This is a followup to Bob Burnett’s essay “Donald Trump, Cult Leader.”
Please read it and then come back to this. Burnett makes a cogent and compelling case for many of Trump voters, indeed, Trump followers, being members of a cult because it's based on Trump, it’s vision is apocalyptic, it is not reality-based, it has it's own media and it is bigoted and angry.
In the middle of his Time essay about his impressions of Fidel Castro, who he met, Joe Klein wrote this about Trump:
There has never been a presidential candidate more caught up with style over substance than Donald Trump. His diversionary tweets about voting fraud and flag burning are all about populist class warfare. His search for a Secretary of State has become a reality-TV show: The Policy Bachelor.
You may need a subscription to read the Time article “Style over substance: Why Fidel Castro’s revolutionary chic was a fraud. What we have seen with Trump is that like Fidel he broke all the rules of decorum and style for a presidential candidate. He’s the first presidential candidate to wear a cheap baseball hat. Here’s what the Washington Post had to say about that:
Donald Trump, marketer extraordinaire, recognized last summer that he had an opportunity to have his campaign slogan appear in every single photo in which he appeared. Find a photo of Trump from July or August, and there's his campaign slogan. It's on his hat. Like those backdrops they use at celebrity red carpet events, step-and-repeats, meant to ensure that sponsor logos appear every time a glamorous photo of Jennifer Lawrence shows up on TMZ. www.washingtonpost.com/…
There have been many heads of state who promoted a cult following. Chairman Mao is but one example. In fact, the Mao Cult was recognized as a major factor in his success:
One of the most visible features of the Cultural Revolution was the cult of Mao Zedong. This personality cult was fuelled by the fanaticism of the Red Guards, pro-Mao propaganda and the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) control of information. Mao’s leadership – or, more precisely, public perceptions of his leadership – made him the subject of respect and adoration. The cult of Mao intensified during the Cultural Revolution. During this period the Chairman was depicted as an ideological visionary, a political genius, a guardian of his people and a kindly and benevolent leader. Mao’s achievements were exaggerated and glorified, while his shortcomings were suppressed or concealed. The failings and brutalities of Mao-era China were concealed or explained away and blamed on others. Meanwhile, as this personality cult intensified, Mao’s power over the party and his control of China both increased. alphahistory.com/...
Trump doesn’t have his visage displayed in every village and city, but he loves to have TRUMP displayed wherever he can.
I don’t think anyone likes to admit that they are a member of a cult. Let’s face it, nobody likes to say they were conned when the evidence mounts that they were gullible, and that they swallowed a huckster’s bait hook, line and sinker. Cult members are extremely resistant to change. That’s why it sometimes requires inpatient treatment — or informal and potentially dangerous “deprogramming.”
Discussing Scientology or Heaven’s Gate shouldn’t be necessary since much has been written about it’s lure. Suffice to say that these particular cults have the basic characteristics of any cult of personality of a political leader.
I think it will be helpful to start to write more about the cult of Trump. Will this work? Who knows? I’m pessimistic.
There are many American’s who have been waiting for a god emperor and don’t find it a bit disquieting that he choose to have Time Magazine photograph him in his palace for their Person of the Year article, which he thinks is an honor and is successfully selling that lie to his cult.