If anything positive could emerge from the van attack in Toronto that saw 10 people killed, allegedly by a member of the “incel” online community, it will be a renewed examination of the relationship between social-media accessibility of such groups and a psychological disability called malevolent or malignant narcissism.
Malignant narcissism, according to University of Kentucky researchers, is not only about self-aggrandizement, but also about inner feelings of weakness and inadequacy. Many narcissists, say researchers, besides being paranoid and vindictive, aim to punish the source of their frustration. Malignant narcissists, those without empathy but with an excessive sense of entitlement, use social media to exploit, manipulate and destroy their victims.
The incel (involuntary celibacy) community, until this attack, had existed in a dark corner of the internet where sexist, racist and homophobic language, cyber bullying and posts normalizing rape are common.
According to James Cantor, the director of the Toronto Sexuality Centre, in an interview with CTV, when it comes to the “incel” community, narcissists are “a group of people who usually lack sufficient social skills and … find themselves very, very frustrated.”
“But now that it is so easy for individuals like this to gather together in the virtual world in large groups, this becomes their only means of social input,” Cantor said, “and when they’re surrounded by online people with similar frustrations, they kind of lose track of what typical discourse is and they drive themselves into more and more extreme beliefs.”
Cantor explains that it is a characteristic of narcissists to use verbal and psychological abuse against those closest to them. Some develop extreme emotions that can lead to violent outbursts and expressions of virtual or even actual physical violence.
Social media have been blamed for breeding narcissists, but narcissists have always existed. Social media have just given them an extra tool with which to bully and taunt.
It remains unclear exactly where Toronto’s accused mass killer Alek Minassian fits into these online communities of anti-feminist trolls, despite his claim to be a member of incel. Nonetheless, many self-styled incels spent the week of the attack celebrating the act he is alleged to have carried out.
And while these sites are well outside the social-media mainstream, they boast a surprisingly large following. Although there might be some overlap, two forums report at least 5,000 members each, while a third claims 9,000 registered users.
Especially during the past decade, online social networking has caused profound changes in the way people communicate and interact. It is unclear, however, exactly how these changes might affect certain normal aspects of human behaviour and even might exacerbate psychiatric disorders.
Several studies have indicated that it is possible that the prolonged use of social-networking sites such as Facebook might be related to signs and symptoms of disorders such as depression.
Some authors have indicated that excessive social-networking activity might be associated with low self-esteem, especially in children and adolescents.
Speaking at the American Psychological Association National Convention in 2011, Larry D. Rosen, professor of psychology at California State University, warned that children whose parents don’t ask them about their online activities tend to be less healthy and more narcissistic, and perform worse at school than children whose parents monitor their technology use.
Rosen also found that students who use Facebook and other social media frequently throughout the day are more prone to mental-health problems than peers who use social media less frequently.
It is not news that many writers link connections between the worlds of sociology, psychology, politics and social media. There is, they suggest, a broad feeling of disenfranchisement among adolescent and adult social structures, which, coupled with the ever-expanding influence of social-media platforms, has fostered the development of a new and satisfying sense of personal empowerment fuelled by the discovery of like-minded people — no matter how extreme the commonalities might be.
In few isolated instances, social media seem to serve as a trigger for action previously only fantasized about.
What we do know for sure is that the Toronto killer’s murderous rage, inflamed as it might have been by the incel community, didn’t just come out of nowhere. Nor did the urge to kill of the shooter at Stoneman Douglas high school, or the gunman at the Waffle House materialize from nothing.
In the words of the Buffalo Springfield song: “There’s something happening here, what it is ain’t exactly clear.”
Geoff Johnson is a former superintendent of schools.
