Gee, I hadn’t noticed that the president has an empathy problem. Did you?
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
I am shocked, shocked I tell you.
His base loves it! They hate the way we liberals are always asking them to care about the disadvantaged, the oppressed, the needy, the misunderstood, the different.
Trump tells them that they don’t have to — it’s exactly what they’ve wanted to hear their whole lives. They can unleash their inner spoiled child. Go ahead and make fun of a disabled reporter! Go ahead and ridicule the needy who want access to health care! Make fun of fags, Muslims, blacks! It’s Christmas for them.
(Until they suffer — like the C+W star who got shot at in Vegas and suddenly realized the anti-gun people had a point, because it was happening to him.)
And what his base doesn’t grok is that they also don’t matter to him except as they’re useful to him. He doesn’t give a shit about their sufferings, their needs, their fears, except as levers for him to yank on.
They know it – they totally understand they are on their own if something catastrophic happens to them.
They just think the odds are much lower of that happening than they really are. Like zero.
They have guns. They think that’s all they need.
(Except the checks they get from the government; the highways; municipal services; the emergency rooms; public schools; but those don’t count.)
How can anyone expect him to feel empathy? Other people exist only as they relate to him by serving his interests, propping up his ego, carrying out his orders, requiring destruction for crossing him. Does a man feel empathy for the ants he treads upon?
Obama said…
“Learning to stand in somebody else’s shoes, to see through their eyes, that’s how peace begins. And it’s up to you to make that happen. Empathy is a quality of character that can change the world.”
Yes, and what is the result of a lack of empathy for the others?
No no no, you can’t use psychotherapeutic language, Booman, no “sociopath”. You are only allowed to call Trump a “nincompoop”.
Trump with an empathy problem? Who knew. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Trump has an empathy problem? I’ll let Iago respond for me.
Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!
If only someone had warned us first.
Well, at least he chose some “soft, very nice, beautiful” paper towels (per a later T tweet) to throw out to the Puerto Ricans. Credit for thinking about the softness and beauty of the products he gave away, for free, no charge, to the local eager citizens. Generous, thoughtful guy. None of that rough, double-duty Bounty stuff, so hard on the hands.
Actually the locals probably missed a big opportunity to show their feelings for the bizarre display of let-them-eat-cake insensitivity by failing to throw the towels back at him. It would have highlighted his lack of empathy and weirdness as the incident would have been media meat for days and weeks. But it appears that church venue was filled with giddy Trumpistas, and so no further drama, just celebrity worship.
You wouldn’t expect his advance team to set up any photo ops that weren’t preemptively stuffed wall to wall with Trumpistas, now, would you?
Folks have noticed that the Trump/Conservative empathy needle has been pegged leftward for some time.
Here’s the beef from Matt Taibbi The Madness of Donald Trump. Read it and laugh (or if inclined renew your outrage meter), and then weep.
This is one very fine piece of journalism and analysis. (Almost better on second reading.) And the writing — who doesn’t long for a moment, just one, when she/he could craft: That makeover was undone just as quickly as it was done, leaving the Donald with the same old tie-on-bulging-duodenum look from the campaign. And that’s not even the best one in the piece, and Taibbi does it again and again throughout it.
The base see Trump’s total lack of empathy as a feature, not a bug. To them responses to those they hate — democrats/progressives/liberals, “the left,” people of color and women, victims of disasters, etc. should be steeped in derision and devoid of any empathy whatsoever. And Trump delivers on all counts, because that’s who he is.
And it is because of who they are that they support him, which is why these constant articles and focus groups on “the Trump voter” are beyond tiresome; they’re just attempts to normalize these horrible people.
That they support this ignorant lout of a human being who’s sum total is so much hatred, ignorance and divisiveness, makes them just as horrific as he is.
Would add obsessive articles on Donald Trump to the list of tiresome.
On the plus side, the size of Trump devotees is no larger than that of GWB. Mostly overlapping circles in a Venn diagram. About 30# of the population. We’ll have to wait to see if it shrinks down into Cheney territory — 19%.
Seems he threatens war with Rocket Man regularly and he is a little nuts, maybe even a sociopath. And his financing pal Bob Mercer thinks a little nuclear war could make us healthier. The question is can he be contained or removed before something bad happens.
I’d suggest a cage match between Combover Don and Rocket Man on Bikini atoll. When the satellite feed suffers an EMP failure, we’ll instantly forget about them and carry on with our lives.
Say Marie3, if Trump is, as you call him, a “nincompoop”, what about Kim Jong Un? I’m sure you would object to psychotherapeutic language for him, too. How about “blackguard”? Or is that too judgmental for you?
Are you a shrink? Do you read, write, speak Korean and have the vaguest idea of what passes for culturally and socially acceptable in N. Korea? And you want to make a clinical mental health assessment of Kim?
Monarchies and pseudo-monarchies aren’t known to produce smart princelings and princesses, and pampered from birth and protected from engaging with ordinary peers and ordering others around from a young age aren’t psychologically healthy by normal standards. However, as there are so few of them, they haven’t been studied and there is no psych classification for those of and by this wealth and social class.
They aren’t leaders in any normal sense of that words. They were placed on a throne by birth and for reasons that completely escape me, at least a majority in countries with a monarchy like having these not to bright and generally not attractive people prancing around and living a life of wealth and leisure.
An entourage of 1,500 were required to prop up the butt of Salman on his visit to Russia. Wonder how many he’ll need next year when deigns to visit the US?
Well there you go again.
Here you are commenting in a thread entitled “sociopath” when you have repeatedly in the past denounced me and others for using that term to describe Trump, using similar language to what you used above (“are you a shrink?”). So aren’t you going to denounce Booman? Lord knows how you value consistency. And with you being The Last Honest Human Alive and all….
Kim Jong Un has ordered the murders of many, including an uncle and half brother. The recent New Yorker profile of Kim notes that some executions involved flamethrowers and artillery. But don’t dare conclude from that that Kim is a sociopath. Apparently Korean social norms may make those methods normal and acceptable. I anxiously await your analysis.
I feel so sorry for him: it must be hell.
It’s not hell for Trump. Sociopaths aren’t capable of normal emotional response.
Lots bad has already happened without him being stopped.
Lots.
this.
You don’t need empathy. You need COMPASSION.
Good point. Empathy — “I feel your pain.” Compassion — “I’m moved to help relieve your pain, burden, etc.”