8/9/2023 0 Comments Trumps cult animosity sign up![]() He’s not a religious figure, although there are members of his base who see him in a messianic light. The definition of a cult is difficult to nail down in some ways. When somebody says I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and kill someone and my followers will still believe in me or follow me, that is a classic statement of someone who is dangerous.Īnother analysis of Trump is that he’s a great marketer, a great brander, a celebrity. But her job as a forensic psychiatrist with an expertise on dangerousness is usually based on not seeing the person in-person, but based on what they say and what they do. ![]() Lee who edited The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump, who have stepped into that zone of saying, well, she hasn’t seen him in person to evaluate him. It is interesting that there are psychiatrists, some forensic psychiatrists like Bandy X. I’m making an assessment based on his behavior, what he has said and what he has done, very systematically over a very long period of time. They just have narcissistic personality disorder, and antisocial personality disorder, and such. In fact, in the DSM-5 of the American Psychiatric Association, they don’t even have a category for malignant narcissism. I’ve had extensive training over the decades by some of the top professionals in the field. How do you come to that conclusion scientifically for yourself? Have people objected to this concept of you calling him mentally ill or assessing him that way? You’re not a psychiatrist. They have incorrect wiring operating in their brain for conscience and empathy and reality testing and respect for others, as well as respect for the rule of law. Cult leaders are much more dangerous because they have a delusion. It isn’t just that the average citizen looks at cult leaders and they go “con man” or “con artist,” as if they were just criminals and knew exactly what they were doing. I will generalize and say most cult leaders that I’ve studied were in a cult themselves previously. He was trained to do thought-stopping from his childhood, about any doubts, any negative thoughts. He was raised in a Norman Vincent Peale’s church, where you’re told to believe something 100% and it will magically be delivered by God, and any doubts are viewed as bad. In Trump’s case, we know his father was an authoritarian who used to tell him and his brother things like, “you are a killer, you are a king, you are a killer, you are a king,” over and over again. ![]() They have what’s called an insecure attachment disorder. I would argue that cult leaders typically did not have a healthy childhood. You’ve said in the past that Trump is “mentally ill.” Cult leaders themselves may be deluded or suffering from some mental pathology of some kind. “Because otherwise authoritarianism, using social media, is a threat.” What follows is an edited transcript of our conversation. “I would put undue influence or mind control as the number-two most important thing that we address for the planet,” he says. Hassan says they can be, but the process will require not only empathy and individual family involvement but a wholesale change in how social media and information systems separate fact from dangerous fictions. ![]() Though his departure from office has certainly shaken some of his most conspiracy-addled devotees, others are doubling down, insistent that Joe Biden’s inauguration is all part of Trump’s plan, or determined to follow him as he promises to “be back in some form.” And certainly not all of them will appreciate the somewhat condescending designation of “cult member.” The question is whether Trump’s followers can be “deprogrammed” the same way that, say, followers of Sun Myung Moon or L. It’s a frightening prospect to consider millions of Americans being brainwashed by a reality-TV celebrity with a now defunct Twitter feed. Trump, he holds, has all the characteristics of a cult leader, and his followers the qualities of a cult, from the all-consuming devotion to a single malignant narcissist to the daily consumption of “alternative facts” to immunize them against cognitive dissonance (a.k.a. The term “cult” gets thrown around a lot to describe the intense passion of Donald Trump’s followers-but is it accurate? For Steven Hassan, a former Moonie turned cult expert and author of The Cult of Trump, the answer is decidedly yes.
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