Deranged Trump Syndrome

There seems to be more than usual discussion lately of how we got here. What broke people’s brains. Putting aside the ambiguities of what different people mean by that, I’d like to offer two possibilities that I haven’t seen much discussed. The first is simply being constantly assaulted by the bigoted, ignorant, and crude ravings of a narcissist. I’ll address the second in a later post.

Donald Trump has been a major national figure for around ten years. He has been bigoted, ignorant, crude, and narcissistic all that time. The narcissism means that he seeks attention constantly, and the positions he has arisen to have meant that he gets that attention.

As President, he has several press availabilities a day, from which we are bombarded with video clips and news articles. The press transcribes what he says and fixes it up so that it is fit to print. Then we have a constant argument about the poor job the press is doing (and it is a poor job) that continues to put Trump and his ravings in front of us.

It has been that way for ten years now. The press exercised a modicum of restraint in sharing his words and face with us through the four years of Joe Biden’s presidency, but Trump was never entirely gone from the scene.

It is an abusive situation. Trump is in a parental-like position, and he takes joy in making miserable the people below him. He takes joy in death, whether endorsing RFK Jr’s malign schemes, standing back from Stephen Miller’s rampant hostility to immigrants, or helping Pete Hegseth kill people in small boats.

Even if we are not directly in the line of fire, we witness the injury to our fellow citizens and are helpless to do anything about it. All that has been turned up to 11 in the current administration, and it is constant. We know that abusive situations damage mental health in families, and there is no reason to expect otherwise when the entire nation is abused.

Americans are often critical or mocking of the presidency and the men who have held that office, but it is the highest office in the land, and thus a representation of the American people. To be represented by a monster damages us psychologically. Humiliation is real. The death of a beloved cultural figure should evoke collective sorrow in the nation, but Trump cannot rise to that behavior. Damage on top of damage.

Further damaging is knowing that fellow citizens have, through active bigotry and sadism, narrowed viewpoints, or inattention, felt that Trump was worth voting for. We look around in a crowd and wonder who the negligent or guilty are, or we have family members who don’t see the damage.

We have hoped for relief for so long. We have welcomed incidents that would have taken down other presidents in the hope they would do the same for Trump, and he has prevailed. Finally, small beginnings of cracks in the cruelty seem to appear, although we have been disappointed so many times in the past.

We are also finding ways to fight back. But ten years of abuse has taken its toll. We are all tired and damaged, even as we start to move against the injustices.

I believe we will prevail.

* Title from Jamie Raskin.