After One Year Of Writing On Medium … Democracy Or Social Psychosis?
Editorial
An experiment is currently being tested at PLACE to use a social media platform called Medium to transmit texts relevant to modern analysis, society, and the individual in a highly public and non-academic setting.
The experiment has been informative on many levels, for not only has it revealed the inadequacies of the current social media platforms, Medium, in particular, to make room for any real public debate on a subject that does not reduce to mere entertainment, but several incidents make it clear that an age-old guardian of democracy, constructive criticism, is becoming less and less tolerated and is instead being called 'harassing and shaming'.
In Medium's public announcement it claims:
"Medium is a free and open platform for anyone to write their views and opinions. As such we don’t vet or approve posts before our users publish them. We believe free expression deserves a lot of leeway, so we generally think the best response to bad ideas is good ideas, not censorship."
What I am about to write shows this is far from the case: Medium is involved in a new form of Absolute Censorship that only presents itself as 'free expression' and liberty.
Introducing the Absolute Censor
Recently I was blocked, then reported, by a writer named Christina Caré’s, after I both critiqued her misuse of the word narcissism and objected to how she was abusing psychiatric terminology by indiscriminately pathologizing people in her article entitled: How to Tell If Your Friend Is A Narcissist.
Since there are no fact-checkers on Medium one may well ask if they also ban any form of critique and cross-reference on the site, then are they not simply promoting a site of ‘say whatever you want’, as long as it is not violent, and you can get away with it.
In fact, this is a new form of Absolute Censorship, since unlike the old relative censorship which suppressed free speech and governed by an elite, group of editors, or ruling body, this new form of Absolute Censorship is the promotion of a mad use of free speech.
In a first contact, it is evident that nobody in charge at Medium, except an algorithm and several low pay scale employees who do not know the reasons for why they are deleting or accepting content, but just they are following orders. In the end:
Say whatever you want on Medium and as long as it is not violent and doesn't trip the algorithm.
Why?
Because it really doesn’t matter what you write, at best, it is your opinion, at worst, it is all nonsense.
Remember: on Medium, not only is nobody checking the facts or the validity of an argument, but there is no critique allowed that would cross-reference an author. In other words, the censorship is Absolute.
On Medium, if you do not like what someone says about your writing, you can block them, which for the weakest of writers, is their only recourse, since instead of openly being able to ask and answer questions, they can only hide and hope others don't notice.
Plus these wanna-be writers can try to monetize their articles so it becomes evident real soon that many on the platform are, I hate to say it, hacks trying to find a microwave to defrost a 'cup of noodles': quick, budgetary, but inevitably, tasteless writing trying to market an idea. And be sure to include a flashy image!
But what is worse is that Medium regards any critique of an article on the site as 'shaming' if the author complains it cross-references their text and name. Medium can then suspend your account if you do not take the post down.
Both occurred on Nov.27, 2019: I was blocked from responding to the author with a critique and my account has been temporarily suspended. A discussion is ongoing if I will still consider publishing further on this platform as the pollution is thick and my rubber boots are growing thin. You can judge for yourself if my response is shaming or critique, by reading my text at the end of this editorial.
Frankly, the Medium site is revealing, I could have never imagined the low level of education in the public especially around the question of the psy (psychology, psychiatry, psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, etc.).
Medium claims there is no advertising on their platform, but in the lack of an adequate means of critique — and a quick access to the block button and account suspension — the platform quickly regresses into nothing more than self-advertisers posing as writers on a podium of paranoia (shaming and harassment).
Of course, Medium is fine with this model: if someone somehow can be convinced that they have something to say, are writers, and can have their insulated 'safe-space' for self-expression, then Medium makes a cool $50. per year subscription fee. What is being marketed and sold is no longer the book, but the dream of being an author!
With more time than I have here in this short editorial, it will be important to ask what is this slide from public writing and democracy to marketing and a social psychosis where the Absolute Censor is the name of the game.
A copy of my critical response to Christina Caré’s self-advertisement How to Tell If Your Friend Is A Narcissist is written below.
Critique or Shaming? You be the judge.
If you find my critique is, indeed, a critique, and not shaming, then you may want to contact Medium and/or respond to the author at the bottom of the page of her article to let her know.
For if people these days are not willing to let their voices be heard on such matters, we are all reduced to silence.
Sincerely,
SM
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I like writers like Christina Caré for making clear why it is so difficult to write about narcissism seriously.
A few comments may help to bring out the problems.
Did you ever notice that it is always the other person, ‘your friend’, who is the narcissist in articles like these?
With a little less ‘narcissism’, that is to say, a bit of humility, it becomes evident what is really being spoken about in this article is egoism and egotistical behavior.
The distinction is important for five reasons:
First, everyone you know has an ego and the slide into egoism and egotism is not for a privileged few, but an inertia that can happen to anyone, including the author. In fact, for everyone who calls (incorrectly) their boyfriend or girlfriend a ‘narcissist’, you will probably find the compliments being returned by that same girlfriend/boyfriend. In short, when it comes to egoism, all the ‘subtle signs’ of being vain, mean, arrogant, unempathetic, toxic, etc. are reciprocal.
Second, contrary to the out-dated link provided by the author on the Royal College of Psychiatrists, it is well known today that the diagnosis of ‘narcissistic personality disorder’ is one of the least reliable diagnosis one can make. To date, there have been no clinical trials on ‘narcissistic personality disorder’. See a) Caligor, Eve; Levy, Kenneth N.; Yeomans, Frank E. (May 2015). “Narcissistic Personality Disorder: Diagnostic and Clinical Challenges”. The American Journal of Psychiatry. 172 (5): 415–22. doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.2014.14060723. PMID 25930131.
Third, to think there are signs of a narcissistic personality that can be decoded by a magic ring is not only wrong-headed but paranoiac. It is like diagnosing someone with ‘homosexual disorder’, which until recently was also considered an abnormality in the DSM manual of psychiatrists, then going out looking for all the signs that make someone homosexual. A very paranoiac endeavor … no?
Lastly, because of the sparse and contradictory research literature, narcissistic personality disorder was set to be eliminated from the current psychiatrist’s diagnostic manual (DSM-5) just as other ‘disorders’ such as homosexuality had been previously eliminated. However, in response to pressure from professional groups, the decision to remove narcissistic personality disorder was reversed, and today it has been reinserted as a pathology in the current DSM-5 with a far from unanimous recall. To confirm this turbulent clinical history of NPD, read: b) Shedler J, Beck A, Fonagy P, et al.: Personality disorders in DSM-5. Am J Psychiatry 2010; 167:1026–1028 Link, Google Scholar c)Ronningstam E: Narcissistic personality disorder in DSM-V: in support of retaining a significant diagnosis. J Pers Disord 2011; 25:248–259 Crossref, Medline, Google Scholar d) Miller JD, Widiger TA, Campbell WK: Narcissistic personality disorder and the DSM-V. J Abnorm Psychol 2010; 119:640–649 Crossref, Medline, Google Scholar
Fifth, narcissism, if it were ever to be explained adequately, is a cure for egoism and its paranoiac tendencies.
In the end, the question is up in the air as to whether there are any ‘real’ traits that would allow for “telling if your friend is a narcissist”. But what is sure, is that there are no magic decoder rings and a lot of paranoia.
Just a few grains of salt,
T.R.G.