The most dangerous feature of power and control is how it strips the truth. It eventually causes people to doubt their own perception. Authoritarian or power and control behaviors contain within them a process that results in brainwashing. Some research suggests that Trump supporters, on a continuum, are more authoritarian than the rest of us. www.politico.com/...It's important to note that the central feature of power and control is an attempt to control your perception, your experience, your personal truth and ultimately your behavior. This is done in a form of denial called Minimize, Deny and Blame. If you were ever wounded at the hands of power and control, you will have internalized this powerful defense mechanism. When Donald says, “it was no big deal, you are over reacting!”, he's defending himself and his own shame or fear of being caught doing something “wrong”. He doubles down, “it never happened”. And finally, “I had to do it, you made me”. The narcissist is disabled in his ability to regulate guilt and shame, so the narcissist regulates truth. The narcissist creates reality to fix the shame. This is the essence of the illness and the break from reality that is “mental health”.
The result is that this type of coping or denial invalidates the personal experiences of others. People who were raised in an authoritarian paradigm or where power and control were used to control behavior, are more susceptible to this defense mechanism. That is, they shut down in response to it. They have been taught that their perception of truth is less valid than the identified “authority”. This is the mechanism in Trump supporters that separates our perception from theirs. It's also why Trump supporters don't see his name calling or character assasination. They have been conditioned by years of power and control to believe that their own hurt feelings, pain and anguish from abuse, were invalid, unimportant, or over reaction. Therefore, they cannot see his offensive behaviors. Some of us were raised in power and control but if our pain was occasionally validated, if our parents used it sparingly, we learned NOT to behave in these authoritarian ways. We can be susceptible to it, but not develop the full scale use of it. Domestic violence relationships are notoriously authoritarian. The denial of the battered woman's or man’s experience was often internalized in early childhood as personal experiences were denied by an authoritarian in the house hold. We have all been subjected to varying degrees of this form of invalidation. This is the single most challenging aspect of the problem. Trump supporter cannot see him the way you do. It's physiological. No amount of trying to convince them will change their relationship with guilt and shame. It takes years of therapy to break through this defense mechanism. This is why African Americans can follow him, why women follow him. They cannot see the power and control if they have internalized it.
As a mental health therapist who spent years working both sides of domestic violence, I can tell you that the most damaging aspect is not the abuse and trauma (though this has its consequences and can result in death when it spirals) but instead what it does to the perception of truth. It's the break from reality, the divorce from self that perpetuates violence. Battered spouses also use minimize, deny and blame. They minimize the abuse, the pain, they deny their own experiences, they even blame themselves or their children. We are all in varying degrees of denial about violence in our lives. We are in denial as Americans. It is the essence of racism and sexism because of the process of invalidation inherent in the use of power and control. The power and control paradigm, like the denial of the alcoholic who cannot see that alcohol is killing them, is the same for the use of violence. Some of us are more in denial than others about this paradigm of behavior. Many cannot see that they use it and are susceptible to it. The more invalidated we are, the more blind we are to the paradigm. The very basic tenant of authoritarianism is the belief that the authority is unquestionable truth. In an authoritarian paradigm, truth is perceived in relation to fear, not a valid connection to reality. You believe the authoritarian because you must. You will be punished if you don't. Truth in an authoritarian frame is distinguished by the emotion of fear, guilt and shame, not reality. Not truth.
Trump literally cannot regulate guilt and shame. He will breach with truth before he will allow it. He will create his own truth to avoid feeling shame. Nothing we can do to change this. Force feeding shame sandwiches only enables and solidifies his break from truth. We need to come to acceptance about this aspect of Trump leadership. He has demonstrated this behavior, this defense mechanism in an invariable way. And he will escalate in response to all attempts to hold him accountable. It really does help, in my opinion to know what it is and why it's happening. He will never admit his mistakes or validate the feelings of his opponent. This is the crux of the brain wash. His minimizing, denying and blaming literally causes us to think it must be no big deal. We are already tolerating unacceptable behavior. We are the frog in the pot. We will not change Trump and his followers. Their denial, just like the alcoholic is physiological. Their brains have shut out the truths that relate to violence. They have been taught not to attend to the feelings of the experience of power and control. They are at higher risk to repeat these behaviors in marriage, work and family life or to be victims of it. If you don't believe me look for these mechanisms in Trump. You will see how often he employs this defense mechanism.
- 1) Deny. There is no racism, sexism, homophobia or xenophobia. It doesn't exist. It never happens. And we aren't doing anything to hurt you to deny it. There are no wounds. It's all in your heads. You imagined your beating, your rape, the names you were called and your pain.
- 2) Minimize. If it did happen, it was no big deal. Get over it. Stop whining. It didn't really hurt you. You are over reacting and hysterical.
- 3) Blame. If it did happen and it did hurt you...It's your own damn fault.
The following is is a list of behaviors linked to power and control. These behaviors are the under pinning of violence. These behaviors must occur long before violence begins. These are the seeds. But make no mistake, the invalidation is the behavior that perpetuates it. Without this part of the process, our emotions, our experiences would cause us to fight harder against it. But invalidation, chronic, consistent invalidation of our personal experience eventually causes us to look to regulate the authoritarian by behaving instead of regulating ourselves. We give up our emotional response out of fear, guilt and shame.
The Behaviors of Power and Control (seeds of violence)
Intimidation: police forces, militia, tanks, weapons and military displays. Yelling. To cause fear.
Mind Games: Name calling, put downs, comparisons, gas lighting. Meant to cause self doubt. To gut you from your own perception.
Isolation: Jail, confinement. Prison camps. Military camps. Gated communities. To separate rate. To conquer and divide. To keep us from validating each other, comparing notes, and rising up.
Minimize, Deny and Blame: Whatever the pain related to wound, it's no big deal, it didn't happen, if it did happen, it's your fault. Again, this one is part of a soul death, meant to take the fight, the truth, out of you. Over time, it steals your truth. And consequently it erases YOU!
People as Objects: Labels, Stereotypes, Roles. These take away the journey of truth and connection. I don't need to engage you, for fear I would run into your truth. I stick to the labels to avoid my shame and to avoid delving into unknowns. I don't need to get to know you. I already know all I need to know. Again, when you experience this chronically over time, you become invisible, your individuality becomes less validated and less visible, less valued. It's demoralizing.
Authority: I am more important, more knowledgeable and more right than you. Therefore I am ENTITLED to do what ever I want. This done to you makes you invisible. Your truth does not matter.
Using Economics: If I control your access to money, I control your power. There is no free market or carpenters, blue collar workers, teachers, nurses, docs would be paid as to the importance, our desire for their work. The upper percent control this by regulating pay. Keeping wages down and basically setting the market value for themselves. Without money we struggle for power.
Threats and coercion: Uses fear to over ride truth. If I keep you in fear, it doesn't matter what the truth is, because you will be forced into a defensive position. They killed the fearless like Jesus, Martin Luther King, and Jailed Ghandi.
The fearless cannot be controlled. They will work tirelessly to fight back with truth in whatever ways possible. The more truth, the more validity, the more threat will be used to scare you. It's meant to distract you from truth, make you run away and avoid. But in these cases not speaking truth, is imminent danger.
Notice as you look at the list that this is the way we do basic training. Military training, prisons, and even public education use varying degrees of power and control. This process, this brain washing both causes shame and denies it, but does not allow that shame to be regulated. Shame is an emotion that keeps us from doing behaviors that could get us kicked out of our tribe, or group. It, like guilt helps us regulate behavior. Guilt occurs when we breach from our own values and morals. It helps us stay on track. Shame occurs when we breach from the values of our group. It's powerful because without it we could be abandoned. If we have been shamed for spilling milk or making normal mistakes of being human we end up unable to regulate the emotion. It over takes us and we feel bad about who we are. In a narcissist the feeling of shame has become so powerful that it forces the narcissist to hide from truth. They hide from themselves. The action urge that goes with shame, is to hide. It makes sense then, that the narcissist is literally so afraid to see himself, so afraid of being wrong, that he will deny reality. This denial of reality has a ripple effect for all around them, it's contagious because, it replaces self perception with the perception of the authority. You must accept their version of truth or they will punish you. This creates a crises within. It causes us to doubt our perception and forces compliance, not only in behavior but in perception. It is brain washing. And it's cyclical. It perpetuates through the mechanism of denial. We as Americans are in denial about slavery, American Indians, the treatment of women and children and finally the treatment of animals and ultimately the earth. Truth and compassion, love and acceptance are the cure. Call in Jesus, Buddha, Martin Luther King Jr, and that's the answer. We have to be the change and get out of perpetuating this cycle.
We are wasting our time trying to talk to Trump supporters by shaming them. We will only force them deeper into denial. Just as we have found in treating alcoholism and addictions, using anger, shame and interventions only tends to send them deeper in denial. What works? Acceptance of the truth. Living in truth with an addict, not condoning or enabling OR shaming, is what allows the shame cycle, the denial, to finally shift to acceptance. We have to build bridges not walls, stop using power and control ourselves against them and instead be an advocate for truth. Acceptance is the first step of change. In a power and control paradigm we focus on change before acceptance. Healthy change occurs once we radically accept the truth of our circumstances. To the authoritarian, truth is irrelevant. To create positive, effective change, truth is God, and God is truth. Speak truth, be aware of the denial, understand that shame only escalates anger as a defense mechanism and perpetuates denial. People have asked why are Trump supporters so angry?? This is why. This is why they get unhinged if they are confronted. This is why truth does not matter, this is why they have no compassion, this is why they can't see that the emperor has no clothes. Understand this mechanism, accept this reality, and it changes how we interact with them and perhaps it changes our destiny. Be the change.