Narcissists – The Ultimate Lawbreakers
By nature, narcissists are rule breakers. They do not believe rules or laws apply to them. So, in essence, they choose not to follow them.
If narcissists are caught breaking rules, they always have an excuse for their behavior. These excuses never include taking accountability for their actions. These excuses also do not lay out the foundation that their behavior is wrong. There is always someone else or something else they blame. They are never at fault. Instead, they are faultfinders.
Do As I Say But Not As I Do
I think of an instance with a former narcissist frenemy that I dubbed as Rain. She was notorious for breaking the rules and laying blame on others. She never accepted accountability for her actions no matter who was in harm’s way. I can only conclude that others feared bringing Rain to the carpet for her negative behavior because she was rarely called out for wrongdoing.
Rain stood on a soapbox as if to speak with authority about the ills of drinking and driving. She would tell any and everyone about how her close relative was killed by a drunk driver. Each time she told the story, I could always hear the resentment and bitterness in her voice over the loss of her relative. My heart went out to Rain, and I extended my condolences to her family.
Yet, I later realized that Rain often told her story of loss when eliciting sympathy for herself. Much later I also came to see she was nothing more than a hypocrite. She loved to pass judgment upon others to shame them when she participated in the same behavior. She often drank alcohol and drove under the influence.
Do not get me wrong. I definitely discourage drinking and driving; it is dangerous to all on the highway including the driver. However, I believe it is self-righteous to tell others what to do and not follow through on doing the very things preached to others. It is like the pot calling the kettle black. Rain preached to others often. She wanted no judgment for herself, but in turn, she judged others quite harshly.
I knew that Rain often drank alcoholic beverages and drove under the influence. The first time I saw her in action I was taken aback. One night after hearing her preach to me about certain people she knew who were too tipsy to drive but still did so, I blasted her. I was sick of her hypocrisy. I questioned her reasoning as to why it was okay for her to do the very thing that she was angry at others for doing. Her response was baffling to me.
Rain basically said that she could handle it … that she could “handle liquor” and was immune to the influence. When I told her that the same judgment she passed on to the person that killed her relative was no different than the judgment she would face if the same thing happened to her because of her own drinking and driving, she was livid.
Rain basically saw me as a sympathizer of drunk drivers even though I was trying to prove a point to her about her behavior. Instead of seeing the error in her own behaviors, however, she flipped it all around on me. I was the enemy. She punished me with the silent treatment for days. She was more the “do as I say and not as I do” type of person.
Entitlement
Narcissists have a sense of entitlement and superiority. They do not believe that any rule set up by others actually applies to them. They believe the only rules that should be followed are the rules that they create for others to follow. If there is a rule, narcissists will find some way to bend it or break it just because they believe they can do so. Most of the time, they do not even follow their own rules even though they expect others to follow them.
Narcissists will always tell you what you need to do, but they will become deeply offended by the slightest suggestion that they need to be doing something (or not doing something). Their sense of entitlement has them believing that they are more deserving than others, and no one has the right to judge them. They see no problem in breaking laws or not following rules. Yet, if you do break the law or choose not to follow rules, they will put you in their judgmental spotlight to shame and embarrass you.
Thou Shalt Not Cast Shame Upon The Narcissist
Despite knowing right from wrong, narcissists simply choose not to do what is right even when it is the law. They do not care about others because they lack the emotional empathy to care. They are selfish and will use cognitive empathy because they only care about what happens to them. They lack the emotional fortitude to care about how their actions affect anyone else.
When I told Rain that her choosing to drive under the influence could cause someone else harm, she scoffed at the thought. She said that I was being ridiculous, over-imaginative, and thoughtless. According to her, she drank for pleasure and had the frame of mind to know not to get into a car and drive recklessly even though she actually drove under the influence. I mentioned to her that it was very possible that the driver who killed her relative may have had the same rationale and had no way of knowing that their actions would lead to her relative’s death.
Rain would not hear me though. She refused to see my perspective. In fact, to her, my perspective was nothing more than me sympathizing with “an evil killer”. Despite my awareness and compassion for what her family had suffered in losing her relative, I simply wanted to point out to her how dangerous the same behavior that she displayed was to everyone else on the highway who would be affected by her actions. She simply refused to see my point-of-view even though she would be guilty of the same charges of driving while under the influence.
In Rain’s eyes, I was attempting to blame and shame her for something that had never happened to her. In her eyes, I was attempting to make her “an evil killer” in the way that she saw the drunk driver who caused the death of her relative. Although it was never my intention to cause her shame or blame her for any accident, Rain would not see my words any other way. Instead of accepting responsibility for her actions, she simply projected her emotions onto me for bringing the matter to her attention in the first place.
The Ultimate Lawbreakers
Narcissists are the ultimate lawbreakers. In a sense, they partake in criminal activities without giving their activities a criminal label. They see nothing wrong with even the thought of doing something that is against the law. They see nothing wrong with even including you in on their plans either. They never think about the consequences of their actions.
Although many narcissists do preplan, many do not preplan consequences because they do not believe they will ever be caught. They simply preplan that everything will go their way, and if that happens not to be the case, then they will simply come up with an excuse to shirk accountability. They see no consequences to face because they do not even see their illicit behaviors as wrong.
When narcissists are caught in the act of breaking the law, they will challenge the law. They will project blame elsewhere. They will find fault with the laws and the lawmakers. They will whine about the consequences. They will argue about the unfairness of it all. To them, suffering consequences for breaking the law is not fair to them. They believe they are above the law.
To narcissists, the rules of others are created to be broken. Narcissists are the ultimate lawbreakers. If they follow any law or rule, they most likely create it for you to follow.
My Voice Unchained 