Help me @sneerclub you’re my only hope https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/matt-yglesias-considered-as-the-nietzschean
Remind me, do we have actual proof that The Last Psychiatrist is a real person and not a persona Scott made up for his most unhinged bullshit?
In the sense that TLP isn’t Blackbeard, no, we don’t. But I would suggest that, unlike Scott, TLP genuinely understands the pathology of narcissism. Their writing does something Scott couldn’t ever do: it grabs the narcissist by the face and forces them to notice how their thoughts never not involve them. As far as I can tell, Scott’s too much of a pill-pusher to do any genuine psychoanalysis.
Also, like, consider this TLP classic. Two things stand out if we’re going to consider whether they’re Scott in disguise. The first is that the dates are not recent enough, and indeed TLP’s been retired for about a decade. The second is that the mythology and art history are fairly detailed and accurate, something typically beyond Scott.
(In true Internet style, I hope that there is a sibling comment soon which shows that I am not just wrong, but laughably and ironically wrong.)
I am going to state my well-worn opinion that TLP doesn’t do that, he doesn’t have a particularly good grip on how narcissists think, certainly doesn’t say anything that could productively grapple with narcissism, is a boring asshole, and is shit at his job. But his style is incredibly flattering to the reader’s pessimism. He knows how to tell you you’re getting the good shit nobody else will give you - it’s just that it isn’t particularly good shit.
Check out Section III of your classic.
What have you learned so far? Do you think you’ve understood?
You heard the story, you heard the words, but your mind unheard it and replaced it with something else. Even after I tell you this, you’ll have trouble remembering it.
You think Narcissus was so in love with himself that he couldn’t love anyone else. But that’s not what happened, the story clearly tells it in the reverse: he never loved anyone and then he fell in love with himself. Do you see? Because he never loved anyone, he fell in love with himself. That was Narcissus’s punishment.
You thought Narcissus rejected all those people because he was in love with himself, but he rejected them all before he loved himself. Loved himself? Do you think Narcissus rejected them because he thought he was better than them? Or better looking? How would he have known he was so beautiful? He didn’t even recognize his own reflection! He rejected all those people because they loved him.
What does he do with that passage? It’s a numbered section so it must be important! He bullies you. Or rather, he bullies somebody. But of course, you DID read sections I and II. So you know that in the last sentence of Section II he’s cleverly turned the tables on the traditional interpretation of the story, a point he goes on to reiterate at the end of this Section III. But he’s planted in your mind one of two ideas, depending on what kind of reader you are (a) if you’re a pliable reader, you might question whether you REALLY got it without being told a second time, (b) if you’re a little more self-confident, now it occurs to you that there IS another kind of reader - not nearly as careful as you are - to whom Section III DOES apply.
What effect does this have? Primarily, it’s giving you the idea that TLP is the smart one in the room. The straight talker who keeps people on their toes and makes them pay attention.
But what’s true in his reversal isn’t actually that clever, it’s actually just this:
if no one ever seems right for you, and then the one person who does seem right doesn’t want you, then the problem isn’t the person, the problem is you
Now if I had told you this banal truism in that one sentence, and then added to it the heavy implication that you - and everybody else you know - is a pitiable narcissist who needs to read a lot more blog posts to get well, you might be tempted to say I was (a) an arsehole, (b) going a bit overboard with the narcissism thing.
You might not be tempted to read the other 7 or 8 sections of my post.
This stuff has real consequences. TLP’s particular view puts such banal truisms on a foundation of reactionary masculinism and pessimism. You are fallen, and you - you pitiable narcissist - need to be SHAKED BY THE THROAT to cure you of your narcissism. Well I am here to tell you that that’s wrong. Perhaps it works for this person or other, or they THINK it works for them because it flatters their own aspiraingly muscular pessimism, but by and large it doesn’t. By and large, what works for people is communication, community, and connection.
And he makes it sound, if you really twist it apart, like that’s what he’s telling you works. But he isn’t! He’s telling you to eat what you’re given and forget entirely about what you thought you wanted.
He is RIGHT that nothing is never not about us. But that doesn’t make us narcissists. That sets up an implied standard that he doesn’t state outright because it’s ludicrous: in order to not be a narcissist, on this view, you would have to never consider yourself in your own choices. Those choices, by the way, which are the only choices in the universe over which you have any control! It’s funny that we’re doing this in a thread about slave morality, because I would hazard that at the root of TLP’s pessimism (re: narcissism) is the impossibly high standard for self-sacrifice set by Christianity - a standard I have personally seen bring many people to their knees (and that is, of course, another criticism of TLP: to take him at his word is to learn how to punish yourself into oblivion).
If it helps you on your way to those things to be bullied now and again, fine, and I’ve certainly seen that work on a temporary basis, but TLP’s panacea stops at the surface and takes no interest in the deeper person. Of course it does, he’s doing a Hunter Thompson bit!
Oh, you misunderstand. It’s not for me.
NSFW
I’ve been to plenty of shrinks and never been diagnosed with anything outside of neurodivergence: giftedness, ADHD, and autism. I appreciate TLP because it had helped me understand and manage my narcissistic parent.
Nonetheless I agree with your critique of the writing style; it’s got all the fake edge of a 20s frat boy learning about existentialism for the first time.
