The first thing a cult does is tell you everyone else is lying to you
“There are many reasons to be saddened, disgusted, confused, outraged, scared, and even traumatized by Trump’s presidential campaign. He has just declared a “scorched earth policy” and is saying there is an “international conspiracy that is persecuting him” and he is just a “martyr for the cause of America.”
In studying cults and their leaders for 40 years, certain patterns consistently are evident in their words and behaviors. Based on my own experience being near Sun Myung Moon (him too a billionaire, claimed to be the Messiah and 10 times greater than Jesus Christ), I wish to offer a way of actually analyzing Trump. My work is based on brainwashing and mind control models put forth by Robert Jay Lifton M.D. and Dr. Margaret Singer. My BITE Model and the Influence Continuum is an objective way to evaluate any person (yes, there are cults of personality) or group. Indeed there are ethical ways which are healthy and well as unethical, unhealthy ways to influence people. Please take a look. While most people and groups lie more in the middle of the spectrum, Trump apparently typifies the extreme destructive right hand side. https://freedomofmind.com/blog/2016/10/14/does-trump-display-the-stereotypical-profile-of-a-cult-leader/
The GOP has become a dangerous cult
By all accounts, the members of the Heaven’s Gate cult were nice people who avoided harming others. They kept their sickness inside their ranks. By contrast, Republicans are forcing an entire country, and to a certain extent the world, to choke down their poisoned applesauce. https://www.forbes.com/sites/chrisladd/2017/12/02/the-gop-has-become-a-dangerous-cult/#2532942b245c
Cult expert Steven Hassan: Trump’s “mind control cult” now faces an existential crisis Author of “The Cult of Trump” explains how the president has trained his followers to believe no one but him https://www.salon.com/2020/04/07/cult-expert-steven-hassan-trumps-mind-control-cult-now-faces-an-existential-crisis/
The Doomsday Cult of Trump
“She just believes every word out of his mouth, everything she watches on FoxNews.” he said. “I can’t reason with her. It’s like talking to someone who’s been brainwashed. She isn’t the mother I grew up with.”
This is how cults work. They gradually alter people’s brains, attuning them to a singular voice, and weaponizing them against any dissenting opinions. To their manipulated minds, efforts to reach them with objective truth become acts of aggression against the one they see as divine—and trigger an ever-more passionate affection toward their leader. They will defend (even to relational death with people they once loved) that one person.
America is in a cultic crisis, and Trumpism is the cult. There is no other way to approach these days. When you believe one man above Science, above our Intelligence agencies, above former CIA directors and retired generals and revered journalists—when you believe that one man above even your own eyes and ears—you are fully indoctrinated.
Strategic cult mongering “This hasn’t happened by accident, but by sickening design.
Cult leaders prey upon emotionally vulnerable people; leveraging their loneliness, their disenfranchisement, their disconnection. They bombard their targets with a steady stream of misinformation and chaotic prophecy—and into the swirling confusion created inside their heads, they come promising safety and security, while having no concern for them at all. They start a fire—and rush in with a bucket of water.” https://johnpavlovitz.com/2019/02/04/when-someone-you-love-joins-a-cult/?fbclid=IwAR3mxBnh0pWqZ5FuJQxuO0_IG-rwsgYUV3WmfFZZ_A01HtgwSRYwxmoYziQ
Fox has long been a bane of liberals, but in the past two years many people who watch the network closely, including some Fox alumni, say that it has evolved into something that hasn’t existed before in the United States.
“It’s the closest we’ve come to having state TV.”
Fox—which, as the most watched cable news network, generates about $2.7 billion a year for its parent company, 21st Century Fox—acts as a force multiplier for Trump, solidifying his hold over the Republican Party and intensifying his support. “Fox is not just taking the temperature of the base—it’s raising the temperature,” she says. “It’s a radicalization model.” For both Trump and Fox, “fear is a business strategy—it keeps people watching.” https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/03/11/the-making-of-the-fox-news-white-house
Trump’s Contradiction: Assailing ‘Left-Wing Mob’ as Crowd Chants “lock her up”
Saudi and Trump touching glowing orb https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/05/trump-touches-glowing-orb-in-saudi-arabia-spawns-meme.html
Ex-skinhead explains how he was lured into the racist movement and why he fears Trump
In age of Trump, evangelicals back Dennis Hof, a self-styled top US pimp https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/22/in-age-of-trump-evangelicals-back-self-styled-top-us-pimp.html
Jordan Klepper vs. Trump Supporters What’s better than Jordan Klepper at a Trump rally? Here’s a compilation of his greatest hits:
Don Winslow Nails Lindsey Graham’s Hypocrisy With ‘The Truth Is Coming’ Supercut — HuffPost
Why the Presidency Can’t Just Go Back to ‘Normal’ After Trump — POLITICO
Facebook’s top news stories are like a window into an alternate dimension — Vox
Fear and Loyalty: How Donald Trump Took Over the Republican Party — The New York Times
Look at the Disgusting Pig Sty Trump Supporters Left After His New Jersey Rally
Donald Trump, the Most Unmanly President — The Atlantic
If You Tell Me You Are Supporting Trump, I Already Know Seven Things About You
“He’s the Chosen One to Run America”: Inside the Cult of Trump, His Rallies Are Church and He Is the Gospel Trump’s rallies—a bizarre mishmash of numerology, tweetology, and white supremacy—are the rituals by which he stamps his name on the American dream. As he prepares to resume them for the first time in months, his followers are ready to receive. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/06/inside-the-cult-of-trump-his-rallies-are-church-and-he-is-the-gospel
Here’s Why These Obama Voters Elected Trump For President | NowThis
Roberts County: A Year in the Most Pro-Trump Town
Why the poorest county in West Virginia has faith in Donald Trump | Anywhere but Washington
Obamacare in Trump country
This is the worst rap video in the history of the Universe. She makes Eric, the Bernie Rap Guy, look like Eminem. Bianca Kamala Harris the First of Her Name on Twitter
Oklahoma woman shot while trying to remove Nazi flag https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53247757
Once again, Americans are drinking the Kool-Aid, with predictably tragic results
Why People Who Hate Trump Stick With Him
Since 2018, I’ve conducted roughly 50 focus groups with Trump voters to understand the shifting dynamics within the Republican Party. Equally amazing: The majority of 2016 Trump voters—despite a mismanaged pandemic, widespread economic fallout, a racial crisis exacerbated by divisive rhetoric, and a debate meltdown—plan to back Trump a second time.
What makes one voter who supported Trump in 2016 decide to support Biden? And what makes another voter—even one who thinks things are going badly—stick around?
In the simplest, broadest terms, those who are abandoning Trump are doing so because they place most of the blame for the state of the country on the president. Those who are sticking with him, despite their expressions of discomfort with him personally, are driven by an even deeper scorn for the president’s detractors. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/why-people-who-hate-trump-stick-him/616758/
Good People Don’t Defend A Bad Man https://johnpavlovitz.com/2018/01/12/good-people-dont-defend-bad-man/
Quaking Interlude 