Update: Donald Trump captured in hot-mic-moment after his coronavirus address
click below to watch
Trump gave up his usual arms tightly and smugly crossed pose for yesterday’s Oval Office speech about Coronavirus.
The common interpretation of the arms crossed pose is defensiveness, but there is more to it than that. Read 9 Truths Exposing a Myth About Body Language and note that Trump fits the the “Power Pose” when men in particular will use the crossed arms pose to make themselves look bigger. In his case he uses it mostly when seated and can't tower over shorter people.
Perhaps this is because he hasn’t mastered the frozen hands grasped in the front pose general used by speakers who either are speaking about a grave matter which they are concerned about or want to look that way.
Maybe someone suggested that his I’m master of the universe and I don't give two shits about what anybody else has to say hugging himself pose wasn't appropriate for a coronavirus speech.
In order for this pose to work as intended one has to at least pretend they are praying and not have the heebie-jeebie hands. I have to say, Trump has actually mastered the fake praying pretty well. Perhaps not talking and keeping his eyes closed is the key, and most likely lamenting about what he has to go through to keep his evangelicals happy.
I can see why he affects the crossed arms pose because this prevents him from revealing how nervous he is. The only times his hands appeared to convey what his mouth was say was when he spread them apart in a gesture meant to show what a great job he was doing and again to say stop the partisanship, the later the most hypocritical part of the speech.
Watch the video again and just pay attention to his thumps which are more animated than his lidocained face and his emotionless oratory.
POLL
People like Donald Trump have rigid psychological defenses and rarely if every feel anxiety. Look at this anxiety scale and then ask yourself to what extent you think these defenses have broken down and are no longer working for him.