Donald Trump – Emperor Of Cancel Culture – Writer’s Lounge
Donald Trump – Emperor Of Cancel Culture
“Cancel Culture” — driving people from their jobs, shaming dissenters, and demanding total submission from anyone who disagrees. This is the very definition of totalitarianism, and it is completely alien to our culture and our values, and it has absolutely no place in the United States of America.”
from Donald Trump’s July 4th “Mount Rushmore” speech
Donald Trump is no novice as a practitioner of ‘cancel culture’. He in fact, has been promoting cancel culture for quite some time – even before becoming president, as recounted exhaustively by Vice’s Oliver Noble.
I’ve picked just a few samples from his report.
Boycott all Apple products until such time as Apple gives cellphone info to authorities regarding radical Islamic terrorist couple from Cal
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 19, 2016
Great, and we should boycott Fake News CNN. Dealing with them is a total waste of time! https://t.co/8zJ3j7g5el
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2017
“Quote of the Day: Donald Trump Decrees Boycott on Glenfiddich Scotch” http://t.co/uj7ZoYbh via @Zagat
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 7, 2012
And …
“@rhino848484: @realDonaldTrump how do you feel about the Rolling Stone Cover hitting stores this weekend?” Boycott & cancel subscriptions.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 18, 2013
There are scores more of these in the Vox report – General Motors, Nike, the NFL, Harley Davidson, but we’ll just bring your attention to the most recent.
This time the Snowflake in Chief busted out his box of Kleenex about employees at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company not being allowed to wear their MAGA hats during their work shifts.
Don’t buy GOODYEAR TIRES – They announced a BAN ON MAGA HATS. Get better tires for far less! (This is what the Radical Left Democrats do. Two can play the same game, and we have to start playing it now!).
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 19, 2020
We could say a lot about the stupidity of picking a fight with a major employer in a battleground state that is now in play for Joe Biden, and who provides over 3,300 good paying jobs in Ohio and a potent symbol of American manufacturing that has 64,000 employees throughout America.
Well, we just did. But a lot of people are talking about that. Like a dangerously over-inflated tire, Trump’s call for a boycott is going to blow up in the (impeached) president’s face.
What interests me about this even more, is the psychological underpinnings of Trump’s impulses to display such transparent hypocrisy, even to the point of sabotaging his own interests.
I have a theory that applies to this situation and many others we’ve witnessed for nearly 4 years. Donald Trump has a god complex. “God Complex” is defined generally as:
An unshakable belief characterized by consistently inflated feelings of personal ability, privilege, or infallibility.
If someone is inclined toward self-worship, it is second nature for them to issue edicts and decrees about behavior and conduct that they consider either inconvenient or objectionable, but from which they exempt themselves. Trump as Trump’s personal god, views his prerogatives as sovereign.
There is an echo of this found in Christian theology. It argues that since God is the ruler and the author of the rules and because He has perfect wisdom, it would be illogical to expect Him to conform to the laws and requirements He sets for mortal man.
One apologist justifies instances in the Old Testament where God arbitrarily acts in ways that contradicts the statutes He decreed to man, with this synopsis – “if you are not careful, it makes God subject to His own rules in a way that puts the rules above God instead of God above the rules.”
That’s the concept that Trump internalizes when he sees himself above the law.
To put it simply, they tell us, God is Sovereign and for Him to depart from the standards he’s established is not even relevant to the discussion. That’s how Christian theology resolves the contradiction.
A person with a god complex views matters in the same way. In shorthand, it is the application of the old (1684) cultural maxim of John Seiden’s – “Do as I say, not as I do.”
Donald Trump sees no contradiction whatsoever in his own behavior, because as (a) god, he is excluded from the necessity to follow the rules and expectation he dictates to others.
This is also clearly seen when he comments on, for example, Michelle Obama’s narrative during the Democratic National Convention two nights ago and describes them as “divisive.” Divisiveness is a problem when mortals practice it, but a virtue when Trump practices it. And he views cancel culture, ethics and misconduct in precisely the same terms.
There you have it. Really quite simple stuff. Occam’s Razor. Trump assesses his own habits and way of life through the filter of a god complex. His god complex is not complex.
by Richard Cameron 
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Holes
Rated PG – for violence, mild language, and some thematic elements
Available on Disney +, and most streaming services
A chance encounter with the past. A curse that expands generations. And, an unexpected treasure hunt. History, danger, and a little quirky comedy, tossed in for good measure. This is the premise of yet another underrated gem, Disney’s “Holes.”
Based on the Louis Sachar book of the same name (who also penned the screenplay), “Holes” is the story of a wrongfully convicted boy, Stanley Yelnats III (Shia LaBeouf), who has been sent to Camp Green Lake as punishment, where he’s forced to dig holes in the hot, dry Texas desert all day.
Why must these boys dig hole after hole in the hot, dry desert? To build character, of course.
As “Mr. Sir” (Jon Voight) explains, “You take a bad boy, make him dig holes all day in the hot sun, it turns him into a good boy. That’s our philosophy here at Camp Green Lake.”
But, as Stanley soon learns, the truth is a little more complicated.
After meeting an assortment of characters, including the camp’s staff, including Dr. Pendanski (Tim Blake Nelson) and the Warden (Sigourney Weaver), Stanley forges an alliance with a kid called Zero (Khleo Thomas) and the other convicts as they try to uncover the secret history of the camp itself. A history more personal than either Stanley or Zero could’ve ever realized.
Known for the “Wayside School” stories [which the author’s teacher, Ms. Sloick, would read to her fifth grade class], Sachar weaves a complicated cast of characters and story into one, cohesive mystery that the kids must solve in order to make it home. And, as he did with “Wayside,” weaves plenty of humor into the plot along the way.
The history of Camp Green Lake is connected to the tragic history of the once thriving community that sat on the edge of the now dried-up lake.
It’s here that Sachar displays his serious side, as the issues surrounding prejudice, interracial relationship, between schoolteacher Kate (Patricia Arquette) and onion farmer Sam (Dule Hall) in 1900’s Texas, and jealously from rival “Trout” Walker (Scott Plank), are brought to the forefront.
It’s this history that becomes the catalyst for everything that follows, including why Stanley and the boys are forced to dig so many holes.
It also involves the sorted history of the Yelnat’s family, whose continual string of bad luck, and Stanley’s wrongful incarceration, are all attributed to his, “No good, dirty rotten, pig stealing great-great-grandfather.”
Well, the backstory of the Yelnat patriarch is a little more complicated; involving a forgotten promise to an enchantress (Eartha Kitt), a broken heart, and yes, a pig.
In a world with cleaver, yet forgettable “family entertainment,” Louis Sachar’s “Holes” stands out. It’s a clean story, filled with drama, adventure, mystery with a social justice message and some comedy, all woven into a story that will keep you guessing until the very end.
by Tiffany Elliott
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