Anyone who has experienced narcissistic abuse is likely familiar with the term ‘flying monkeys.’ This refers to individuals who believe the narcissist’s lies and consciously or unconsciously aid them in psychological manipulation against the target.
What are Flying Monkeys?
The term flying monkeys comes from the movie The Wizard of Oz. Today, this is a term in popular psychology mainly used in the context of psychological abuse by a narcissist or psychopath.
According to psychology author Angela Atkinson, flying monkeys are usually unconsciously manipulated people who believe the slander on the victim. But it is also possible that they are narcissists themselves.
Types of flying monkeys
Narcissism expert and author Sam Vaknin distinguishes three main groups of flying monkeys:
- Friends of the abuser
- Victim’s acquaintances being manipulated
- Authorities who are manipulated
Motivations of flying monkeys
The vast majority of flying monkeys have been manipulated by the abuser. They often think they have chosen the right side because they believe everything the (in this case) narcissist has told about the victim. They see the perpetrator as the victim and vice versa.
As a result, the actual victim is often completely alone against a group of manipulated accomplices of the perpetrator. But there are also flying monkeys who themselves have narcissistic traits, or other sadistic tendencies.
Examples of flying monkeys
As the child of a narcissistic mother, I have come across a lot in my life. Based on my own experience I give examples of different types of flying monkeys.
The teacher
During my school days, my narcissistic mother was a member of the parent committees of my schools. I now suspect she has slandered me here. Witness the fact that students from other classes came up with stories about how bad I would behave at home.
In fact, both the teaching staff and the other parents (who passed it on) and their children were my narcissistic mother’s flying monkeys. While I was a victim of psychological violence, they thought I was a bad boy at home.
Also read the article “Narcissistic mother” >>
As a result, almost all teachers disliked me. But there was one that took the cake and that was in the second grade of primary school.
It’s not my custom to mention anyone’s name here, but in this case I will. Mrs. Vlietstra was the name of this horrible witch.
Mathematics
During the mathematical calculations I got completely stuck because I thought too much. When we were given sums starting from the number twenty, I analyzed the word twenty. In twen I recognized two, but what was ty then?
I asked Miss Vlietstra what “ty” was. That could be anything was the answer. Of course I couldn’t do anything with that and so I got completely stuck. But I didn’t have to count on any further explanation, that twenty was just a word for the number after 19.
I fell behind in math and had to stay in detention just about every free Wednesday afternoon. In addition, every weekend I was given a load of penal work. She also regularly bellowed at me “It’s not that you don’t get it, you’re just lazy!”.
Both Miss Vlietstra and my narcissistic mother seemed to take a satanic pleasure in tormenting me. For example, my narcissistic mother once triumphantly said that I might have to do the whole math book this coming weekend. “That’s a lot, isn’t it,” she said with a vicious laugh.
Much later, I learned that gifted people think too far and as a result get poor grades at school. On IQ tests I always score above 130. Only on the counting part I score very low. I think (actually I am sure) that this is a result of this period.
No mercy
And I did not have to count on mercy from Mrs. Vlietstra either. One time, when I had to stay on Wednesday again, while all the other children were allowed to go home, I started to cry. One of the girls felt sorry for me. “I think it’s silly of Mrs. Vlietstra,” she said. But Mrs. Vlietstra didn’t flinch, and I spent my afternoon off at school again.
Once, on a Friday afternoon, I left my penal work at school near the coat rack. Then I wouldn’t have to do it over the weekend, or so I thought.
But I was hardly home when my narcissistic mother triumphantly came with the penal work. Mrs. Vlietstra had found it and ordered another student to bring it over.
You can guess the result. I was bullied by my mother. And on Monday, the flying monkey Mrs. Vlietstra went one step further. “And you left that on purpose!” she bellowed at me.
It was the first time I heard the term ‘on purpose,’ but I understood the meaning. And so I learned the meaning of the term ‘on purpose.’ At least I learned something from her…
Ridiculed
I was also regularly ridiculed by her in front of the other students. For example, in a language class, we were once tasked with combining individual sentences from sayings until they formed a new saying.
I didn’t know some of these sayings (after all, I was only 7 years old), so I made incorrect combinations. Most likely, many of my classmates did the same. However, Mrs. Vlietstra read my mistakes aloud, making the rest of the class laugh at me.
Another time, I slumped in my school desk. As I nearly slipped, I put my hands flat on the tabletop of notebooks to prevent myself from sliding off my chair.
“Just look at what Herman is doing again,” said Mrs. Vlietstra in a theatrical tone. “He sees that the sum is wrong and now he tries to erase it with his fingers.”
This was an extremely idiotic interpretation of what happened. The idea of me putting my hands flat on the table to erase something was absurd. Besides, from that distance, she couldn’t see at all whether that sum was wrong. But I didn’t realize that then.
Everything I did was interpreted negatively in this way. She also once gave me a zero in a theatrical manner. “I don’t give a zero easily, but you get one!” she bellowed at me in front of the class.
And so, the second grade of primary school was a real hell for me. I have always hated math, and my brain still freezes when I see a difficult calculation that I don’t immediately know the answer to.
Was this flying monkey a narcissist herself?
Despite the horrible treatment I received from her, Mrs. Vlietstra was known as a sweet lady. She probably chose an easy prey, making life hell for that person while showing kindness to others…
This fuels the thought that Mrs. Vlietstra may well have been a narcissist herself. Of course, I have no proof for this, but it is clear that she was an extremely toxic person with very mean tricks, all while maintaining an ideal image.
Many years later, as an adult, when I discovered the Dutch website Schoolbank.nl, I read the following text about her: “And then the surrogate granny, Mrs. Vlietstra. A fantastic human being.”
My hands itched to respond to this and open a book about that “fantastic human being,” but I wisely refrained from doing so at the time. So, here it is on my own website.
Me me me
We’ll stay in primary school for a while. In fourth grade, I had a teacher who was generally nicer to me than the other teachers. This was the time when my mother used to scold me and call me selfish every night, as I describe in detail in the article “Narcissistic mother.”
It was at this time that this teacher suddenly turned to me during class and started singing “I’m taking everything…”. I don’t remember exactly how the text went on, but I remember the ending all too well: “Me me me, I don’t care about anyone else but me.”
It was exactly this sentence that I heard every night from my narcissistic mother, along with a furious look in the eyes and aggressive gestures.
At the time, I thought it was a coincidence, but with the knowledge I have now, I believe that my mother had told him during the last parents’ evening what kind of selfish person I was.
And with that, this nice teacher had also turned himself into my narcissistic mother’s flying monkey. I would like to put him in the category of manipulated authority figures.
The Cleaning Lady
We jump to the early 1980s when my parents hired a cleaning lady. She was a rather overly theatrical type, and more recently, she became very famous in the Netherlands when she disrupted a show from a Dutch comedian. The video someone made of it went viral.
She would turn out to be one of my narcissistic mother’s biggest flying monkeys. After the latter had first tried to get me into a boarding school for difficult children, she turned her attention to Daddy. She put him in an institution.
When he came home after two years, my mother started behaving more and more aggressively. This is also described in detail in the article “Narcissistic Mother.”
This cleaning lady witnessed this, but she remained meekly on my mother’s side. In her presence, my narcissistic mother even threw coffee in my father’s face.
If someone were to throw hot coffee in your face, it would be normal to become angry and retaliate. But my father apparently remained calm and only grabbed her wrists. Probably because he was already completely traumatized by her behavior.
Later, this cleaning lady would say that she was particularly shocked by my father’s reaction. So, not the fact that my mother threw coffee had shocked her, but the lack of violence on my father’s side. I find that a very strange observation…
The last faithful
No matter what horrible things my narcissistic mother did, she continued to see her as the victim. And she saw the real victims as the perpetrators. She is probably one of her last faithful now.
This woman, who once came into our lives as a cleaner, is one of the friends of the abuser. Probably someone who is very easy to manipulate, with some Cluster B traits of her own.
Cluster B is a group of personality disorders used in psychiatry. The official description of disorders in Cluster B is: Theatrical, emotional, or erratic behavior. This includes the narcissistic personality disorder.
The The Neighbor
In the article “Narcissistic Mother,” I talk about a female neighbor who sided with my narcissistic mother during the divorce. Once, my sister and I overheard her talking to our mother and being horribly offended by Dad.
After a long period of misery, there was some light at the end of the tunnel when Dad bought back the property our narcissistic mother had taken from him. With that, he went back to live next door to said neighbor.
During this period, this neighbor has shown herself to be a real flying monkey by bullying Dad. This was done, among other things, by putting feces in front of the door and blocking the alley on which my father had the right of way.
I would like to include this neighbor among the abuser’s manipulated friends. But I can’t help feeling that she herself also has some sadistic features, given her bullying.
The Psychopath
At the end of the 90s, I ended up in the so-called ‘job pool project.’ One day, a colleague who was new to me, having worked there before my time, returned. It turned out that he had bullied someone terribly during that time, and this time, I was the one he targeted.
What disappointed me most then was that colleagues with whom I had always gotten along well up to that point laughed when he bullied me. There was only one who stood up for me.
He could still remember the one from the earlier period and also spoke to him about his previous victim. That person was named Jelle. The colleague who stood up for me called Jelle a pathetic boy and said that such a person could completely die because of being bullied.
But the bully showed no remorse and laughed. “Haha, poor Jelle,” he said. It seemed like he was still enjoying his past bullying. For this reason, I strongly suspect that he is a psychopath.
He had no mercy for me either. The bullying overwhelmed me, and I called in sick. When I came back after a few weeks, the bullying continued. It eventually resulted in me sitting at home for a long period of time, exhausted.
In addition to the flying monkeys that I would like to qualify as followers, there was also someone who actively participated. I suspect he was afraid of becoming the next victim.
The Spy
We jump in time and arrive in 2006. My sister had broken off contact with our narcissistic mother that year, and a new flying monkey presented itself. This one also lived in a strategic place, opposite my sister’s house.
She would tell my mother everything that happened there. Later, I heard from my sister that our mother sometimes babysat there and could keep a close eye on them.
I would like to classify this flying monkey as the abuser’s manipulated friend. She probably believes everything our narcissistic mother tells her and thinks it serves a good cause.
How to Deal with Flying Monkeys?
As a child, I could not escape the flying monkeys of my narcissistic mother, but as an adult, I can. That is the advice I am giving.
Trying to convince the flying monkeys that they chose the wrong side is completely pointless. They are often manipulated in such a way that they do not believe you anyway. The harder you try, the more they will see it as confirmation of what the narcissist has told them about you.
So, try to keep these flying monkeys — just like the narcissist himself — at a distance as much as possible. If you do have to deal with them, be careful about what you tell them. They will relay everything to the narcissist.
Also, don’t make the mistake of using flying monkeys to pass on to your narcissist that you have unmasked him or her as a narcissist. When this gets to the narcissist, they will turn everything around. And guess who will be known as the narcissist?
Also read the article “Narcissistic Abuse: 7 Pitfalls for victims“
That concludes my article on flying monkeys, with examples from my own life. Do you have any comments or other examples? Share them in a comment. Knowledge is power!
