Narcissism - The Attention Game

The Attention Game

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Does any of following ring a bell? If you live with a narcissist it does.

Protocol

At all times, everyone must face the king. The foot servant is beneath the king's notice. So, the king never dignifies him with any attention at all, does not even look at or speak to him. Now, this might seem a bit inconvenient, for what good is a servant you can't speak to? But the foot servant's duty was to watch over the king and see to all his needs without the king having to suffer the indignity of having to ask him for anything. So, the most he got from the king was an offhanded grunt or a hand signal while the king was talking to someone else, which was to be interpreted as "Bring me my footstool." To obey the command, the foot servant approaches the king in a groveling manner to indicate that he asks for the favor of being allowed to approach the king and bring him his footstool. The foot servant takes care to avoid notice so that he distracts nobody's attention, even for a moment, from the king. The king is to tolerate the foot servant's vulgar presence no longer than necessary and, without looking at him, "spurns" him (kicks him aside) when the task is done. Then the foot servant shows his gratitude by humbly bowing-and-scraping away.

There you have it — a real-world example of relating between someone who deserves all attention and someone who deserves no attention.

The actions of both parties to that "relationship" speak louder than words. I scare-quoted the word relationship because this is an un-relationship. The king is dis-relating to his foot servant.

Nobody bothered to know that the king must have zero integrity if merely looking at another person would degrade him, but the farce in the myth of nobility is beside the point. Nobody noticed that they were treating the king like an infant, either. I mean, only an infant normally gets its needs taken care of without having to ask for anything.

Well, just like the king, I guess: he's such a big baby it would be an insufferable affront to his dignity if he ever had to ask for anything.

What about Please and Thank you? Though he is unworthy to be heard by the king, the foot servant is the one who must say "please" and "thank you," by literally groveling and then bowing-and-scraping away. How perverted can human behavior get?

So perverted that the foot servant was deemed so unworthy of attention that he deserved no acknowledgement of his service, let alone thanks. For, in acknowledging what someone has done for you, or in expressing gratitude for it, you're paying them attention, aren't you? Majestic beings mustn't degrade themselves by doing that. To emphasize this, the custom was for the foot servant to receive anti-gratitude with a gratuitous kick. That is why kings responded to whatever their foot servant did for them by "spurning" them, literally kicking them away. How perverted can human behavior get?

Answer: The foot servant had no right to even resent such treatment. Therefore, he was subjected to the extreme perversity of having to bend over for it (the Sin of Sodom). And with a smile. For, he then had to bow-and-scrape some more in gratitude for the minuscule attention of a kick. Can't get perverser than that.

There are only three places I know of where one person must be the focus of all attention: a theater, a church, and a royal court. The way-up-high-in-the-sky there thing — the so-called "star." Or God. Or the king.

Correction: there is one more place where that is the case, any place plagued by a the presence of a malignant narcissist. He or she must be the focus of all attention.

Being entitled to all attention and being entitled to no attention are appraisals of a person's value, or worth. In a society that regards all human beings as created equal, to give all attention to the narcissist is to worth-ship him as a false god, and to give no attention to others is to dehumanize people and treat them like dirt.

Which is exactly why the narcissist plays The Attention Game = to make himself God and all others dirt beneath his feet. This is how he supports his delusions of grandeur. He's just playing Pretend. He's making it so by acting as though it is.

Do you play along?

© 2004 – 2008, Kathleen Krajco — all rights reserved worldwide.
The URL of this page is: http://www.narcissism.operationdoubles.com/attention_game.htm.
It was last updated on 3/7/2008.
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