Is Donald Trump Mentally Ill?

stumbler · Oct 26, 2020

conroe4 said: ↑

He's crazy as hell for putting up with all the crap thrown at him. I would have long said FUCK YOU LEFTISTS.
I don't need your bullshit. your lies. your hate. your disruption. your hate for America. Fuck you each and every one.

But he didn't. And he's about to give us another 4 years of great leadership. And boy, are the cry-babies gonna unleash the tears.
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shy guy said: ↑

The true mentally ill believe they're healthy and everyone else is crazy, spending an inordinate amount of time trying to convince others, Trump does neither, ...others keep insisting Trump is crazy...endlessly!
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shootersa said: ↑

Biden?
Really?
Harris.
Really.
Hunter!
Shit!
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Many mental health experts are explaining that simply defeating Trump will not be enough because his supporters like you guys are still suffering from a shared psychosis. And so we need to be able to understand your mental illness, take steps to protect the rest of us from you, deprogram you, and hope you can get better.

His fans ‘would follow Trump off a cliff’: 14 key traits revealed in psychological analysis of people who support the president

As he himself said even before he won the presidential election in 2016, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.” Unfortunately for the American people, this wild-sounding claim appears to be truer than not, at least for the majority of his supporters, and that is something that should disturb us. It should also motivate us to explore the science underlying such peculiar human behavior, so we can learn from it, and potentially inoculate against it.

In all fairness, we should recognize that lying is sadly not uncommon for politicians on both sides of the political aisle, but the frequency and magnitude of the current president’s lies should have us all wondering why they haven’t destroyed his political career, and instead perhaps strengthened it. Similarly, we should be asking why his inflammatory rhetoric and numerous scandals haven’t sunk him. We are talking about a man who was caught on tape saying, “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab them by the pussy.” Politically surviving that video is not normal, or anything close to it, and we can be sure that such a revelation would have been the end of Barack Obama or George Bush had it surfaced weeks before the election.

While dozens of psychologists have analyzed Trump, to explain the man’s political invincibility, it is more important to understand the minds of his staunch supporters. While there have been various popular articles that have illuminated a multitude of reasons for his unwavering support, there appears to be no comprehensive analysis that contains all of them. Since there seems to be a real demand for this information, I have tried to provide that analysis below.
Some of the explanations come from a 2017 review paper published in the Journal of Social and Political Psychology by the psychologist and UC Santa Cruz professor Thomas Pettigrew. Others have been put forth as far back as 2016 by myself, a cognitive neuroscience and psychology researcher, in various articles and blog posts for publications like Psychology Today. A number of these were inspired by insights from psychologists like Sheldon Solomon, who laid the groundwork for the influential Terror Management Theory, and David Dunning, who did the same for the Dunning-Kruger effect

This list will begin with the more benign reasons for Trump’s intransigent support, and as the list goes on, the explanations become increasingly worrisome, and toward the end, border on the pathological. It should be strongly emphasized that not all Trump supporters are racist, mentally vulnerable, or fundamentally bad people. It can be detrimental to society when those with degrees and platforms try to demonize their political opponents or paint them as mentally ill when they are not. That being said, it is just as harmful to pretend that there are not clear psychological and neural factors that underlie much of Trump supporters’ unbridled allegiance.

The psychological phenomena described below mostly pertain to those supporters who would follow Trump off a cliff. These are the people who will stand by his side no matter what scandals come to light, or what sort of evidence for immoral and illegal behavior surfaces.

Practicality Trumps Morality

For some wealthy people, it’s simply a financial matter. Trump offers tax cuts for the rich and wants to do away with government regulation that gets in the way of businessmen making money, even when that regulation exists for the purpose of protecting the environment. Others, like blue-collared workers, like the fact that the president is trying to bring jobs back to America from places like China. Some people who genuinely are not racist (those who are will be discussed later) simply want stronger immigration laws because they know that a country with open borders is not sustainable. These people have put their practical concerns above their moral ones. To them, it does not matter if he’s a vagina-grabber, or if his campaign team colluded with Russia to help him defeat his political opponent. It is unknown whether these people are eternally bound to Trump in the way others are, but we may soon find out if the Mueller investigation is allowed to come to completion.

The Brain’s Attention System Is More Strongly Engaged by Trump

According to a study that monitored brain activity while participants watched 40 minutes of political ads and debate clips from the presidential candidates, Donald Trump is unique in his ability to keep the brain engaged. While Hillary Clinton could only hold attention for so long, Trump kept both attention and emotional arousal high throughout the viewing session. This pattern of activity was seen even when Trump made remarks that individuals didn’t necessarily agree with. His showmanship and simple language clearly resonate with some at a visceral level.

America’s Obsession with Entertainment and Celebrities

Essentially, the loyalty of Trump supporters may in part be explained by America’s addiction with entertainment and reality TV. To some, it doesn’t matter what Trump actually says because he’s so amusing to watch. With the Donald, you are always left wondering what outrageous thing he is going to say or do next. He keeps us on the edge of our seat, and for that reason, some Trump supporters will forgive anything he says. They are happy as long as they are kept entertained.

“Some Men Just Want to Watch the World Burn.”

Some intelligent people who know better are supporting Trump simply to be rebellious or to introduce chaos into the political system. They may have such distaste for the establishment and Democrats like Hillary Clinton that their support for Trump is a symbolic middle finger directed at Washington. These people do not have their priorities straight, and perhaps have other issues, like an innate desire to troll others, or a deranged obsession with schadenfreude.

The Fear-Factor: Conservatives Are More Sensitive to Threat

Science has unequivocally shown that the conservative brain has an exaggerated fear response when faced with stimuli that may be perceived as threatening. A 2008 study in the journal Science found that conservatives have a stronger physiological reaction to startling noises and graphic images compared to liberals. A brain-imaging study published in Current Biology revealed that those who lean right politically tend to have a larger amygdala — a structure that is electrically active during states of fear and anxiety. And a 2014 fMRI study found that it is possible to predict whether someone is a liberal or conservative simply by looking at their brain activity while they view threatening or disgusting images, such as mutilated bodies. Specifically, the brains of self-identified conservatives generated more activity overall in response to the disturbing images.

These brain responses are automatic, and not influenced by logic or reason. As long as Trump continues his fear mongering by constantly portraying Muslims and Hispanic immigrants as imminent dangers, many conservative brains will involuntarily light up like light bulbs being controlled by a switch. Fear keeps his followers energized and focused on safety. And when you think you’ve found your protector, you become less concerned with offensive and divisive remarks.

The Power of Mortality Reminders and Perceived Existential Threat

A well-supported theory from social psychology, known as Terror Management Theory, explains why Trump’s fear mongering is doubly effective. The theory is based on the fact that humans have a unique awareness of their own mortality. The inevitability of one’s death creates existential terror and anxiety that is always residing below the surface. In order to manage this terror, humans adopt cultural worldviews — like religions, political ideologies, and national identities — that act as a buffer by instilling life with meaning and value.

Terror Management Theory predicts that when people are reminded of their own mortality, which happens with fear mongering, they will more strongly defend those who share their worldviews and national or ethnic identity, and act out more aggressively towards those who do not. Hundreds of studies have confirmed this hypothesis, and some have specifically shown that triggering thoughts of death tends to shift people towards the right.

Not only do death reminders increase nationalism, they influence actual voting habits in favor of more conservative presidential candidates. And more disturbingly, in a study with American students, scientists found that making mortality salient increased support for extreme military interventions by American forces that could kill thousands of civilians overseas. Interestingly, the effect was present only in conservatives, which can likely be attributed to their heightened fear response.

By constantly emphasizing existential threat, Trump creates a psychological condition that makes the brain respond positively rather than negatively to bigoted statements and divisive rhetoric. Liberals and Independents who have been puzzled over why Trump hasn’t lost supporters after such highly offensive comments need look no further than Terror Management Theory.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect: Humans Often Overestimate Their Political Expertise

Some support Donald Trump do so out of ignorance — basically they are under-informed or misinformed about the issues at hand. When Trump tells them that crime is skyrocketing in the United States, or that the economy is the worst it’s ever been, they simply take his word for it.

The Dunning-Kruger effect explains that the problem isn’t just that they are misinformed; it’s that they are completely unaware that they are misinformed, which creates a double burden.

Studies have shown that people who lack expertise in some area of knowledge often have a cognitive bias that prevents them from realizing that they lack expertise. As psychologist David Dunning puts it in an op-ed for Politico, “The knowledge and intelligence that are required to be good at a task are often the same qualities needed to recognize that one is not good at that task — and if one lacks such knowledge and intelligence, one remains ignorant that one is not good at the task. This includes political judgment.” These people cannot be reached because they mistakenly believe they are the ones who should be reaching others.

Relative Deprivation — A Misguided Sense of Entitlement

Relative deprivation refers to the experience of being deprived of something to which one believes they are entitled. It is the discontent felt when one compares their position in life to others who they feel are equal or inferior but have unfairly had more success than them.

Common explanations for Trump’s popularity among non-bigoted voters involve economics. There is no doubt that some Trump supporters are simply angry that American jobs are being lost to Mexico and China, which is certainly understandable, although these loyalists often ignore the fact that some of these careers are actually being lost due to the accelerating pace of automation.

These Trump supporters are experiencing relative deprivation, and are common among the swing states like Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. This kind of deprivation is specifically referred to as “relative,” as opposed to “absolute,” because the feeling is often based on a skewed perception of what one is entitled to.

Lack of Exposure to Dissimilar Others

Intergroup contact refers to contact with members of groups that are outside one’s own, which has been experimentally shown to reduce prejudice. As such, it’s important to note that there is growing evidence that Trump’s white supporters have experienced significantly less contact with minorities than other Americans. For example, a 2016 study found that “…the racial and ethnic isolation of Whites at the zip-code level is one of the strongest predictors of Trump support.” This correlation persisted while controlling for dozens of other variables. In agreement with this finding, the same researchers found that support for Trump increased with the voters’ physical distance from the Mexican border. These racial biases might be more implicit than explicit, the latter which is addressed in #14.

Trump’s Conspiracy Theories Target the Mentally Vulnerable

While the conspiracy theory crowd — who predominantly support Donald Trump and crackpot allies like Alex Jones and the shadowy QAnon — may appear to just be an odd quirk of modern society, the truth is that many of them suffer from psychological illnesses that involve paranoia and delusions, such as schizophrenia, or are at least vulnerable to them, like those with schizotypy personalities.

The link between schizotypy and belief in conspiracy theories is well-established, and a recent study published in the journal Psychiatry Research has demonstrated that it is still very prevalent in the population. The researchers found that those who were more likely to believe in outlandish conspiracy theories, such as the idea that the U.S. government created the AIDs epidemic, consistently scored high on measures of “odd beliefs and magical thinking.” One feature of magical thinking is a tendency to make connections between things that are actually unrelated in reality.

Donald Trump and his media allies target these people directly. All one has to do is visit alt-right websites and discussion boards to see the evidence for such manipulation.

Trump Taps into the Nation’s Collective Narcissism

Collective narcissism is an unrealistic shared belief in the greatness of one’s national group. It often occurs when a group who believes it represents the ‘true identity’ of a nation — the ‘ingroup,’ in this case White Americans — perceives itself as being disadvantaged compared to outgroups who are getting ahead of them ‘unrightfully.’ This psychological phenomenon is related to relative deprivation (#6).

A study published last year in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science found a direct link between national collective narcissism and support for Donald Trump. This correlation was discovered by researchers at the University of Warsaw, who surveyed over 400 Americans with a series of questionnaires about political and social beliefs. Where individual narcissism causes aggressiveness toward other individuals, collective narcissism involves negative attitudes and aggression toward ‘outsider’ groups (outgroups), who are perceived as threats.

Donald Trump exacerbates collective narcissism with his anti-immigrant, anti-elitist, and strongly nationalistic rhetoric. By referring to his supporters, an overwhelmingly white group, as being “true patriots” or “real Americans,” he promotes a brand of populism that is the epitome of “identity politics,” a term that is usually associated with the political left. Left-wing identity politics, as misguided as they may sometimes be, are generally aimed at achieving equality, while the right-wing brand is based on a belief that one nationality and race is superior or entitled to success and wealth for no other reason than identity.

The Desire to Want to Dominate Others

Social dominance orientation (SDO) — which is distinct but related to authoritarian personality syndrome (#13) — refers to people who have a preference for the societal hierarchy of groups, specifically with a structure in which the high-status groups have dominance over the low-status ones. Those with SDO are typically dominant, tough-minded, and driven by self-interest.

In Trump’s speeches, he appeals to those with SDO by repeatedly making a clear distinction between groups that have a generally higher status in society (White), and those groups that are typically thought of as belonging to a lower status (immigrants and minorities). A 2016 survey study of 406 American adults published last year in the journal Personality and Individual Differences found that those who scored high on both SDO and authoritarianism were those who intended to vote for Trump in the election.

Authoritarian Personality Syndrome

Authoritarianism refers to the advocacy or enforcement of strict obedience to authority at the expense of personal freedom, and is commonly associated with a lack of concern for the opinions or needs of others. Authoritarian personality syndrome — a well-studied and globally-prevalent condition — is a state of mind that is characterized by belief in total and complete obedience to one’s authority. Those with the syndrome often display aggression toward outgroup members, submissiveness to authority, resistance to new experiences, and a rigid hierarchical view of society. The syndrome is often triggered by fear, making it easy for leaders who exaggerate threat or fear monger to gain their allegiance.

Although authoritarian personality is found among liberals, it is more common among the right-wing around the world. President Trump’s speeches, which are laced with absolutist terms like “losers” and “complete disasters,” are naturally appealing to those with the syndrome.

While research showed that Republican voters in the U.S. scored higher than Democrats on measures of authoritarianism before Trump emerged on the political scene, a 2016 Politico survey found that high authoritarians greatly favored then-candidate Trump, which led to a correct prediction that he would win the election, despite the polls saying otherwise

Racism and Bigotry

It would be grossly unfair and inaccurate to say that every one of Trump’s supporters have prejudice against ethnic and religious minorities, but it would be equally inaccurate to say that many do not. It is a well-known fact that the Republican party, going at least as far back to Richard Nixon’s “southern strategy,” used tactics that appealed to bigotry, such as lacing speeches with “dog whistles” — code words that signaled prejudice toward minorities that were designed to be heard by racists but no one else.

While the dog whistles of the past were subtler, Trump’s signaling is sometimes shockingly direct. There’s no denying that he routinely appeals to racist and bigoted supporters when he calls Muslims “dangerous” and Mexican immigrants “rapists” and “murderers,” often in a blanketed fashion. Perhaps unsurprisingly, a recent study has shown that support for Trump is correlated with a standard scale of modern racism.

Bobby Azarian is a neuroscientist affiliated with George Mason University and a freelance journalist. His research has been published in journals such as Cognition & Emotion and Human Brain Mapping, and he has written for The New York Times, The Atlantic, Psychology Today, and Scientific American. Follow him on Twitter @BobbyAzarian.
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https://www.rawstory.com/2020/10/hi...analysis-of-people-who-support-the-president/

stumbler · Nov 1, 2020

‘Vile’ Trump is inciting his supporters to commit violence because he knows ‘he can’t win legitimately’: Mary Trump

Appearing on MSNBC on Sunday afternoon, Donald Trump’s niece Mary expressed disgust with the president praising supporters who surrounded a Biden/Harris bus in Texas on Saturday, almost forcing it off the road.

Speaking with host Jonathan Capehart as they watched clips of the president speaking at a Sunday rally, Mary Trump called her uncle “vile” and said he is inciting his followers to commit more violence.

“As if my blood pressure weren’t high enough,” she began. “He is vile. He is actively calling on American citizens to commit violence against other American citizens simply for voicing their opinions.”

“This is so dangerous,” she added. “He is doing the same thing with his armed supporters to go watch the polls. And we know which neighborhoods he’s sending these people to. So, it can’t be clearer what he is doing. Please understand that he will allow violence to be committed in his name in order to take this election because he knows he can’t win it legitimately.”

Watch below:
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https://www.rawstory.com/2020/11/vi...he-knows-he-cant-win-legitimately-mary-trump/

stumbler · Nov 2, 2020

Famed psychologist: Trump’s worsening Twitter mania and extreme grandiosity show he is mentally unraveling

This continues the series, “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump Revisited: Mental Health Experts on the Devastating Mishandling of a Pandemic.” Whereas we could not have predicted a pandemic three-and-a-half years ago, the authors of The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 37 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President anticipated how the president would respond, should there be a crisis. We tried to warn the public of the very consequences that are unfolding today: abuse of power, incompetence, loss of lives and livelihoods of many Americans, and increasing violence.

Philip Zimbardo, Ph.D., professor emeritus at Stanford University, is a scholar, educator, and researcher. Zimbardo is perhaps best known for his landmark Stanford prison study. Among his more than five hundred publications are the best seller The Lucifer Effect and such notable psychology textbooks as Psychology: Core Concepts, 8th edition, and Psychology and Life, now in its 20th edition. He is founder and president of the Heroic Imagination Project (heroicimagination.org), a worldwide nonprofit teaching people of all ages how to take wise and effective action in challenging situations. He continues to research the effects of time perspectives and time perspective therapy.

Lee: Your lifetime work in social psychology and more recently on time perception have guided me and others for a long time, but especially since the beginning of our publicly speaking up. What are your current observations on Donald Trump?

Zimbardo: Our president has two new distinctions: first the analog of the worst prison guards of the Stanford prison experiment; and secondly, he is the most extreme present hedonist in the universe. Two quotes that exemplify part of my presentation that will follow are, first, Trump’s desire for dominance over everyone can be fully realized as his new role as the mean prison guard who rules over all citizens as his imaginary prisoners. And secondly, as an extreme present hedonist, Trump makes important national and international decisions, as we just heard from the previous speaker, without ever thinking about the future consequences. He also becomes addicted to any activity that is novel and readily accessible, notably Trump’s Twitter mania.

How have you come to these conclusions?

First, Trump as domineering prison guard. I often analogize between Donald Trump and the worst prison guard in my Stanford prison experiment. That student, who by chance was assigned to play a prison guard, soon internalized that role in the extreme. He reported later that he felt as if he were a puppeteer, and the prisoners, who were other students, were his puppets. That he could make them do anything by pulling their strings. This total dehumanization of others is like a dictatorial mindset that characterizes much of Trump’s treatment of everyone, starting with his personal staff, his appointed team, extending to women, American minorities, immigrants, climate scientists, victims of extreme natural disasters, and all political opponents. Power is Trump’s aphrodisiac. And then I want to add another of his mindless addictions. Virtually everything he has done publicly since becoming president of the United States is part of his addiction.

Secondly, Trump’s previous manifestation of sexual addiction pales in comparison to his recent Twitter over-the-top addiction. In the past three years he has made almost 22,000 “tweets.” His “tweets” have been regularly increasing: 6.5 daily in 2017, eight daily in 2018, almost ten daily in 2019, and, so far, more than 34 daily in 2020! As he becomes more manic, his Twitter explosion has been as high as 200 “tweets” on one day and night in June 2020.

Many of these “tweets” reflect his egocentric megalomania and extreme grandiosity, as Trump is praising himself as brilliant: “I’m a stable genius.” Even more self-aggrandizing assertions such as being able to achieve anything he wants to that no other American president in all of history has ever been able to do, and that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize.

You have described since the beginning what people find to be the most compelling characteristic about him: his present hedonism. Would you explain what that is?

As an extreme present hedonist, Trump lives in the moment without any concern for the validity or prior foundation of any of his assertions. Since becoming president, Donald Trump has made over 20,000 lies, more for misleading claims, many of them repeated hundreds of times, and have been rising exponentially over the years. These conclusions are based on decades of scientific research on the psychology of time perspective. I developed a scale called “the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory,” and we studied people around the world, and to be a present hedonist means you live in the moment, you seek novelty, you live only for enjoyment, you never think about the future, you never link what you are doing now to its future consequences. My inventory is the most reliable and valid measure of individual differences in time perspective, and many researchers and businesspeople around the world are using it.

Is there anything else you would like to add?

He is also an extreme narcissist. Everything is about I, he, and me. We saw this in the first debate where he was uncontainable. They could not hold him down, he was oozing all over the place! In the second debate where they had a mute, he was contained, but two interesting things. The moderator asked Joe Biden and Donald Trump: “Imagine you are elected as president in the next election, what would your acceptance speech be to the nation?” And Biden said, this means you have to imagine, something that is going to happen next month, and Biden accepted that and simply said, “My fellow Americans, as your president, I will do the following three things.” When it was Trump’s turn—this is his most fervent desire, to be the president—he could not do that. He could not project himself into that future, and he kept complaining about what he had been talking about earlier, that people do not appreciate what he has done, he is under-appreciated. So, that is one instance.

Recently, he has been going around the nation. He actually loves being up on the stage. He loves these things. Recently, he was going on and on about how washing machines and showers waste water. But not just mentioning it, taking five to ten minutes to this audience, what this was, he was following up on Biden’s sense at that, he is not interested in conservations. He is not interested that we have to do to conserve our resources, given the climate change. His inability to project what is needed by America to go from where we are to where we should be, and also what it means to be a present hedonist is, you seek novelty. You are bored by sameness. And he has virtually said this: “The problem with COVID-19 is it keeps coming on, it is on and on. It is boring.” Waving his hand, he said: “Let us get past it, let us get by it, let us get on.” So, these are the traits that make him totally unfit to be a president, make him unfit to be anything, and continues to be a danger. One thing that can happen is, we vote him out of office.

Read previous interviews with Dr. Robert Jay Lifton, Dr. Judith Herman, Dr. James Gilligan, and Drs. Dee Mosbacher and Nanette Gartrell.

Follow Dr. Lee at bandylee.com.
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https://www.rawstory.com/2020/11/fa...e-grandiosity-show-he-is-mentally-unraveling/

latecomer91364 · Nov 2, 2020

shootersa · Nov 2, 2020

Its OK, 24 hours and they'll have all kinds of new butt hurt to twirl about.

Or, should Biden win, we'll be subjected to a week or so of nyah nyah nyah stuff. And then the payback can start.

deleted user 555 768 · Nov 2, 2020

shy guy said: ↑

Someone has a never ending .....

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Distant Lover · Nov 6, 2020

The New York Daily News, November 5, 2020

Trump’s mental pathology, confirmed

By Dr. Bandy X. Lee

Donald Trump’s declaration of victory on election night when he lacked even an Electoral College lead reveals his plans for destruction of norms and potential for violence. Like an emotional seismograph, he has calibrated his words and actions to what he senses he can get away with, and he clearly understands he has a chance if he can disdain, maltreat and even sicken and kill his followers “without losing any votes.”

His post-election gambit confirms once again that he is more dangerous than the typically dangerous leaders of the past because of two factors: his irrational followership and the enormous powers of the U.S. presidency.

The coming weeks and months will be the most dangerous period of this presidency, during which we can expect Donald Trump to go to any lengths to stay in power. The inability of the media to change its coverage significantly and the American Psychiatric Association’s refusal to retract its detrimental “gag rule” have been ominous signs. The abuser of the nation, bloated with entitlement and delusions of impunity over the years, is maximally positioned to threaten the victim who tries to leave the relationship with him.

Lee is a forensic psychiatrist, president of the World Mental Health Coalition and author of “Profile of a Nation: Trump’s Mind, America’s Soul.”

---------

I am uncomfortable with a psychiatric explanation of evil. Most neurotics are harmless. Many are well meaning. They are simply more afraid and depressed than they need to be. Nevertheless, a powerful person who is unnecessarily angry and suspicious can be dangerous.

Distant Lover · Nov 6, 2020

stumbler said: ↑

Many mental health experts are explaining that simply defeating Trump will not be enough because his supporters like you guys are still suffering from a shared psychosis. And so we need to be able to understand your mental illness, take steps to protect the rest of us from you, deprogram you, and hope you can get better.

His fans ‘would follow Trump off a cliff’: 14 key traits revealed in psychological analysis of people who support the president

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/10/hi...analysis-of-people-who-support-the-president/
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This is an interesting article, but I question this assertion:

Lack of Exposure to Dissimilar Others

"Intergroup contact refers to contact with members of groups that are outside one’s own, which has been experimentally shown to reduce prejudice. As such, it’s important to note that there is growing evidence that Trump’s white supporters have experienced significantly less contact with minorities than other Americans. For example, a 2016 study found that “…the racial and ethnic isolation of Whites at the zip-code level is one of the strongest predictors of Trump support.” This correlation persisted while controlling for dozens of other variables. In agreement with this finding, the same researchers found that support for Trump increased with the voters’ physical distance from the Mexican border. These racial biases might be more implicit than explicit, the latter which is addressed in #14."

If this was true we would expect Southern whites to be less hostile to blacks than whites in other parts of the United States. Instead, they tend to be more hostile. In my interactions with whites, both in person and on the internet, I have found that the most anti black whites are those who attended black majority public schools as students, or who taught at schools where blacks made up most of the student body.

In my own life, exposure to Jews and Orientals has increased my esteem for those groups. I learned to like them by living with them, by going to school with them, and by working with them. Exposure to blacks has had the opposite effect. I never attended a school where the percentage of blacks was over 5%. Usually it was less. When I had less experience with blacks I had a higher opinion of the Negro race than I do now.

A different point I would like to make, is that on the internet one may be expected to be more candid about one's opinions than in person. Among internet posters - this includes our own valued shootersa - I do not encounter unquestioning admiration for Trump. The consensus seems to be: "Yes he has flaws, but we live in dangerous times, and his opponents are worse."

stumbler · Nov 15, 2020

This phenomena explains what’s wrong with Trump supporters’ brains: report

A woman comes face-to-face with Donald Trump at a rally (Reuters)

In a column for the Daily Beast, Jay Michaelson suggests Donald Trump “dead-enders” will never accept that the president lost his re-election because they are not psychologically capable of letting go of their deeply held beliefs.

As Michaelson writes, Donald Trump has spent the last four years distorting reality to serve his own ends and his rabid followers have lapped up his lies because they comport with their own beliefs and cognitive dissonance rules their world.

“Human beings will do just about anything to resolve contradictions between our deeply held beliefs about the world and the reality of the world itself. Cognitive dissonance is so unpleasant, so disordering and catastrophic for the ego, that no amount of absurd, tortured reasoning is worse than reality contradicting a deeply held belief,” he wrote before adding, “All of us try to resolve cognitive dissonance, but the Trump movement has been a years-long exercise in it. Election denial is its latest manifestation. But before that came COVID denial, science denial, climate denial, ‘alternative facts,’ the inability of Trump’s most devoted fans to see him for the obvious con man that he is, and, at the movement’s very core, denial of the social and demographic changes that are transforming America.”

As the columnist notes, supporters of the president who have been buffeted by reality are increasingly reaching for far-fetched conspiracy theories which helped along groups like QAnon.

“Cognitive dissonance is also a primary reason that people resort to conspiracy theories, which Trumpworld increasingly resembles, not only in fringe manifestations like QAnon but in the allegation of widespread fraud in the presidential election, which, of course, has no factual basis whatsoever and is, at this point, simply a conspiracy theory writ large,” he explained. “In this light, QAnon isn’t some weird, fringe phenomenon with no connection to populist politics. It’s a logical extension of the populist worldview. If ‘the people’ are actually the majority, then a sinister minority—Jews, ‘coastal elites’, the media, the Satanic pedophiles, whoever—is actually in control. It’s a short jump from that to full-blown conspiracy madness. And when the anointed messenger of ‘the people’ turns out to be a buffoon chiefly interested in his own enrichment, well, that must all be a ruse. Or a media conspiracy. Or whatever.”

You can read more here (subscription required).
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https://www.rawstory.com/2020/11/th...s-wrong-with-trumps-supporters-brains-report/

And if you want to see cognitive dissonance in action this is a perfect place to do it. Just notice what the Trump supporters were saying then and what they are saying now.

https://forum.xnxx.com/threads/the-...e-next-president.444462/page-22#post-12114798

deleted user 555 768 · Nov 15, 2020

...No

stumbler · Nov 15, 2020

shy guy said: ↑

...No
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Cognitive dissonance is so unpleasant, so disordering and catastrophic for the ego, that no amount of absurd, tortured reasoning is worse than reality contradicting a deeply held belief,”

shootersa · Nov 15, 2020

When a free society stops civil discourse and not only censors political leaders, but censors any who might agree with them, that society is no longer free.

Since Trump came on the political scene not only he, but any who fail to condem him have been attacked, demonized and lied about. Now, his supporters are being maligned. The next step is to deny them basic civil rights, imprison them, and enslave them.

And it is exactly at the point that despicables try to enslave deplorables that the import of the 2nd amendment will become clear to despicables.

Despicables would do well to consider what game they play.

thinskin · Nov 15, 2020

shootersa said: ↑

When a free society stops civil discourse and not only censors political leaders, but censors any who might agree with them, that society is no longer free.

Since Trump came on the political scene not only he, but any who fail to condem him have been attacked, demonized and lied about. Now, his supporters are being maligned. The next step is to deny them basic civil rights, imprison them, and enslave them.

And it is exactly at the point that despicables try to enslave deplorables that the import of the 2nd amendment will become clear to despicables.

Despicables would do well to consider what game they play.
Click to expand...

I have never known you to be civil but then again freedoms in the US are being eroded daily........much to your joy no doubt.

Thinskin

Betty4fun · Nov 15, 2020

He has talen mental illness to a new level

conroe4 · Nov 15, 2020

Brilliant Betty doesn't sound fun to me. Can't spell worth a shit, or can't proofread, and can't think either.

So what's fun about that? Must be a blonde.

thinskin · Nov 15, 2020

conroe4 said: ↑

Brilliant Betty doesn't sound fun to me. Can't spell worth a shit, or can't proofread, and can't think either.

So what's fun about that? Must be a blonde.
Click to expand...

Delightful sentiments.......isn't xnxx such a warm and welcoming place.

Thinskin

deleted user 555 768 · Nov 15, 2020

shootersa said: ↑

When a free society stops civil discourse and not only censors political leaders, but censors any who might agree with them, that society is no longer free.

Since Trump came on the political scene not only he, but any who fail to condem him have been attacked, demonized and lied about. Now, his supporters are being maligned.
Click to expand...

Well said....And this has become acceptable on the left, "A house divided...", and its conclusion, will be their day of reckoning....because of a differing political opinion,

deleted user 555 768 · Nov 15, 2020

Almost forgot...

shy guy said: ↑

...No
Click to expand...

stumbler · Nov 18, 2020

This is the reality we can see ourselves. Trump has abandoned being president and has barricaded himself in the White House demanding his sycophants change reality and make him dictator for life. And our government which is supposed to protect us is paralyzed because of Trump's delusions.

Trump is ‘reaching a new level’ in ‘trying to push back against reality’: NYT’s Haberman

NYT's Maggie Haberman -- CNN screenshot

President Donald Trump is still refusing to admit that he lost the 2020 election to President-elect Joe Biden, and his decision to fire a top election security official indicates that he has no intention of bending to reality anytime soon.

Appearing on CNN, New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said that the president still appears to be in denial about his defeat, while also noting that Trump has actually wanted to fire former Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Chris Krebs for weeks.

“This was… inevitable and Krebs knew that it was going to happen,” Haberman explained. “It doesn’t make it any less shocking, it doesn’t make people less scared about what the president might do over the next 60 days.”

Haberman said that Krebs was fired by the president because he delivered an accurate description of reality, which the president could not stand.

“He was fired because he said something contrary to what the president wants to say about the election,” she said. “It is reaching a new level in terms of how the president is trying to push back against reality, which is that he lost the election. He’s trying to make that not the case and this is another brick in that wall.”

Watch the video below.
Click to expand...

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/11/tr...g-to-push-back-against-reality-nyts-haberman/

And we can see how far Trump and his supporters have drifted from reality with their shared psychosis with Trump with just a simple question the can't and won't answer.

Since when does the country have to stop until the president can accept reality?

Jh2 · Nov 18, 2020

He's definitely something

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