The Conversation (0)
Kate Plummer
Oct 12, 2021
If Donald Trump was reelected in 2024 it would have a catastrophic effect on America’s psyche, experts say.
Speaking to Raw Story, several experts said the former president’s comeback would have profound effects on the country’s democracy and would create polarisation and violence.
Dr. Lance Dodes, a retired assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, said his reelection could threaten democracy because of his “delusional sociopathy: his absence of a conscience, incapacity to care about or empathise with others, projection of blame to others (paranoia) and his psychotic distortion of reality in order to maintain his belief that he has a godlike superiority”.
“Trump’s primitive emotional state make him an enormous danger to democracy, which he cannot abide. As a consequence, if he were to again become president, the end of democracy in this country would become a realistic possibility,” he said.
Meanwhile, Dr. Justin Frank, a former clinical professor of psychiatry at the George Washington University Medical Center who has written a book about the former President, described him as a “destroyer.”
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If elected “it would mean that more Americans than ever embrace authoritarianism, and that would deliver the deepest blow to our democratic process in our history,” he said.
“The other major effect of a Trump victory in 2024 would be the likely apathy and despair felt by those who fought against him.”
Trump has hinted that he may stand again and there is a large base of voters who mistakenly believe the 2020 election was ‘stolen’ from him.
If he does stand, Elizabeth Mika, a psychotherapist and contributor to the 2017 bestseller “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump” said his return would exacerbate problems in society.
“If Trump runs and wins in 2024, we will see an accelerated continuation of our demise. Every negative trend we are experiencing now will be augmented, especially our polarisation, inequality and violence,” she said.
And Dr. John Gartner, a psychologist, had a stark warning of his own:
“Democracy would be dead, and the coup complete. All future “elections” would be Putin-style shams, where the electorate never actually has the power to remove the Republicans from power.
We could expect criminal prosecutions against Democratic leaders, the press and anyone who opposed the regime. Experts of all types would be persecuted. “Patriots” would be encouraged to expose, punish and marginalize citizens at all levels of society who are not MAGA. Fox would become de facto state-TV propaganda. Only loyal “party members” would be allowed to work in government.
Internationally, the U.S. would become a Russian puppet state. NATO and our international alliances would crumble. The economy would contract. Global warming would spiral out of control. And we might well stumble into war.”
In case you needed more reasons to think that Trump is bad news, these are pretty strong.