The pursuit of luxury and power by a select few public leaders, despite the cost to many, comes at a time of extreme corruption and horrific violence in the U.S. political process.
It’s not enough that pay to play techniques are rampant– including appointing tech execs as lieutenant colonels– it seems that stolen valor and deeply intrusive surveillance culture dominate the political arena.
It appears many of these figures also want the public to trauma bond with them. It’s a set of tactics that is all too familiar for survivors of domestic abuse.
I understand this as 2024 was a personal reckoning for me. The same year that my body and mind betrayed me with a near total collapse due to perimenopause, I also came to terms with the fact that I had experienced long term, life-threatening abuse during a relationship with an individual with Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).
If that wasn’t enough to process, last summer I had a deep shake up of past traumas caused by the sudden death of my estranged father, who also had NPD. This combination of horrors could have kept me in a months-long bed rot, but instead it became one of the keys to my liberation.
When I finally let myself realize both my partner and my father were incapable of loving me, and that their motivations for love bombing was always linked to a manipulative long game, I could opt out of the Sisyphean experience of trying to earn their love.
Though neither familial nor intimate, I see distinct similarities in today’s political hierarchy relating to the American people. In my observation, the newly re-established order in this White House administration employs political love bombing, gaslighting, dehumanization and shock and awe tactics to keep the underclasses under submission.
Much like intimate partner abusers (many of whom are on the Cluster B spectrum), those policymakers and officials holding political power and influence have enacted an aggressive form of targeting educational, research, medical and legal institutions with massive funding cuts and mandates. This mimics financial abuse so often exercised in the cycle of intimate partner violence.
These actions function as a way to ensure institutional compliance. But much like a narcissistic family system, this also deputizes centers of learning, support or opportunity to enact suppression of free speech or dissent. These moves essentially turn deans, faculty and researchers into what is termed flying monkeys for the regime.
This creates a dangerous place for the people of the U.S. to live, work and reside, considering the more extreme ideals of policymakers, including targeting the underclass. This involves the current nightmare of people being kidnapped by masked deputized agents.
The evidence suggests many of the players in the current federal leadership are on the spectrum of narcissistic personality disorder and psychopathy. The collective feeling of fatigue, hypervigilance and overwhelm so many in this country say they are enduring today is a direct result of large scale societal narcissistic abuse by chaos-producing federal leaders.
Survivors of these kinds of abuse can share wisdom that leads the way in some aspects of political survival.
When the public stops projecting empathy and ethics on politicians, it is possible to opt out of entire aspects of interfacing with the systems they design. There is a freedom in that release.
As an activist working on the frontlines in Los Angeles, I have had the honor of witnessing the community resisting the targeted xenophobia and racial profiling of the Trump administration through protests, documenting of ICE violence, know your rights campaigns and community self-defense.
While some survivors of narcissistic abuse are labeled as histrionic, thus validating the narcissist narrative that the survivor is “crazy,” so too can political silencing exist in a similar fashion with claims of dissenters, protesters and immigrants being murderers terrorists, criminals or lunatics.
So what is the healthy, productive response?
Shahida Arabi, founder of Self-Care and author of the 2020 book, The Highly Sensitive Person’s Guide to Dealing with Toxic People: Reclaiming Your Power from Narcissists and Other Manipulators, suggests that for survival of political abuse to follow the healing journey of survivors as one of your tools.
A prime way to escape narcissistic or psychopathic abuse is to have no or low contact. While no contact with political abusers may not be possible, low contact can mean focusing attention on building a better society rather than being activated by the one that threatens to destroy many. Low contact can look like limiting doom scrolling, curating how much and what type of news to consume, and boycotting companies run by the oligarchs.
Living in the grief and liberation of broken illusions may be the best chance of survival, for some. Others will not survive. It is urgent to take bold action to sever the trauma bond, which will look differently for each person. They can also build solidarity with others, and make a safety plan should the worst happen.
Recovery from any form of abuse requires taking time away from the toxicity that causes the harm. Take it from survivors: strengthening yourself and your community is the way through to a different tomorrow.