Sometimes it seems that it took images of crying toddlers and grieving mothers to mobilize Americans against Donald Trump and his Right-wing enablers. Of course, there has certainly been a “resistance” to Trump before now, but nothing like what erupted following the implementation of Trump’s zero tolerance policy. Notwithstanding, the current Right-wing echo chamber’s cynical spin about these news stories, the outpouring of spontaneous indignation about forced family separations at the border spanned the political spectrum. Christian evangelicals, the UN Commission on Human Rights, several Republican lawmakers, and even the Pope were all upset and angry. The depiction of children who lost their mothers sparked greater and more intense resistance than most of Trump’s other offensive and provocative initiatives.
It Will Take a Political Revolution to Cure the Epidemic of Depression
What causes depression and anxiety? I have been a practicing psychologist and psychoanalyst for almost 40 years and have seen hundreds of patients suffering from both. In my experience, some factors are obvious. People who suffer from depression and anxiety have experienced stresses and traumas in their development that predispose them to mood disorders. Garden-variety psychodynamic theory teaches us that issues involving loss, neglect, guilt, and rejection usually figure prominently in the backgrounds of people who present with significant symptoms of depression and anxiety.
In addition, over 50 years of research into the neurobiology of mood disorders strongly suggests that genetic and biological factors usually accompany, if not underlie these painful affective states. As a result of these assumptions, the treatment of depression today usually relies heavily on pharmacology, and drug companies have spent billions making sure this explanation is widely accepted. Some one in five US adults is taking at least one drug for a psychiatric problem; nearly one in four middle-aged women in the United States is taking antidepressants at any given time; and around one in 10 boys at American high schools are being given powerful stimulants to make them focus.
Since it’s well known that psychological events produce biological changes, it remains debatable whether or not disorders of our biochemistry are causes or effects. What we do know is that untold amounts of money have been spent by the pharmaceutical industry to finance research and public relations designed to enshrine biochemistry and pharmacology as primary in the diagnosis and treatment of depression and anxiety.
Why Do Some Men Engage in Sexual Exhibitionism?
Among the weirdest peccadilloes to emerge in the recent flood of stories of sexual harassment are those situations in which a man invites or coerces a woman to watch him masturbate. Analyzing the psychology of such a man can potentially help us understand the various forms of toxic masculinity currently filling the headlines. As a therapist, I’ve seen a few men who have done this kind of thing and most are driven by intolerable anxiety. The exhibitionistic fantasy—that’s what this is—originates in the man’s need to reassure himself that his penis, his manhood, is not bad, defective, or insignificant. A key part of the imagined scenario is that the woman is fascinated and excited by the display, which affirms the man’s positive sense of masculinity and momentarily relieves his anxiety. This dynamic is usually unconscious.
Of course, the actual woman complaining about this behavior invariably feels controlled, degraded, or ashamed. But her experience of humiliation does not necessarily imply that the exhibitionist’s main goal is to humiliate her. He needs to set up a situation, over and over, in which he can escape anxiety; he’s not primarily out to make women suffer. He uses women as a kind of mirror that, in his mind, reflects back admiration and excitement, not horror or disappointment; the women just feel used.
Normal masculinity in our culture is shot through with anxiety. For reasons that can only be discerned on an analyst’s couch, the normal stresses of growing up male become so extreme to some men, and their particular life circumstances make women so “available,” that sexual exhibitionism becomes a compelling fantasy to enact. When these ingredients are present, you get someone like Louis C.K.
You Don’t Need to Be a Shrink to Understand Trump’s Mind
Everybody knows that Donald Trump is mentally disturbed. His mental illness is hiding in plain sight. Someone who can never admit a mistake or show remorse or guilt is unbalanced. Someone who frequently brags and demeans others is emotionally insecure and volatile. And someone who appears to lack empathy invariably has something missing inside. No one has to go out on a limb to know that these things are true.
When I say that “everybody knows,” I realize that that isn’t literally true. Many people seem to like and admire Trump, and likely believe that critiques of his psychological stability originate from the liberal media and his political opponents. Instead, when I say that “everybody knows” Trump is disturbed, I’m saying you don’t need to be a trained psychiatrist or psychologist to believe that he is riddled with extreme emotional conflicts that hamper his ability to be a responsible leader. You just need some combination of common sense, intuition and empathy. Most psychotherapists understand their clients with just such tools. In this sense, analyzing Trump’s mind is almost as easy for the lay person as for the so-called expert.
For example, is anyone surprised that someone who smiles and clowns around all the time might be hiding depression or sadness? Or that a bully might secretly feel weak and scared? Or that a braggart is likely defending him or herself against feelings of insecurity or inferiority? Or that an abuser might have been abused as a child? These inferences don’t require speculative diagnostic leaps or specialized psychiatric knowledge, but are knowable through the ordinary emotional intelligence that guides us in normal social life.
