A lemmy.dbzer0.com admin by the handle of Unruffled, actual username @Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com, posted an ableist comment today in relation to a ban decision.
Unruffled’s explanation for the ban is that people with narcissistic personality disorder are not a victimised demographic, and that when pwNPD claim to be marginalised, this is an abuse tactic.
Wikipedia says on its page for NPD:
It is often comorbid with other mental disorders and associated with significant functional impairment and psychosocial disability.[1]
People with NPD are significantly functionally impaired, and psychosocially disabled. I could bring up a half dozen corroborating sources, but I’ll skip that for now.
Now, the fact that people with the disability known as NPD suffer unfair hatred shouldn’t be a controversial statement. A great example is the stereotype that pwNPD are abusive, and everything they do is a manipulation. This stereotype is massively damaging. In fact, if you have NPD and you look to Google for resources on dealing with your disability and improving your mental health, the first result you’ll get is sources on how you’re an evil abuser and resources for people who’ve been abused by you.
This is a significant barrier to treatment. In addition to the physical difficulty of finding resources by sifting through the hate, it can provoke feelings of shame and defensiveness, and drive people to avoid or distrust all online resources about their disability. And, like autism, a lot of the disability of NPD comes from other people’s intolerance. The idea that we’re all abusers primes people to see and choose aggression when dealing with us. It starts fights, it gets people hurt, it turns out lives into one big punching match.
The fact Unruffled engaged in this counterfactual stereotype while denying basic medical facts about a disability is troubling. It’s my opinion that db0 should have a long conversation with Unruffled about sensitivity towards disabled people. Ideally, Unruffled would come away feeling ashamed of their behaviour and with a resolution to do better. But in the event Unruffled is unruffled by the conversation and unwilling to improve their behaviour, they should be banned from lemmy.dbzer0.com immediately for clear hate.