Richard Grannon and Angie give their thoughts on why narcissists use flying monkeys for their smear campaigns - plus how you can deal with painful smear campaigns that narcissists use against you to humiliate and further abuse you.

What is a flying monkey?

It might be a funny comparison, calling them flying monkeys, but the reality of it is anything but funny.

A quick and dirty definition of a narcissist's "flying monkey" is a person who does the narcissist's bidding for them. Sometimes, these flying monkeys are unaware of their role in the narcissist's puppet show - you know, the stage they set for their gaslighting manipulation and preferred state of drama. Other times, they're "in on it" with them.

The Unwitting Flying Monkey

Often, flying monkeys come in the form of well-meaning friends and loved ones. They show up, trying to gently convince you to go along with what the narcissist wants - and it's generally a direct result of their own manipulation by the narc.

See, a toxic narcissist will do anything to get or her way, including telling lies about you and/or others in order to make things go their way. If you look up "smear campaign" in the dictionary, you'll find that the political version of the term matches up with the narcissistic one: "a deliberate attack on somebody, by spreading an untrue and unpleasant rumor about them, or by making an accusation intended to damage their reputation."

Quite simply, that's what a narcissist does when he feels threatened or otherwise concerned that he might lose his narcissistic supply.

And contrary to popular belief, a narcissist who stoops to the level of creating a smear campaign is not crying out for help; rather, s/he's crying out for attention and, in many cases, for a new source of supply.

A lot of narcs use sob stories (such as "this person has treated me so poorly, poor me, feel sorry for me) - as part of their love bombing and or hoovering tactics when they're hooking in a new victim (or trying to re-hook you once you manage to get away).

Why Narcissists Run 'Smear Campaigns': The Neurological Components

As someone who isn't a toxic narcissist, this stuff doesn't make sense to you.

You might find yourself feeling shocked or even confused by the smear campaign, because it's not normal behavior. The fact is that unless you're intentionally educating yourself about toxic narcissism and narcissistic personality disorder, you can't really understand the way a narc's mind works.

That's because it doesn't work the same way as a "normal" person's mind does. See, most people feel empathy for others in their lives, and they'd never want to hurt someone they love. But narcissists don't really see others as people who are on the same level; to them, to put it bluntly, you are not a person.

That's because, according to Robert Hare, PhD, "their information, including emotional information, is scattered all over both brain hemispheres - it takes too long or the brain to retrieve and process information, and the entire process of socialization becomes so ponderous that ultimately, it fails."

Living with a narcissist puts you in a tough spot: you sort of forgo the simple pleasures in life. Rather than taking fun strolls down memory lane and laughing together, you'll find yourself feeling like you're literally sleeping with the enemy.

It's like the very stuff that makes life worth living becomes forbidden to you - and as you watch those in healthy relationships have normal, healthy interactions with their love ones, the pain can become even more intense.

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