* they indulge in domestic violence and child abuse even though it is illegal
* false imprisonment even though it is illegal
* trespassing even though it is illegal
* stalking, even though it is illegal
* threats to hurt their spouse or grown children if you don't do what they demand (illegal in some states in the USA under new coercive control laws, completely illegal in the United Kingdom)
* teaching a child how to shoot a pistol even though it is illegal
* killing wild animals out of season, harvesting more wild animals that is over the legal limit
* torturing wild animals in ways that are illegal
* setting traps where there are "no hunting, fishing or trapping" signs
* hunting on private property where there are "no hunting, fishing or trapping" signs, hunting within 100 yards of someone's house (both illegal) 
* consumption and trafficking of illegal substances
* trafficking children or other human beings
* lie about how much alcohol and drugs they consume
* lie about cheating
* lie about being victimized when they are the victimizers
* then there is Jeffrey Epstein who felt entitled to have sex with a lot of underage girls, breaking the law blatantly, because he was wealthy, had co-conspirators, manipulated prosecutors into giving him "sweetheart deals" and had "dirt" on other wealthy people - he had all of the criteria for Narcissistic Personality Disorder plus some of the criteria for Antisocial Personality Disorder and communal narcissism.   
* and then there are a lot of narcissists who don't want to care a shred about how you feel and what you've endured, and they also feel entitled to refuse to hear you out, but when you put up boundaries and refuse to talk to them about certain subjects, and want "out" of the relationship, they find it maddening and cruel 

Most of these incidences show rebellion. In other words, they feel entitled to act in these ways, but do not want others in their life to act like this towards them.

This is all so confusing when it comes to children: "Am I supposed to do what you do, or am I supposed to only listen to what you want me to do? And by the way, why do you get to do what you don't want me to do?" That's where the cognitive dissonance starts: wrong is right somehow, and right is somehow wrong. If you are a good kid and tell the truth, you are somehow bad, and if you lie a lot (especially for them) you are good. That's just a small example of the thousands of mixed up messages kids get. And to make it all worse, one kid from the same family practically gets away with murder, while another kid can't even get away with a facial expression the narcissist doesn't like without getting abused over it. That is because narcissistic parents put their children in roles. And to randomize this set of circumstances, some narcissists change the roles on their children so that no child gets comfortable with consistent treatment!

One of the greatest hypocrisies that most people notice early on in a relationship with a narcissist is that they expect complete compliance, conventional adherence, loyalty, and even hate any signs of rebelliousness from their victims, but are often over-the-top rebellious themselves, refusing to live by the standards they set for others.

They feel free to thumb their noses at societal norms, to be disloyal, to lie and over-inflate what they do and who they are, even break laws, and to top it all off, too cowardly to confess when they've broken laws. But others? They want complete confessions and reparations, especially if abuses, mixed messages and crimes committed against them. They have expectations of others that they would never live up to themselves. 

If they are so rebellious, why can't they give you a break when you are just a tad rebellious? Do they only give themselves a break to act out, and excuse themselves for acting out, and not you? 

The answer to this is "yes". 

And it is why it is so hard to respect them, or even listen to their defenses, lectures, insistences of compliance, and attacks on our character. We get fed up with their double standards and their "Do as I say and not as I do" stances and excuses. 

It's all about how they feel entitled to "special treatment", the typical definition found in just about every major medical description of Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

Entitlement, rebelliousness, "it's okay for me to act like this, but not okay for you" attitudes, and all of the glaring and myriad hypocrisies around their entitlements are too hard to live with day in and out, for anyone ... They are also some of the first signs that we see when we have gotten to know narcissists a little for who they really are. We come to understand that entitlement explains why they break promises without any kind of feeling or introspection, but feel that others should not only keep their promises to the narcissist, but do everything the narcissist wants. What kind of fantasy world do they live in?

A big one.

Their entitlement and hypocritical rebellions are also one of the biggest contributors to why they are incapable of hanging on to deep authentic close personal relationships. They can't be close to people because they have a compulsion to control them in ways they can't be controlled = bad outcome for relationships of longevity. 

"Introduction to Entitlement"

by Dr. Ramani Durvasula:
(my note: she makes the case that entitlement is deeply connected to their lack of empathy):

"Understanding the narcissist's entitlement (30 DAYS OF NARCISSISM) - Dr. Ramani Durvasula"

"When narcissists use their performance/accomplishments to justify their entitlement"
by Dr. Ramani Durvasula:

"Your Disobedience Toward A Narcissist's Control"
by psychologist Dr. Les Carter
for Surviving Narcissism

"7 Signs Of A Narcissist's Entitlement"
by psychologist, Dr. Les Carter:

"How To Handle A Narcissist - Dr. Phil"
with Dr. Phil McGraw:

also from Dr. Phil McGraw that I thought was really to the point
(he makes the case of why narcissists should not be in therapy):
What Is Narcissistic Personality Disorder?

FURTHER READING

Narcissism and Entitlement: "Do I Have to Stand in Line?" (When living large means something different) - by Karyl McBride Ph.D. for Psychology Today

Covert Narcissist: Signs, Causes, and How to Respond - by Jodi Clarke, MA, LPC/MHSP, Medically reviewed by David Susman, PhD for Very Well Mind

Revisiting the Psychology of Narcissistic Entitlement (Not all narcissists are created equally when it comes to entitlement). - by Susan Krauss Whitbourne Ph.D. for Psychology Today

Endlessly Entitled Narcissists: What to Look For - by Linda Sapadin, Ph.D for Psych Central

Do Narcissists Ever Grow Up? (New research investigates continuity and change in narcissism from young adulthood to midlife) - by Scott Barry Kaufman for Scientific American 

What Is Narcissistic Entitlement And What To Do About It - by Melanie Tania Evans, popular You Tuber and writer on narcissism

How to Think Like a Narcissist and Why They Hurt People (Understanding a narcissist's mind shields and empowers you to react effectively.) - by Darlene Lancer, JD, LMFT for Psychology Today

The Psychology Behind Sense Of Entitlement - by Robert Porter for Better Help

Tell Me All I Need to Know About Narcissistic Personality Disorder - by Christina Gregory, PhD
and Krista Soriano, medically reviewed by Jean Kim, MD for Psycom

Narcissistic Entitlement - by Roy F. Baumeister & Kathleen D. Vohs for Sage Knowledge

How to Deal With a Narcissistic Mother - by Dr. Silvina Galperin, C. Psych. for CBT Psychology for Personal Development

The Narcissistic Mother or Father: Why they make their children suffer - by Jay Reid for Jay Reid Psychotherapy

Narcissistic Parents Are Literally Incapable Of Loving Their Children - by Joanna McClanahan for the Scary Mommy website 

5 Damaging Lies We Learn From Narcissistic Parents - by Shahida Arabi, Contributor, #1 Amazon Bestselling Author and Founder of Self-Care Haven for the Huffington Post