Hmmm. Very interesting. We certainly need to identify these bad actors.
"Personal charisma" might be viewed differently than the provided definition. None of the candidates currently fit that. And DeSantis fails badly here.
But there is what I call "dark appeal". It's when a speaker stirs up long held resentments (bigotry) and conspiracy ideas. And it leads to a favorite human pass time: Blaming Others. Ironically, many (not all) "Christians" seem to enjoy and employ this as a passionate mission - as if directed by "God".
"The Socialists are going to take your money with high taxes!" or "The immigrants will take your jobs!" or "The libtards are killing babies!" Dark falsehoods that stir fear and anger and violence.
Maybe it should be called "religious conning" or "finding the devil"? Whatever...it's really appealing to the dark side of humanity.
As a related thought, yesterday I heard about an interesting study/experiment in Nigeria that compared two groups who were playing the identical game. Part of the game offered a chance to harm (figuratively) one's opponent. The variable was the room temperature. One group enjoyed 68 degrees. The other 86. Guess which one more often lashed out with harm.
In my years of bible study experience, the most common scripture invoked around the table was Matthew 7:1-3, or the "Judge Not" passage. Judgement inevitably followed.
Holier than thou is easy to justify when you convince yourself it's for the greater good. Your "dark appeal" is a good descriptor. For many "Christians" the name of the game is making sure they appear more worthy than others. The more groups and individuals they cut down and blame, the easier that becomes.
All religions I am aware of have the tribal us/them dogma baked in. It's also a feature of human psychology, with or without the dogma. Maybe science will find a solution to the issue of tribalism one day. That would spark joy.
Check out brutality of nominally Buddhist republics against the Muslims in their ranks and you will find some of that ol' Tribalism thang that makes its way around this dizzying world of woes. Or the Hindu mega majority targeting Muslims in India after partition and particularly under the current Hindu Fundamentalist regime of Narendra Modi.
See Myanmar's treatment of Muslims, largely coastal castaways under the Burma Generals who used to get their high tech weapons from the West where Virtue Signalling is the thing that makes our world spin on point. Palestinians who have the temerity to demand equal rights in the Jewish democratic beacon of da Muddle East are mostly Muslim, but also Christian back when Jews residing there where we were welcomed and sheltered as refugees from Spanish Christian expulsion by the Turkish Ottoman Empire and nominal Caliphate for most of 400 years, Palestine where Galilean Peace and Equality Activists like Arabic diva from Christian family Amal Murkus says to the current fascistic and utterly corrupt Bibi regime and ruling coalition as she asks of her many Jewish fellow human rights activists and those from the recent emigration from Africa, Russia\Ukraine flooding her own indigenous people of the 'Jewish State': "Aren't we all Palestinians"?
Mebbe not according to the British Partition of Palestine in 1948 which was supposed to create a Jewish State and an Arab State with a Green Line down the middle of muddle east indigenous folk of other groups like the Druze, Bahai, Saracen and various regional sects and remnants of vital communities studied for centuries like the Bedouin or Bdoon, Coptics, Kurds, Nabbateans and Phoenicians. Consult the Sykes-Picot Agreement of Euro colonizers who back circa 1916 and WW I even had a Kurdish State on the map where now the former Persian Empire and Iranian Islamic Republic along with the Young Turks and Grey Wolves of the crumbling Ottoman Turkish Empire and the Syrian, Palestinian and TransJordanian Naqab\Negev has been mapped out to others like the Mediterranean Basin tragic game of Muddle Eastern Musical Chairs.
Each culture makes such beautiful music. Cultural pioneers. Soon to be history's door mats. Yet, not enough nation-states to go around and the left out are often hauled off in exile to the homeland of some invader.
Niger\Nigeria? Carthage\Cairowene? Libya\Loov? What is left is a Normalized Homeless human remnant. Left to Lament their former Promised and Mapped Lands. As we sat and wept by the willows on the banks of the Rivers of Babylon\Where we hung up our harps, zithers, lyres, qanoon and oud\On the branches of willows\By the banks of the Rivers of Babylon....(Now everybody join in....)
Aren't we all Palestinians or Philistines or Egyptians or Ivrim only passing through over Promised and Quaking Lands? Check out Leonard Cohen Live in Germany 1973 singing after serial holocausts down through the centuries: California Professor Dick Blakeslee's take on an older folk tune:
"We're only Passing Through..."
Covered most recently according to Erin at P's & Q's here in No'Po, Ore by Pacific NW troubadour and bardic barnstormer Nick Delffs and his sometimes band The Shakey Hands:
My comment wasn't regarding anyone other than people who seriously practice Buddhism. There are violent and oppressive sects within every religion that I'm aware of because cultural and political factors take precedence over everything else. All of these other religions seem to have large segments of their adherents who have no problem with horrendous evil. In most of those cases I don't think the true tenants of the religion are being practiced, they're just being distorted to serve ulterior motives.
I'm a big fan of Venn diagrams and that's a great one.
Many of your subscribers are savvy, intellectuals who write extremely well. So let me get this out of the way. I'm a idiot when it comes to political maneuvering. I just don't see the machinations until somebody hits me over the head. Please hold your fire.
"... One of the many unpleasant consequences of Trump’s presidency was the willful politicization of entertainment. He wanted us to never not think of him. He wanted to infect our thoughts, so we could have no respite. He wanted no safe spaces, anywhere, ever. Our guard was up, always. This is why he bitched and moaned about NFL players kneeling during the anthem. This is why he dispensed his valet…er, his veep, Mike Pence…to baseball games and Broadway musicals. It was strategic. He denied us the luxury of peace and quiet we spoiled Americans take for granted. You know, like strongmen do."
I honestly thought the Trumpeter was just being an a$$. Machiavelli would have eaten me alive.
Trump is afflicted with narcissistic personality disorder. What are the symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder?
Sense of self-importance.
Preoccupation with power, beauty, or success.
Entitled.
Can only be around people who are important or special.
Interpersonally exploitative for their own gain.
Arrogant.
Lack empathy.
Must be admired.
That last one is the essence of Trumpworld. He cannot meet his affliction's wants and needs without a cult following.
A person with NPD who is elevated to the most powerful office in the country leaks toxins from its brain into the brain of millions of other humans who then become a zombie horde (detached from reality).
This Venn diagram was a long-time in the making and I think, much like my newsletter, it will continue to evolve. Thank you for being here.
We laughed at Trump all the time he was running for office in 2016 and for much of the first year of his Presidency. He appeared to be such a buffoon.
Now many are convinced that he is playing three dimensional chess. I think Greg OLear’s comment reflects that.
It is neither. I agree with your assessment that he is an a**. He is most certainly a boba fide narcissist. And he has a singular talent for recognizing people’s weaknesses to maximum advantage.
Trump is as far from Machiavelli as is possible. If they ever get him to trial and convict him, we will get a merciful respite from this mostly moronic bully.
I am working on a video clips movie of some of Trump's most ridiculous moments. I've been wading through hundreds of hours of asinine statements and nonsense that pour out of his mouth like diarrhea. How anyone could listen to him and conclude that he is any kind of competent at anything besides making up lies and bullying others is beyond my capabilities to understand.
Where in the Venn diagram is the dotted line signed by all voters of Donald Trump: Cult of Personality?
I would not think there is personality there. Donald Trump's paper trail extends to the terrific bird-dog muck raking work done by Wayne Barrett of my yoot reading the VILLAGE VOICE.
Back then Donald T.'s father Fred Trump was building his family's wealth by contracting to BIG FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIZED LOW INCOME HOUSING CONSTRUCTION that was capped by the Democratic Party under Bill Clinton circa 1990's until last year when a new breed of Democrat working in the Public Interest named Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez broke from our Duopoly Machine's fealty to Private Interests and managed to get the Clinton era Faircloth Amendment repealed. Worth looking that news report up in Public Interest Media platform Common Dreams.
Despite Trump & Heir to a Huge family fortune that under Donald's management has become a small fortune becoming President in 2016 running against the other Clinton (Hillary) as a SHRINK BIG GOVERNMENT GOP candidate in 2016, back circa 1970's and 80's in my well-spent outer boroughs yoot in the Empire State and Bankrupt City's Blue Neo-Liberal Wall Street controlled utterly corrupt political machine the Trumps were back then Democrats (after a fashion) and socially liberal enough to frequent the Studio 54 scene where cocaine and other emoluments were widely shared with those who beat the caste system door policy.
If someone like my former Professor of Cult Dynamics and Formation at U.C.-Berkeley and also a former outer borough New Yorker named Richard Ofshe could explain the Cult of Personality for a devoid of personality poor imitator of Roy Cohn and Il Duce blowhard like Donald Trump this and other endangered republics should be most appreciative.
Health and balance to US all.
Regardless of the proven fallacy of the Reagan-PapiBush-Clinton-ShrubBush-Obama-Biden whose campaigns were all advised by a man for All Larry Summers' economic seasons aphorism and shared campaign slogan that "A rising tide lifts all ships," in fact Michael Ray Richardson the eloquent and concise street-smart N.Y. Knicks hoops star had the reasoning sense to note ahead of these White House renters that "Da ship be sunk."
Hmmm. Very interesting. We certainly need to identify these bad actors.
"Personal charisma" might be viewed differently than the provided definition. None of the candidates currently fit that. And DeSantis fails badly here.
But there is what I call "dark appeal". It's when a speaker stirs up long held resentments (bigotry) and conspiracy ideas. And it leads to a favorite human pass time: Blaming Others. Ironically, many (not all) "Christians" seem to enjoy and employ this as a passionate mission - as if directed by "God".
"The Socialists are going to take your money with high taxes!" or "The immigrants will take your jobs!" or "The libtards are killing babies!" Dark falsehoods that stir fear and anger and violence.
Maybe it should be called "religious conning" or "finding the devil"? Whatever...it's really appealing to the dark side of humanity.
I'm definitely thinking about this. Would it be a problem if I borrow the term dark appeal in future essays/posts? It's got a ring to it.
Feel free.
As a related thought, yesterday I heard about an interesting study/experiment in Nigeria that compared two groups who were playing the identical game. Part of the game offered a chance to harm (figuratively) one's opponent. The variable was the room temperature. One group enjoyed 68 degrees. The other 86. Guess which one more often lashed out with harm.
In my years of bible study experience, the most common scripture invoked around the table was Matthew 7:1-3, or the "Judge Not" passage. Judgement inevitably followed.
Holier than thou is easy to justify when you convince yourself it's for the greater good. Your "dark appeal" is a good descriptor. For many "Christians" the name of the game is making sure they appear more worthy than others. The more groups and individuals they cut down and blame, the easier that becomes.
All religions I am aware of have the tribal us/them dogma baked in. It's also a feature of human psychology, with or without the dogma. Maybe science will find a solution to the issue of tribalism one day. That would spark joy.
I'm certainly not an authority on Buddhism but from what little I've read , and the Buddhists I've heard speak, I'm not seeing the tribalism thing.
Check out brutality of nominally Buddhist republics against the Muslims in their ranks and you will find some of that ol' Tribalism thang that makes its way around this dizzying world of woes. Or the Hindu mega majority targeting Muslims in India after partition and particularly under the current Hindu Fundamentalist regime of Narendra Modi.
See Myanmar's treatment of Muslims, largely coastal castaways under the Burma Generals who used to get their high tech weapons from the West where Virtue Signalling is the thing that makes our world spin on point. Palestinians who have the temerity to demand equal rights in the Jewish democratic beacon of da Muddle East are mostly Muslim, but also Christian back when Jews residing there where we were welcomed and sheltered as refugees from Spanish Christian expulsion by the Turkish Ottoman Empire and nominal Caliphate for most of 400 years, Palestine where Galilean Peace and Equality Activists like Arabic diva from Christian family Amal Murkus says to the current fascistic and utterly corrupt Bibi regime and ruling coalition as she asks of her many Jewish fellow human rights activists and those from the recent emigration from Africa, Russia\Ukraine flooding her own indigenous people of the 'Jewish State': "Aren't we all Palestinians"?
Mebbe not according to the British Partition of Palestine in 1948 which was supposed to create a Jewish State and an Arab State with a Green Line down the middle of muddle east indigenous folk of other groups like the Druze, Bahai, Saracen and various regional sects and remnants of vital communities studied for centuries like the Bedouin or Bdoon, Coptics, Kurds, Nabbateans and Phoenicians. Consult the Sykes-Picot Agreement of Euro colonizers who back circa 1916 and WW I even had a Kurdish State on the map where now the former Persian Empire and Iranian Islamic Republic along with the Young Turks and Grey Wolves of the crumbling Ottoman Turkish Empire and the Syrian, Palestinian and TransJordanian Naqab\Negev has been mapped out to others like the Mediterranean Basin tragic game of Muddle Eastern Musical Chairs.
Each culture makes such beautiful music. Cultural pioneers. Soon to be history's door mats. Yet, not enough nation-states to go around and the left out are often hauled off in exile to the homeland of some invader.
Niger\Nigeria? Carthage\Cairowene? Libya\Loov? What is left is a Normalized Homeless human remnant. Left to Lament their former Promised and Mapped Lands. As we sat and wept by the willows on the banks of the Rivers of Babylon\Where we hung up our harps, zithers, lyres, qanoon and oud\On the branches of willows\By the banks of the Rivers of Babylon....(Now everybody join in....)
Aren't we all Palestinians or Philistines or Egyptians or Ivrim only passing through over Promised and Quaking Lands? Check out Leonard Cohen Live in Germany 1973 singing after serial holocausts down through the centuries: California Professor Dick Blakeslee's take on an older folk tune:
"We're only Passing Through..."
Covered most recently according to Erin at P's & Q's here in No'Po, Ore by Pacific NW troubadour and bardic barnstormer Nick Delffs and his sometimes band The Shakey Hands:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_Through
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Songs
Mitch Ritter\Paradigm Sifters, Code Shifters, PsalmSong Chasers
Lay-Low Studios, Ore-Wa (Refuge of Atonement Seekers)
Media Discussion List\LookseeInnerEarsHearHere
My comment wasn't regarding anyone other than people who seriously practice Buddhism. There are violent and oppressive sects within every religion that I'm aware of because cultural and political factors take precedence over everything else. All of these other religions seem to have large segments of their adherents who have no problem with horrendous evil. In most of those cases I don't think the true tenants of the religion are being practiced, they're just being distorted to serve ulterior motives.
I'm a big fan of Venn diagrams and that's a great one.
Many of your subscribers are savvy, intellectuals who write extremely well. So let me get this out of the way. I'm a idiot when it comes to political maneuvering. I just don't see the machinations until somebody hits me over the head. Please hold your fire.
Your diagram is a helpful (and terrifying) addition to what Greg Olear's "Prevail" hit me over the head with last Sunday. (See https://gregolear.substack.com/p/sunday-pages-down-the-shore?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email)
"... One of the many unpleasant consequences of Trump’s presidency was the willful politicization of entertainment. He wanted us to never not think of him. He wanted to infect our thoughts, so we could have no respite. He wanted no safe spaces, anywhere, ever. Our guard was up, always. This is why he bitched and moaned about NFL players kneeling during the anthem. This is why he dispensed his valet…er, his veep, Mike Pence…to baseball games and Broadway musicals. It was strategic. He denied us the luxury of peace and quiet we spoiled Americans take for granted. You know, like strongmen do."
I honestly thought the Trumpeter was just being an a$$. Machiavelli would have eaten me alive.
Carol,
Trump is afflicted with narcissistic personality disorder. What are the symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder?
Sense of self-importance.
Preoccupation with power, beauty, or success.
Entitled.
Can only be around people who are important or special.
Interpersonally exploitative for their own gain.
Arrogant.
Lack empathy.
Must be admired.
That last one is the essence of Trumpworld. He cannot meet his affliction's wants and needs without a cult following.
A person with NPD who is elevated to the most powerful office in the country leaks toxins from its brain into the brain of millions of other humans who then become a zombie horde (detached from reality).
This Venn diagram was a long-time in the making and I think, much like my newsletter, it will continue to evolve. Thank you for being here.
We laughed at Trump all the time he was running for office in 2016 and for much of the first year of his Presidency. He appeared to be such a buffoon.
Now many are convinced that he is playing three dimensional chess. I think Greg OLear’s comment reflects that.
It is neither. I agree with your assessment that he is an a**. He is most certainly a boba fide narcissist. And he has a singular talent for recognizing people’s weaknesses to maximum advantage.
Trump is as far from Machiavelli as is possible. If they ever get him to trial and convict him, we will get a merciful respite from this mostly moronic bully.
I am working on a video clips movie of some of Trump's most ridiculous moments. I've been wading through hundreds of hours of asinine statements and nonsense that pour out of his mouth like diarrhea. How anyone could listen to him and conclude that he is any kind of competent at anything besides making up lies and bullying others is beyond my capabilities to understand.
This is an assignment for a brave man with a limitless capacity for drudgery.
It could also be a huge public service. Trump is becoming dangerously mythologized:
1. Teflon Don
2. Unbeatable in debate
3. The Great American Victim
4. Not so nice, but a superb President
5. Master of 4 dimensional chess.
All of these myths will be destroyed by the historical record, when it gets written decades from now. He will be flattened.
Too late. He needs to be savaged now - hoist by his own petard, as opposed to outside commentary which, no matter how good, will be blown off.
Trump naked could go a long, long way to sowing seeds of doubt.
Thank you for this work.
* bona fide
Where in the Venn diagram is the dotted line signed by all voters of Donald Trump: Cult of Personality?
I would not think there is personality there. Donald Trump's paper trail extends to the terrific bird-dog muck raking work done by Wayne Barrett of my yoot reading the VILLAGE VOICE.
https://www.villagevoice.com/the-dirty-deal-that-helped-make-donald-trump/
Back then Donald T.'s father Fred Trump was building his family's wealth by contracting to BIG FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIZED LOW INCOME HOUSING CONSTRUCTION that was capped by the Democratic Party under Bill Clinton circa 1990's until last year when a new breed of Democrat working in the Public Interest named Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez broke from our Duopoly Machine's fealty to Private Interests and managed to get the Clinton era Faircloth Amendment repealed. Worth looking that news report up in Public Interest Media platform Common Dreams.
Despite Trump & Heir to a Huge family fortune that under Donald's management has become a small fortune becoming President in 2016 running against the other Clinton (Hillary) as a SHRINK BIG GOVERNMENT GOP candidate in 2016, back circa 1970's and 80's in my well-spent outer boroughs yoot in the Empire State and Bankrupt City's Blue Neo-Liberal Wall Street controlled utterly corrupt political machine the Trumps were back then Democrats (after a fashion) and socially liberal enough to frequent the Studio 54 scene where cocaine and other emoluments were widely shared with those who beat the caste system door policy.
If someone like my former Professor of Cult Dynamics and Formation at U.C.-Berkeley and also a former outer borough New Yorker named Richard Ofshe could explain the Cult of Personality for a devoid of personality poor imitator of Roy Cohn and Il Duce blowhard like Donald Trump this and other endangered republics should be most appreciative.
Health and balance to US all.
Regardless of the proven fallacy of the Reagan-PapiBush-Clinton-ShrubBush-Obama-Biden whose campaigns were all advised by a man for All Larry Summers' economic seasons aphorism and shared campaign slogan that "A rising tide lifts all ships," in fact Michael Ray Richardson the eloquent and concise street-smart N.Y. Knicks hoops star had the reasoning sense to note ahead of these White House renters that "Da ship be sunk."
Mitch Ritter\Paradigm Sifters, Code Shifters, PsalmSong Chasers
Lay-Low Studios, Ore-Wa (Refuge of Atonement Seekers)
Media Discussion List\LookseeInnerEarsHearHere
Nice illustration. No one comes to mind just now that fits all the criteria you listed.
That illustration took me hours. Thanks for noticing!
Typo Alert: Replace "tenants" with tenets cuz da rent is too damn high in religion....
Health and balance
Tio Mitchito