I think, we're all guilty of seriously misunderstanding Trump.

[DetlefK]

We all get riled up when Trump says something stupid or offensive.
"How could he say that? That's a lie! That's not what it is! That's not how this works! Argh!!!"

And this is where we go wrong. Trump's statements, as stupid and offensive they may be, are not worthy of outrage or rebuttal. For a simple yet mindbending reason:





We operate under the pretense that, if a person says something, they have something to say. That they have something to contribute to a conversation and drive it forward to a resolution.

Trump does not care if he has something to say. He blurts out whatever he feels like because he's the greatest and he wants all of us to bask in whatever random thought has at a given moment.

Trump doesn't give a shit about you, about the US, about the world.
Trump is not invested in anything: He doesn't give a shit about his wives or the people loyal to him or the GOP or what he just said.

We have to understand that at the core of communication is the concept that a group of people is a community, with them being connected through conversations.

Trump does not speak to us to have a conversation with us. He does not regard other people as his community. There is nobody but himself in his world. He speaks random words because he has nothing else to do.

Trump's world is in constant flux.
Truth and lie are whatever a person wants them to be at a given moment.
And the purpose of language is not communication for the good of the community.
The purpose of language is to fill the universe with the random noise of your personal thoughts for your personal amusement.

We should stop treating Trump's demented ravings as if he were trying to convey information to us.

Like a babbling toddler he is speaking to himself and we just happen to be there. He is not speaking to us. What he says was never meant to convey a message to us. His words were solely and purely meant to amuse him.

















If you believe that this is no more than yet another self-gratifying narcissistic rant from some anonymous rando on the internet, here is a simple experiment with which you can test my hypothesis:

Try to find a tweet of his that contains useful information that is worth remembering.
Worth remembering for a reason other than 1) outrage or 2) as evidence in court as a prosecutor tries to establish the defendant's criminal intent.

[unblock]

1. as someone with mental illness in the family, it's a waste of time to dive into their arguments

to dissect their statements and to try to refute them, whether with logic or facts or reason or appeals to emotion, it's all a giant waste of time and only serves to reinforce whatever convictions they have -- that you're the enemy, you're the problem, or you're the brainwashed one.

of course, one would have to be a manifest fool to think they could actually convince donnie of anything. temporarily manipulate, ok, but actually convince, no.

the real question is, not how to respond *to* donnie, but how to respond *about* donnie, in order to convince *other people* that donnie is nuts.



this is always the nerve-wracking part of dealing with mental illness in the family -- will others be able to see what you see, or will they be seduced by the exploitative features of the mental illness?

[marylandblue]

2. You are correct. The way to handle a narcissist is to ignore him

and do whatever you want to do on your own. The narcissist is free to follow your lead or make a commotion, but you should never respond to the commotion. When the narcissist is the President, this means ignoring the press a lot, except when they report on your own agenda.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Trump is mostly talking to himself.

He's telling himself things that he wants to be true.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

4. The only major problem with ignoring him

(and I don't disagree with the idea of ignoring his delusions and rantings) is that he is (currently) President of the US and his words carry massive weight. We can ignore him when he is sent packing from the WH and can be remanded to a psychiatric institution.

[Martin Eden]

5. That's my view as well.

We need to avoid being distracted from important issues by getting bogged down in outrage by the rhetoric of this POtuS, but he represents our country to the world and when he lies about important matters we have to call it out.

[DownriverDem]

13. Totally agree

My husband tells me all the time to not pay attention to what trump says. I just can't. trump is the president. What he says matters to us and the world. How can I ignore that?

[In It to Win It]

18. Agreed!

[LanternWaste]

32. Ignoring the captain of a ship heading us towards the iceberg is idiocy.

But make no mistake... the eventual movie about his Presidency will be gold!

[Rural_Progressive]

34. I ignored him before he occupied the WH

and I am eagerly looking forward to ignoring him again when he is removed from the WH.

[hunter]

6. I mentally replace Trump's voice with the quacking of an angry duck.

Trump's rants are not any more sophisticated than that.

Trying to find any deeper meaning in them is pointless.

[oldlibdem]

30. I use the Peanuts parents voice....

Wonk-wonk, wonnnnnnkkkkk....

[louis-t]

7. On one of the Sunday shows, the host was

asking someone why drumpf is in a battle with a Supreme Court justice, like there was some sort of purpose or long term goal behind it. Don't these people realize he's just a reactionary? He is responding in the only way he knows how, like a 4-year-old who's been told he can't have a cookie or he has to take a bath.

[Garrett78]

8. Primarily, I think he's trying to do 3 things:

1) rile up his base
2) dominate the media cycle
3) obfuscate

When we vent about the hypocrisy or stupidity or cruelty, that's all we're doing. We're venting. I'm sure most of us recognize that we aren't really accomplishing anything substantive beyond making ourselves feel better. It's not clear, though, that venting helps. Some research suggests it can increase anger and frustration.

[DownriverDem]

14. About the base

If they aren't riled up by now, they never will be.

[In It to Win It]

17. I don't think it's about filing up his base at all...

I think it’s about his own selfish need to feel adored.

I don’t think he goes to rallies and say stupid shit to rile up his base. He goes to make sure all of their attention is on him. He does it to ensure he’s the one being talked about.

What other politician goes to stump for someone else and spends almost the entire time talking about himself? What other politicians boldly thanks themselves on Thanksgiving?

[Garrett78]

22. Trump is certainly a narcissist who wants the adoration. But he and Republicans in general...

...have to feed the base a steady diet of anger, fear and hate. They created a monster over the last 50 years and it must be fed.

[Garrett78]

20. The anger and fear has to be maintained. It must be fed constantly.

Last edited Tue Nov 27, 2018, 12:56 PM - Edit history (1)

[libdem4life]

9. I agree. That's how he holds the conversation.

Keep people's head spinning from his multiple lying and projecting his own neutered personality. Outrage is his life's blood. Anger, riles him up. I was intimately aware of a Rageaholic...yes it is a real term...there is No Winning. They will twist their own words in a matter of a few minutes to contradict themselves, if need be to keep the emotional projection going...just like he does. It is pathological. It is the only outlet they have to reduce the inner demons that rule their lives.

[jmbar2]

10. He uses word vomit to keep attention on himself

Polite, normal people will listen to someone talking just out of courtesy. He uses that to continuously suck the attention of all around him. His need for attention is insatiable.

[PatSeg]

11. Oh yes

I've known people like Trump, people who just opened their mouths and out came whatever pops into their heads. They are never constricted by truth or facts and actually prefer to make up outrageous stories. Until now, however, I have never known someone like that who had money and power.

[DownriverDem]

15. Too bad

trump is president. If he was just a reality tv star, I could ignore him big time. I know I could, because I never watched him on tv.

[PatSeg]

23. Same here

Occasionally I saw him being interviewed on cable news and I found him to be odd and goofy. I couldn't begin to imagine why anyone watched his TV show. I also couldn't imagine him in the White House. Alas, reality has surpassed my once active imagination!

[dustyscamp]

12. Trump is good at playing the Heel

In professional wrestling, a heel (also known as a rudo in lucha libre) is a wrestler who portrays a villain or a "bad guy" and acts as an antagonist to the faces, who are the heroic protagonist or "good guy" characters.

[In It to Win It]

16. Great post!

[electron_blue]

19. Absolutely! I would add that his rants are meant to manipulate us.

It's time everyone move on from this stage and start actively dismantling his administration and white male supremacy.

[world wide wally]

21. This.

And his words are calculated so as to not implicate him in a court of law since he has spent so much time fighting lawsuits.

[apnu]

24. I agree. I don't see why people waste energy getting worked up over every thing that turd utters

Its exhausting. Also the things he vomits usually have no follow up. He says that shit to get a rise out of people. He delights in the adoration his brain-dead fans give him and seeing everybody else freak out. He's been acting this way his whole life. Look back at his celebrity days, he's always spewed a river of bullshit.

Why anybody takes him at his word is beyond me.

Don't play his game people. If you want to get back at him, show him how unimpressed you are, drown him in disdain and boredom.

[Locrian]

25. trumps strategy of bullshit works

it's of course not "strategy" in being planned, its just how is mind "works"

It works because
* his supporters will always interpret it any way that they want - this is important because it's adaptable to different points of view, event conflicting views
* blame the media etc for "not getting what he really meant"
* he can never really be challenged - there's no "debate" there's just verbal diarrhea
* he can be the "victim" and use that to energize his base

It follows the strategy of a lot of religious cults - the bullshit, the "not understanding the truth", etc

[BeyondGeography]

26. Matt Taibbi gets it

He pulled out of the Paris Agreement, striking a blow on behalf of the tens of millions of Americans who vehemently oppose both science and France. Then there are his steel tariffs, the policy equivalent of stumbling out of a bar after 14 shots of Jägermeister and reaching for your car keys. Will they accomplish anything except chaos? Hell, no. But chaos is what Trump voters asked for.

The press has steadfastly refused to understand this aspect of Trump’s pitch. The subtext of his run wasn’t about making America great again. It was, Let’s fuck shit up.

[YessirAtsaFact]

27. A physiological anomaly-Massive quantities of bullshit coming out of a horse's ass

Thank you Bette Middleton for such an accurate, succinct description of the psychopath.

I have a loved one on the autism spectrum. When he was in grade school he said stuff over and over that had nothing to do with the current conversation.

A social worker called it non-functional vocalization. Basically talking about whatever he was fixated on at the time, without regard to context.

He has since learned to converse.

Trump on the other hand will blabber on forever.

[extvbroadcaster]

28. Correct

The news media and half the voting public wastes a huge amount of time on Trump. He's suffering from multiple personality disorders and is incompetent. That's it. He should be playing golf at mar-a-lago, telling racist jokes, and screwing off. That's what he is qualified for. The reality that he is President is appalling. We all have to struggle through and hope America holds. The sad part is that anybody paying attention could see he was a total douche bag on the "Apprentice." A Hollywood fantasy that he was some sort of big businessman who it would be an honor to learn at his knee. Geez. Hang on, America. And stop being stupid and falling for Trump's con jobs.

[oldlibdem]

29. I think he mostly talks or tweets to feed his narcissistic ego.

But, he must be challenged on every falsehood and inappropriate remark that he makes . Someone has to teach him manners and it looks like it's the place of the Democratic party at this time in history!

[LanternWaste]

31. I over-estimated him.

During the campaign and for a few weeks thereafter, I thought he was a rational guy simply playing to the lowest common denominators of the country for the sake of theatrics.

Now I know better. He's part and parcel of the lowest common denominator, little more than a series of verbal bumper-stickers, and his tweets are nothing more than his own wish-fulfillment read aloud in basements with an awe only the fully ignorant can muster.

I honestly thought his idiocy was a ploy to his base. Now I know better... it's actual idiocy.

[spanone]

33. He's as dangerous as they come. A charismatic narcissist with one emotion...rage

[lambchopp59]

35. I think the MAGA's are guilty of misunderstanding damn near everything

Mindlessly clapping and cheering on their worshiped hero, blathering on ad nauseum how wonderful he is.
Just every now and then, one of them actually stops cheering long enough to listen to the garbage flowing out of the Orange shartcannon's pie hole.
I don't think there was any more revealing, embarrassing a moment than when Fox and Fiends couldn't get Donny off the phone. If that had become a daily segment of their show, many more MAGA's would awaken to what a dipshit they elected.

[Nitram]

36. What do you mean "WE", White Man?"

I believe most people on DU have their eyes wide open and saw through Trump from the beginning.

[DetlefK]

37. I'm not white. It's more of an eggshell.