THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

It seems foolish to start a discussion about people behaving badly and not acknowledge the elephant in the room - the elephant being Donald Trump and the room being the Oval Office. So, let’s talk about Mr. Trump.

For someone like me who has spent a lifetime studying bad behavior, Donald Trump is the mother-lode. He behaves badly on all levels in every imaginable social context. We know he learned to behave badly from his father and has always behaved badly. We also know that his bad behavior gets him what he wants and needs the most, which, being a narcissist, is more attention. What we don’t know is, is his bad behavior willful or is it the uncontrollable behavior of someone who is mentally ill.

In January of 2017 a petition by author and psychologist John Gartner, PhD, signed by more than 26,000 psychologists, psychiatrists, and other mental-health professionals and published in Psychology Today, declared that Mr. Trump has “a serious mental illness that renders him psychologically incapable of competently discharging the duties of President of the United States.” I agree with the last part of that statement, that he is incapable of competently discharging the duties of President of the United States, but I’m not sure I agree with the mental illness part. 

If the implication is Mr. Trump is neurotic or has personality disorders that may explain his inappropriate behavior, I'd have to agree. The same thing could be said about any of us. We’re all a little crazy. On the other hand, if Dr. Gartner and his colleagues are suggesting that Mr. Trump is suffering from a condition that produces behavior he cannot control (i.e., PTSD, Schizophrenia, Turret’s Syndrome, etc.), I strongly disagree.

I’ve worked with mentally ill people who truly could not control their behavior and I can tell you their uncontrollable bad behavior was seldom in their own self-interest. In fact, most of their uncontrollable bad behavior was self-destructive. In contrast, Mr. Trump’s bad behavior always seems to get him exactly what he wants and needs... more attention. That fact alone leads me to suspect that he is not as out of touch and out of control as Dr. Gartner, his colleagues, and many others may think. Then there is the timing of Mr. Trump’s bad behavior. Have you noticed how his worst behavior seems to occur at exactly the right moment to distract the media and the rest of us from looking into something more important that he wants us to ignore? That’s happened far too many times for it to be coincidence or just plain dumb luck. I am not prepared to let him off the hook that easily and excuse his bad behavior as a symptom of mental illness. I believe his bad behavior is calculated, more reactive than planned, but definitely deliberate. He knows exactly what he is doing and he is going to keep doing it because it works for him and always has.

One might argue, or at least hope, that Mr. Trump’s behaving badly will ultimately be his downfall. That may ultimately prove to be true, but it hasn’t been the case so far. In fact, the opposite is true - the more outrageous his behavior, the more his supporters rally to his defense. Donald Trump has never had to suffer the consequences of his bad behavior and that is a big part of the problem. He has had to pay some fines and settle several law suits, but punishing wealthy people by requiring them to spend money is like throwing Br’er Rabbit into the briar patch. Mr. Trump can easily afford paying a fine or settling a law suit. What he can’t afford is being ignored. I believe he understands that and has very cleverly gotten himself, possibly with foreign assistance, into a position where, as President of the United States, he cannot be ignored. And he is using that position to feed his cravings for attention as well as to line his pockets, because in addition to being a narcissist, he is also greedy.

So, how do we stop Donald Trump from behaving badly? Many Americans are calling for his impeachment. That might be worth doing because the world would certainly be a lot safer place if he was no longer the President of the United States, but it won’t stop him from behaving badly. He will continue lying, cheating, manipulating, spewing hate and feeding the divisiveness that is preventing us from working together as Americans to solve our problems and move forward as a nation. And the media will give him the platform to do so by continuing their non-stop coverage of everything he says and does, like they did during the campaign, because it is in their financial interest to do so. No, the only thing that will shut Donald Trump down is locking him up for the crimes he has already committed.... and closing his Twitter account.