This young man (19) killed his parents after spending £30,000 in credit cards. While he got life imprisonment, his charge was reduced to manslaughter. Why?
Blackwell admitted manslaughter with diminished responsibility. He suffers ‘narcissistic personality disorder’.
Narcissistic personality disorder?
What?!
Just to make sure I’m not off my rocker, I went back and looked at both the European and American definitions. In short, the kid thinks he’s better than everyone else.
Now I’m sure some folks might ask what the big deal is. My personal gripe is that we’re treating this as some sort of clinical, scientific disease (a personality disorder?). “Spoiled” is the word my grandparents would have used. It’s not a disease. The kid needed a good swift kick in the ass when he was growing up (another term my grandparents would have used – and applied).
My other complaint would be the classification process. It’s not the person that’s the problem — the problem is this gobbledygook “personality disorder” that’s troubling this person, as if it could be vivisected, isolated, and treated. I disagree to a large part, but of course that’s the philosopher talking and not the well-trained psychologist who arrived at this disorder.