Donald's Followers

 

Recently, Paul was driving in Nevada. He commented that he saw a number of trucks with guns and with designed Trump flags on their way to a rally. He also saw a Trump-Rambo type flag with Sylvester Stallone muscles and guns with a Trump head. This essay addresses the psychological characteristics of these followers.

After four years, we have a good idea of what the money driven TV star Trump projects and/or represents. 1. He’s a racist as evident by his “building the wall” to keep out the brown  murderers and rapists; he displays no empathy for the police killings of the black skinned people; he’s commented about shit- hold African countries; he’s called the  white supremacists” good people” 2. He’s sadistically hateful toward others as evidenced by putting asylum-seekers in cages while separating over 1000 of  their children; recent reports of women receiving unauthorized hysterectomies in the Georgia facility; and Mike Pence staffer reported him saying he’s glad  of the Coved -19 epidemic so he doesn’t  have to shake hands ; he’s called servicemen losers and suckers 3. He’s a pathological liar as evidenced by his 2000 lies, daily tweets and his so-called press conferences; his acknowledgment of the dangers of Covid- 19 while telling the country otherwise; his countering Dr. Redfield’s message regarding a vaccine and mask wearing 4. His cheating and exploitation of others with his phony foundation and college; his numerous lawsuits regarding not paying employees fairly 5. His antisocial personality tendencies of persistent lying. Using Russian interference for the 2016 and currently in the 2020 election. He doesn’t function as a responsible president that accepts social norms with respect to lawful behavior 6. Irritability and aggressiveness, disregard for the truth and putting down others.

 Bill Gates, with his assessment, stated that the Covid -19 pandemic was mismanaged. A recent Pew research poll ranked leaders like Merkel, Macron, Johnson, Putin and Xi for their handling of Covid -19. These presidents received the highest marks. Donald was dead last and received the highest negative for his handling of Covid 19. The ineptness of Trump is obvious to all.  Donald is not the right person for the job of president. Yet, he has number of sycophants. Let’s employ research findings to illustrate the makeup of these young people.  

How many young people, in their right mind, take a gun to a rally, sit close to one another, not wear a mask and say lock her up? As a contrast, we witnessed many young individuals protesting, a First Amendment right, in the streets and wearing face coverings as well. How can we account for the behavioral differences in aggression and taking responsibility for the two groups? Certainly these Rambo type young did not become this aggressive and violent all at once. Let’s go back to parenting styles and adolescent acting out behaviors. We know that aggression depends primarily on social experiences, including reinforcement received for such behavior, observation and imitation of aggressive models, and the degree of anxiety or guilt associated with aggressive expression. The displacement of aggression on a scapegoat is another example. Frustration often produces increased aggression.  Individuals differ widely in their ability to tolerate frustration and the intensity of the reactions. Aggressiveness is fairly consistent especially with boys.  If they are highly aggressive in preschool we can expect the same in childhood, adolescence and adulthood.

Peers are also frequent sources of reinforcement for aggressive behavior too. Not surprisingly, parental use of physical punishment for aggressive behavior may actually enhance rather than inhibit aggression because the parent serves as a model for aggression.

The following section sites research findings on parenting styles, prejudice, and juvenile delinquency. Findings by the Fells Research Institute found the children growing up in authoritarian homes tend to be punished for manifesting curiosity, spontaneity or self-assertion; they’re rewarded for obedience to parents, conformity with parental standards, and support for compliance and conformity. Therefore these traits become strong habits and are generalized to the social world outside the home. These children were the most immature, highly dependent, with less self-control and less self-reliance. There were withdrawn and tended to retreat from novel or stressful experiences. In their households, the parents were lax both in disciplining and rewarding the child. They exhibited relatively few and only weak demands for mature behavior and paid little attention to training for independence and self-reliance.  These authoritarian parents did not practice what they preach. They were more concerned with their own ideas and standards and not with the child’s interest and welfare.

 Permissive parents do not demand much of their children as far as rewarding for self-reliance, and responsible behavior. The do not discourage immature behavior, and are lacking in responsible achievement orientation. With a lack of control, the child is at loss with the knowledge and experience and unable to act in independent and self-reliance ways.

The hostile authoritarian parent with low permissiveness and excessive punishment leads to self-punishment, suicidal tendencies and accident proneness for the child. These children also have social withdrawal difficulties with the peer group, little confidence and motivation toward adult role taking responsibility. Parents that were rejecting and neglectful are likely to have their children engage in aggressive acting out behavior. Lack of parental warmth engenders hostile feelings while lax arbitrary inconsistent use of controls encourages the expression of those feelings. It appears that a consistent erratic discipline may be as harmful as too little or too much discipline.  Inconsistency may stem from parental hostility or indifference, from parental uncertainty, lack of confidence or from simple mood swings. Parenting styles and inconsistent parental discipline often leads to and contributes to maladjustment, conflict and/or aggression in the child.

We are not born with prejudice. Prejudice is learned in the family by the direct and indirect teachings of adults; the prejudices of the various identifications; and with the adults who tend to be rigid, authoritarian, highly conforming and overly moralistic. Yes the adults are prejudiced, hateful and discriminatory. Prejudice is related to personality structure. Research findings by Else Frenkel- Brunswik, Theodor W. Adorno and others found that these prejudiced have a selfish orientation toward America and are indifferent toward other countries. They agreed with generally intolerant statements such as “only people who are like myself have the right to be happy.” Other generalized attitudes of the prejudiced include rejection of all that is weaker, different; together with admiration of the strong, tough and powerful. They despise weakness in themselves, are rigidly conforming, condemn others, and exhibit feelings of helplessness in the world thought to be full of chaos and destruction. This suggests a narrow and rigid personality.

These prejudiced children complained of a lack of affection, and submission to stern harsh punishment treatment at home. Prejudice individuals have significantly poor self-concepts and less satisfaction with their mental abilities; impaired social relations with members the same sex; greater dissatisfaction with parents and teachers, and over concerned with their own personality and school subjects. Prejudice children favor their own immediate group over any larger societal group.  They do not trust and are suspicious of the integrity of others. They are distressed and lack confidence in self with feelings of guilt and uneasiness.

Research findings by John C. Conger and others found the following related to delinquent boys:  1.In kindergarten years they were more poorly adjusted, did not relate well to peers and were inconsiderate and not fair in dealing with others, less friendly, less responsible, more impulsive, and more antagonistic to authority. They were also less liked and accepted by their peers 2. By the fourth to the six grade, they were viewed as underachievers, showed poor work habits, demonstrated less leadership ability, with a narrow range of general interests, became more and more attention seeking 3. By the end of ninth grade, the boys displayed significantly less respect and consideration for the rights of others, they were less cooperative in observing school rules and regulations, and failed in meeting their responsibilities as members of the social group 4. The boys were less friendly and less pleasant. They were less likely accepted by their peers 5. These individuals were also defiant, resentful, hostile, and destructive with a low self-concept and feelings of inadequacy. They had a need for self-expression and they didn’t value others. 6. They were less well-adjusted and were lacking in self-confidence and/or respect. They were not cheerful or happy. They were incapable of establishing close personal relationships with peers or adults.

 Intellectually, their work habits demonstrated carelessness in their school work. They required much more supervision from teachers. They appeared more distractible and had less capacity for sustained attention, they daydreamed more, the tended to give up easily, they were less well-adjusted, and generally lacking in self-confidence or respect.

In essence, parents significantly contribute to the personality development of their offspring. Parenting styles and reinforcement inconsistencies have negative effects on their children. Donald’s messages correlate with his alienated, hateful, prejudiced and discriminatory crowd. Make America Great is the slogan for keeping America white. Rhetoric around Black Lives Matter, protesters, people with black and brown skin, asylum-seekers, etc. mean the white group is good and the other group is bad and evil. This populist message is detrimental to our country domestically and internationally.

Donald’s group are intolerant and condemn others calling them murderers, rapists, socialists, unpatriotic etc. That same message is repeated in so many different ways. In fact it’s okay for over 202,000 people to die from Covid-19 because that group is mostly black and brown. They don’t count. They are weak and deserve to die.

Intellectually, this group does not function well cognitively. Their lack of curiosity affects their interest in learning about others and the world. They don’t apply analysis, reason or rational thought well and are limited in their understanding of symbols or words. For example, Paul had a conversation and this individual told him that Biden was a pedophile because he touched a woman’s hair. My friend told him the derivation of pedophile and meaning of the word. The other person didn’t respond. On another occasion, my friend had a discussion and this person told him that Bernie was a socialist. Paul explained to him a little about the everyday socialism that takes place in our economy. Once again, no coherent response.  While running, I saw flag that said “Trump 2020, No More Bull Shit.” I haven’t had a conversation with that neighbor yet.

Psychologically, these insecure, hateful, prejudicial and biased white people are compromised and identify with the Trump father figure image. They buy into the propaganda of him being wealthy, withholding tax returns and being TV popular. They have low self-esteem; do not trust so “fake news” fits; are suspicious and have impaired meaningful interpersonal relationships. Being part of a sadistic and hateful fringe group, that carries guns and expresses hate fits their sadomasochistic character. They put themselves and others at risk by not wearing a mask which is sadistic and self-defeating. These insecure individuals long for power and strength and blindly follow their master.