Popular culture
According to recent cultural criticism, Narcissus has replaced Oedipus as the myth of our time. Narcissism is now seen to be at the root of everything from the ill-fated romance with violent revolution to the enthralled mass consumption of state-of-the-art products and the 'lifestyles of the rich and famous'.
Jessica Benjamin (2000), "The Oedipal Riddle," p. 233
Some critics contend that pop culture has become more narcissistic in recent decades. This claim is supported by scholarship indicating some celebrities hire "fake paparazzi", the frequency with which "reality TV" programs populate the television schedules, and the growth of an online culture in which digital media, social media and the "will-to-fame" are generating a "new era of public narcissism [that] is mutating with new media forms." In this analysis, narcissism, rather than being the pathologized property of a discrete personality type, has been asserted as a constituent cultural feature of an entire generation since the end of World War II.
Supporting the contention that American culture has become more narcissistic and that this is increasingly reflected in its cultural products is an analysis of US popular song lyrics between 1987 and 2007. This found a growth in the use of first-person singular pronouns, reflecting a greater focus on the self, and also of references to antisocial behavior; during the same period, there was a diminution of words reflecting a focus on others, positive emotions, and social interactions. Similar patterns of change in cultural production are observable in other Western states. A linguistic analysis of the largest circulation Norwegian newspaper found that the use of self-focused and individualistic terms increased in frequency by 69 per cent between 1984 and 2005 while collectivist terms declined by 32 per cent. References to narcissism and self-esteem in American popular print media have experienced vast inflation since the late 1980s. Between 1987 and 2007 direct mentions of self-esteem in leading US newspapers and magazines increased by 4,540 per cent while narcissism, which had been almost non-existent in the press during the 1970s, was referred to over 5,000 times between 2002 and 2007.
Cross-cultural studies of differences in narcissism are rare. Instead, as there is a positive association between narcissism and individualism and a negative one between it and collectivism, these traits have been used as proxies for narcissism in some studies. This approach, however, risks the misapplication of the concepts of individualism and collectivism to create overly-fixed, "caricature-like", oppositional categories. Nonetheless, one study looked at differences in advertising products between an individualistic culture, America, and a collectivist one, South Korea. In American magazine advertisements, it found, there was a greater tendency to stress the distinctiveness and uniqueness of the person; conversely the South Korean ones stressed the importance of social conformity and harmony. This observation holds true for a cross-cultural analysis across a wide range of cultural outputs where individualistic national cultures produce more individualistic cultural products and collectivist national cultures produce more collectivist national products; these cultural effects were greater than the effects of individual differences within national cultures.
Fictional narcissists
Of Lord Petyr Baelish (nicknamed "Littlefinger"), in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series and its television adaptation, Game of Thrones, Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) Colleen Jordan observes: "If you look at Littlefinger, we know he's not remotely personally interested in Lysa, but he likes the attention. And he needs her. Narcissists use people for functions, which he does.”
Maisie Farange, in Henry James' novel What Maisie Knew (1897), is neglected by her vain and self-absorbed parents. After her parents’ divorce, find new partners, and ultimately cheat again on their new partners, Maisie finally decides to move in with the morally strong family maid.
Mavis Gary, Charlize Theron's character in Young Adult (2011), who conspires to return to her hometown to steal back her high school sweetheart, despite his being married with a child, embodies many narcissistic traits–including the emptiness she feels when she is not receiving attention or praise from her writing.
Jay Gatsby, the eponymous character of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby (1925), "an archetype of self-made American men seeking to join high society", has been described as a "pathological narcissist" for whom the "ego-ideal" has become "inflated and destructive" and whose "grandiose lies, poor sense of reality, sense of entitlement, and exploitive treatment of others" conspire toward his own demise.
Gordon Gekko, the fictional character in the film Wall Street (1987) and its sequel Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010), has become a symbol in popular culture for unrestrained greed and self-interest (with the signature line, "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good"), often in fields outside corporate finance.
Charles Foster Kane, a fictional character and the subject of Orson Welles' film Citizen Kane (1941 film), which explores the life of the titular character, who is born of humble origins and is widely believed to be based on the publishing tycoon William Randolph Hearst. (Buddy Swan played Kane as a child; Welles played Kane (receiving an Oscar nomination), as well as produced, co-wrote, and directed the film.) In 1871, Kane's mother puts him under the guardianship of a New York City banker named Walter Parks Thatcher, who raises him in luxury. As an adult, Kane takes control of a newspaper, which he uses to advance businesses in which Kane holds stock. Kane also hires staff members away from the rival Chronicle newspaper, regarding them as collectibles. To finance the fledgling Inquirer, Kane uses his personal resources, which allowed him to operate it, even at a million dollar annual loss, for decades.
The Lannisters, in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series and its television adaptation, Game of Thrones, have been deemed a "family of narcissists".
About the Lannister siblings: Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) Colleen Jordan has said the incestuous twins Cersei and Jaime have a combination of borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder, and their younger brother Tyrion is an alcoholic narcissist. Additionally, a clinical psychologist posted as Redditor Rain12913: “People seem to be falling into the trap of thinking that Cersei really does genuinely love her brother and her (late) children. While she certainly says that she does quite a bit, and while her behaviour may seem to suggest that she does, it is highly unlikely that such a narcissistic character is capable of true love.”
About the family's patriarch, "Tywin Lannister is actually the worst of them", observes Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) Colleen Jordan.
Suzanne Stone-Maretto, Nicole Kidman's character in the film To Die For (1995), wants to appear on television at all costs, even if this involves murdering her husband. A psychiatric assessment of her character noted that she "was seen as a prototypical narcissistic person by the raters: on average, she satisfied 8 of 9 criteria for narcissistic personality disorder... had she been evaluated for personality disorders, she would receive a diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder".
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