On reading yet another article with interviews with mental health professionals explaining why Trump is both mentally unfit to be president and dangerous ('Beyond our current worst nightmares': Mental health experts warn about the likely effects of a Trump comeback) the following occurred to me:
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously said in his 1964 Order that he could not use words to describe pornography but "I know it when I see it." Unfortunately Trump supporters refuse to acknowledge mental illness in their cult leader when they seen it. Those who read articles by and interviews with mental health experts have known for a long time that Trump has every characteristic of a malignant personality. This is what eminent social psychologist Erich Fromm called a " 'severe mental sickness' representing 'the quintessence of evil"calling it "the most severe pathology and the root of the most vicious destructiveness and inhumanity". (In 1964's "The Heart of Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil."
With the rare exception of experts like John Gartner who in May 2017 wrote an article published in USA Today ("Donald Trump's malignant narcissism is toxic: Psychologist - Mental health professionals have a 'duty to warn' about a leader who may be unfit to serve") the large majority of the mental health professionals warning about Trump's dangerous psychopathology have shared their analysis and alarm in the progressive media. Bandy Lee, editor of "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump" met with a dozen Democratic members of Congress in Jan. 2018 to explain to them why Trump was mentally unfit to be president (Yale psychiatrist briefed members of Congress on Trump’s mental fitness). Those with open minds have been so well informed about Trump's psychopathology they might have well completed a graduate psychology course. Now the question is whether it is possible to enlighten those who still refuse to admit to themselves the psychological truth about Trump.
In 2019 cult expert Steven Hassan weighed in, again in another Chauncey DeVega Salon interview with “Can members of the Trump cult be deprogrammed after the leader falls? Steven Hassan says yes.” Fast forward to Jan. 2021 and we had articles like “What If Someone You Love is Trapped in the Trump Cult?” Six months later Healther “Digby” Parton wrote “How the Trump cult has become even more dangerous since he left office.”
I don’t find any of these articles or those like them reassuring. Trump led his cult with accidental effectiveness. He’d be considered an evil propaganda genius on par with Joseph Goebbels if he actually planned to sway masses of people to believe in him and his cause. Instead he was by sheer chance the right messenger with a compelling message of fear and hate however untethered from reality who came along at the right time to win the presidency the first time and to keep his cult intact after he lost the second time.
In August Thom Hartmann wrote (on Daily Kos) Trump's "Shared Psychosis" Is Destroying the Fabric of Society: There is a "Cure".
We know how Trump’s “shared psychosis” is destroying the fabric of society, but what is Hartmann’s cure? This is what Hartmann suggests:
Stop giving Trump any serious real-time coverage or echoing or amplifying his messages, and instead point out as often and as clearly as possible what a criminal, hustler, con artist and genuinely damaged person he is.
Replace him as the nation’s “father figure” with a man of compassion and understanding like President Joe Biden, and make clear how destructive his policies were when he was in office.
Break the bond with his followers by crushing his aura of invincibility: indict and convict him of very ordinary crimes like public corruption, tax fraud, bank fraud, theft and rape.
If we fail to deal with Trump in this way, it’ll be extremely difficult to rescue his followers who’ve fallen deeply into the Qanon/Trump rabbit hole.
And, like so many infamous leaders in history, he’ll simply attempt a comeback and further tear apart the psychological and political fabric of our nation.
If we are to save America, we must convict and imprison Trump for his lifetime of very real crimes.
Trump ending up in prison seems to me at least as likely as his having an undeniable psychotic break. As for ending media coverage of Trump, the mainstream and progressive media have to a large degree already stopped frequent coverage of him. I just don’t see Hartmann’s solutions as realistic. I think what needs to happen is out of our control. Trump must go, to use the colloquial term, batshit crazy in a nearly impossible way to excuse as just Trump being his over-the-top self, to break the hold he has on his cult.
I wrote about this last week in “Reading about Trump raging at the media for not supporting his big lie I wonder about psychosis.” I noted symptoms of psychosis. The most obvious ones (from WebMD) are:
Hallucinations: Someone might hear voices, see things that aren't there, or feel sensations on their skin even though nothing is touching their body.
Delusions: These are false beliefs that someone refuses to give up, even in the face of facts.
- Speech or language that doesn't make sense
- Unusual behavior and dress
- Problems with memory
- Disorientation or confusion
- Changes in eating or sleeping habits, energy level, or weight
- Not being able to make decisions
Keep in mind the above symptoms and consider how many Trump may already be exhibiting.
Most of Trump's supporters are so well and thoroughly brainwashed that the only way they will accept that he is truly mentally ill and because of this is no longer a worthy leader is that if he comes to his next rally wrapped head to toe in aluminum foil in abject panic ranting about space aliens bombarding him with skin devouring bugs which he frantically tries to scrape off his body. Even then there'd be a few in his audience who believed him to the extent they'd experience the same psychotic symptoms. Bandy Lee wrote about this Trump contagion here.