A description of Trump from the book I am reading: Twilight of American Sanity

[mnhtnbb]

A Psychiatrist Analyzes The Age of Trump by Allen Frances, MD (who wrote the diagnostic criteria for Narcissistic Personality Disorder)

Trump manages to be truculently wrong on every existential question facing humanity--denying global warming, encouraging pollution, promoting resource depletion, enjoying saber rattling, opposing population and gun control, escalating obscene inequality, and trampling on civil rights protections. He has the demeanor of a circus barker, the integrity of a con man, the temperament of a neighborhood bully, the breathtaking ignorance of an arrogant know-nothing, the political instincts of a fuhrer, and the policies of a tribal nationalist.

All the problems that are inherent in American exceptionalism are now very badly compounded by Trump exceptionalism. Trump doesn't qualify for a mental disorder, but he does present with one of the world's best-documented cases of lifelong failure to mature. He is a boy/man who expects everything to go his way and experiences the world as an extension of himself. Other people exist only to do his imperious bidding, admire his great deeds, and gratify his enormous wants. This is perfectly age-appropriate behavior in a young child, but is perfectly inappropriate in a president. Trump fancies himself the nation's Big Brother, but he is really our neediest Big Baby. Trump is bad, not mad, but we the people are mad for having elected such a terribly flawed person to the most powerful position in the world. His heady rise was surprisingly undeterred by his consistent pattern of bold-faced lying; constant flip-flopping; irresponsible incitement to violence; and self-congratulatory bigotry, racism, and sexism. Blustering, bullying, and bravado play well on reality TV but can be disastrous in real life when you are running a country. No one less qualified to be president has ever won the office. No one so dangerous to our democracy has ever been given its most powerful position.

Trump is an unlikely messenger bearing an unwelcome message about the sanity of our body politic. He has revealed and unleashed a deeper streak of delusional denial in a larger segment of U.S. society than even I would have thought possible.

Although I am only 100 pages in to the book, I am finding it a fascinating read and would recommend it. I recently finished The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President edited by Bandy Lee, MD (a Yale psychiatrist).


Understanding who Trump is--and why he is such a danger to our democracy--as well as how 63 million people either could not see that danger or didn't care about it, is going to be imperative in determining whether we as a society can come back from the edge of the abyss to which Trump is dragging us, or whether we will go over the edge.

[riversedge]

1. I am going to pass this along as much as I can. thanks.

[smirkymonkey]

2. K&R

Thank you for passing this on. I really want to read this book now.

[Hortensis]

3. NOT SO FAST. This man is strongly disagreed with by thousands

of other mental health professionals, including my half sister. The fact that he wrote the text for the DSM in no way elevates him above all the other contributors.

A huge part of his basis for refuting the observations of the others is that they did not spend 45 minutes or so doing a formal face-to-face mental status examination. The "rule" is you can't diagnose if you haven't met with. Okay, but --

Neither has he. Ruling out a mental condition is also a form of diagnosis. And yet, here he is, diagnosing.

What they all do have is over 40 years of tape, video, recorded voice interviews, speeches, public announcements, interviews with people who know him, his biographers and their products, and court records -- thousands of those and at very least several hundred hours of Trump being himself in front of cameras in a wide variety of situations.

I don't know what this guy's agenda is, but I'll take my sister's evaluation over his very questionable one any time, and she and her friends in the profession watched and agreed that he displayed unmistakable signs of a cluster B personality disorder all through the campaign.

[world wide wally]

6. They are both right... Just from different perspectives.

Yes, he's mad
Yes, he's bad

[Hortensis]

11. Lol. Nice rhyme, but personality disorders are not madness.

Specifically, although apparently severe cases can go on and change to exhibit psychosis. If he were insane we'd all see it. But personality disorders merely exhibit normal traits but in very abnormal combinations and strengths.

Normal becomes disordered when traits become so strong -- and so constant -- that a person is unable to function in society well enough to maintain. They can't keep jobs, relationships, etc. Some take delight in hurting others and can be very clever about it, some weep and wring their hands at the thought of turning on a light switch without being instructed by an authority, some can't step on cracks, some insist every manufactured medication they've ever taken made them sicker because they're not "natural," and refuse them--even when their lives are at stake. But they're not divorced from reality.

Around 10% of the population have diagnosable personality disorders. That's about 1 out of every 10, and we've all run across some. A lot were on welfare because they couldn't hold a job, not matter how healthy they looked. A far larger number have "traits of" strong enough to cause serious problems but not strong enough to be diagnosed. They're all the people we can't wait to tell others about, or get away from, and often hate or are hurt by.

Does anyone think if Trump's dad had left him a fast food franchise he wouldn't have lost it, been dumped by wives and girlfriends he abused and exploited, lied his way onto the public dole (or qualified by psychiatric diagnosis), spent a few times in jail for cheating people?

[world wide wally]

15. The main thing that convinces me that he is insane are his facial expressions

Sane people don't make those exaggerated expressions.
We know he is a germophobe. Not normal.
We also know he is a sociopath with no regard for other people's feelings or welfare.
Given, there are different degrees of insanity, I am convinced he is definitely insane and it is more a matter of to what degree.

[kerry-is-my-prez]

10. I know more about Trump than the patients I legitimately diagnose. We diagnose people after a 45

minute interview. We also look at a prior diagnoses and tack that onto people. The person who initially diagnosed the person could have been totally wrong. There are also disorders that can mimic another one. Mania, depression, paranoia and psychosis can be easily confused.

[Hortensis]

14. Oh, my. Watching all this must be as...whatever for you

as it has been for my half sister. I overstated her certitude of zeroing in on a specific disorder for convenience. Even to me she's never been so irresponsible as to claim to know exactly which diagnoses he might be given.

She's very prone to worrying, though, more conservative and less naturally optimistic than me, and I've often thought it'd have been better for her if she didn't understand so much. She's a psychologist, not a psychiatrist, but the ethics of this whole situation have troubled her a great deal as well. Some day experts should feel able to discuss all this openly, and I look forward to understanding a lot more myself.

[LudwigPastorius]

4. "Trump doesn't qualify for a mental disorder..."

That's one doctor's opinion.

Here's another:

Mr. Trump's patterns of pathology have become so consistent and difficult to conceal that it is likely that he is highly impaired... - Bandy X. Lee, MD, MDiv

[mnhtnbb]

8. I just finished reading Bandy Lee's book

which I mentioned in the OP. Also a fascinating read.

Both Dr. Lee (and the other contributors to her book) and Dr. Frances AGREE that Trump is dangerous. They both agree he is the most unqualified
person to ever hold the office of president.

Dr. Frances takes the argument farther, though, with looking at what he calls the "delusional denial" in the large segment of our population that
voted for him, thus enabling him to be elected.

We've had a lot of discussions on this board about what to do about the Trumpsters. Appeal to them? Ignore them? Appeal to only
a certain segment of them? Forget about Trumpsters and just get out the vote among the huge numbers of people who didn't vote
in the last election?

I think it's interesting to turn the focus away from Trump and on the society that elected him.

[kerry-is-my-prez]

16. Sounds like another narcissist - to flatly state a diagnosis like he is the ONLY expert on the topic

"I wrote it so I am the ONLY person who counts." Methinks this person is a bit self-important at the very least.

I believe the DSM 5 has the same exact descriptors as the DSM IV. Plus, there is a whole slew of people involved in writing these diagnoses. He was just the one who insisted that he get the most credit for it - which tells you something about him.

As someone who has had their name listed last on published articles in journals, I can tell you that a lot of politics are involved with who gets their name listed first as an author of an article. I wrote most of an article that was published but because I only had a Master's and they had Phd's their names went first. One person took a lot of credit for things that I had written.

[canetoad]

5. K&R

BAD not mad.

[Beringia]

7. kick

[Bernardo de La Paz]

9. Dear Leader Don Dong Ill is ill. . . . nt

[kerry-is-my-prez]

12. Description of Narcissistic Personality Disorder from DSM 5:

DSM-5 criteria for narcissistic personality disorder include these features:

Having an exaggerated sense of self-importance
Expecting to be recognized as superior even without achievements that warrant it
Exaggerating your achievements and talents
Being preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, brilliance, beauty or the perfect mate
Believing that you are superior and can only be understood by or associate with equally special people
Requiring constant admiration
Having a sense of entitlement
Expecting special favors and unquestioning compliance with your expectations
Taking advantage of others to get what you want
Having an inability or unwillingness to recognize the needs and feelings of others
Being envious of others and believing others envy you
Behaving in an arrogant or haughty manner
Although some features of narcissistic personality disorder may seem like having confidence, it's not the same. Narcissistic personality disorder crosses the border of healthy confidence into thinking so highly of yourself that you put yourself on a pedestal and value yourself more than you value others.


Why do I have this thought that the author could be displaying a defense mechanism and is a narcissist? Why is he so emphatic and defensive?

[Solly Mack]

13. K&R