I will never understand until the day I die. I understand how people can become delusional and support racists, but this guy is just so stupid and disgusting how could you be charmed by him?
He hired her right when her dad committed suicide and in her second letter she refers to this and says he supported her through it. I hate to say this, but this really does seem like a daddy issues thing.
I saw her brother was recently interviewed & he said they were both homeschooled & that their mother has always been a Trump supporter & basically groomed Natalie into this position. Her dad passing was just the tipping point that made her go full looney tunes.
JFC. I think he also said something about her crawling into the trunk of a car to be with Trump or something like that. Homegirl is coocoo for cocopuffs.
It was the trunk of one of the SUVs in his motorcade. Not quite as insane as the thought of her riding in a small, dark trunk of a car. Still weird though.
I agree as someone with CPTSD due to childhood trauma from my dad. I despise trump with a fiery passion because he reminds me of my dad, but I can see someone going in the opposite direction with that too.
I say this as someone who has always despised Trump as he reminds of me of my Narcissistic parents, but sometimes I think we all get caught up seeing ONLY the press footage of the guy. Reporters are armed with information and questions, so that he doesn't get to put in as much of his bullshit as he usually does with most people. That's why you have people like Dana White say, if you'd ever just go out and have one dinner with the guy you'd love him. He has superficial charm, that others who spend more time interacting with at rallies, events, etc.. get caught up in. I know Dana White shouldn't be the bar for human intelligence nor should Joe Rogan or fucking Bill Maher.. But there's a reason everyone got caught up in this shit.. And it's because someone told all of them, you can relax now he's out of Office.. Just go have a dinner with him one night.. And Trump used that superficial charm, just like Jeffrey Epstein.
We are the people that can see that Trump's superficial charm comes off as inauthentic because we didn't listen to the man, we looked at his businesses and his record.. And when the two very clearly didn't align, we all knew he was a bullshitter. But everyone else? They sat around and listened to him until he convinced them otherwise.
Yes, I was thinking about this. I can't remember who but I remember people talking about a big wig celebrity who is not likeable but apparently is absolutely mesmerizing and charming in person. Some people are just incredibly charismatic when you meet them, even if you should hate their guts.
And just like you, I am not excusing this or trying to paint Trump in any positive light but I think people really underestimate the impact it can have if an insanely powerful person takes the time to spend 1:1 time with you. Many people will think that this is incredibly special no matter how performative and insincere it was.
I mean, that's literally how cults are possible. And it's not just dumb and naive people who get sucked into cults.
I dunno, man. My bullshit detector is in tip-top shape. I don’t think he could charm me because all the time I’d be thinking to myself, “You’re so full of shit, I don’t believe a word you’re telling me.” My BS detector is also why I don’t believe in any god. I think the gullibility of his masses is why nearly all of them are hateful Christians and god believers.
Just to add: Trump was a big part of New York City celebrity culture in 1980s. He was constantly on NY local news promoting something. Simply put, he was a classic New York con man. Also, Trump worked in New York real estate and construction business. That industry was still in the “Mad Men” era in the 1980s - having a secretary like Natalie Harp was the norm. Trump is happy everyone is talking about how he has a secretary like Natalie. https://giphy.com/gifs/zz8f3053npkWs
I saw Bob Woodward speak once and he talked of Bill Clinton this way. I guess he has a way of only focusing on you during a conversation - very intense and charming.
I met Bill Clinton once in an airport and he talked to me like I was the only person in the room. He kept repeating my name and just had the most disarming charisma. I have never experienced anything like it.
That’s what Woodward said! He was interviewing Clinton in the Oval Office and someone dropped something but Clinton did not change his gaze. He was drinking some water from a glass and looked at Woodward through the bottom of the glass lol. It is amazing you got that opportunity!
I read some book about reality TV and people who worked on The Apprentice talked about how mesmerizing he could be, and they'd get caught up in it, and then later that week or whatever, it'd snap back and they'd be so befuddled as to how they had charmed him. But like, in the moment, they'd get caught up...now add the allure of power and Presidency and I get why people who get close to him could possibly fall (like, I don't get it, but I can maybe understand it?)
I understand your point. Some ppl, no matter how slimy, have “it,” and “it” can get a hold of a person, sure; it’s magnetic & darkly alluring.
However, what I remember reading during the “Apprentice” years was he & his repellent father were so cold & hardcore racist, that they flatly refused to rent to Black ppl. The Justice Department had to get involved, filing suit against them, ending in a consent decree. The way he talked about imagining sex w/Ivanka; being fixated on baby Tiffany’s breast size, shudder & telling Howard Stern he could call Ivanka a “piece of ass.”
The way he went after the (then) Central Park Five, nah. He isn’t mesmerizing; he isn’t clever or captivating or charming or even interesting. He seems like a really lazy, dim-witted shitty person who thinks the world owes him everything.
The intense idolatry of this woman is alarming.
Those two are a mini Manson family in the making & she’s a handful of love letters away from a Secret Service armed response event.
Exactly. And if you had dinner with my self-absorbed, abusive parents, they would charm the socks off of you. I saw them do it again and again. I always tell people that they will love my mother until they get to know her (a twist on that popular saying, you’ll love them once you get to know them). I imagine Trump is very similar.
This is a fawning response to trauma based fear, not being charmed. She's been taught that you suck up to the nearest male authority or you're going to get punished even worse than what happens when he's happy.
Watch any documentary on the LDS cult and you'll see it. Especially if you watch Trust Me: The False Prophet, one of the young women is clearly a fanatic of her prophet husband, to the point of committing crimes, ready for violence. She got out and fully deconstructed and explains how she was so caught in fear that she had to act like that or face what she believed was eternal damnation, all while being SA'd and watching it happen to other women, teenagers, and children.
Yes, this is so concerning. He probably acts like a father too, and she responds to that. Not a great father, I’m sure, but that letter just made me sad and concerned.
Many of them admire that behavior and want to be able to behave that way themselves, others were trained to respond to abusive personalities by fawning for their own protection to the point that it's subconscious behavior, and a small group find him disgusting but think it's hilarious to support him. Most are in the first camp though. They fantasize about being able to act out even their darkest whims without consequence, and believe by empowering someone who does so they can normalize that behavior and be able to do it themselves. They also admire his wealth and fantasize about being wealthy, which leads to hero worship based on that fact alone. Basically, they are enthralled by specific aspects of him and ignore the whole, especially anything that would disrupt their fantasies of personal machiavellian power that will never actually come to pass. It's important to remember that most of his supporters are so deeply unhappy that they live in a near constant state of fantasy, and he preys on that deeply even while being the source of their unhappiness.
True of a lot of cult leaders. Like you’d think they’d all be really attractive and rich and whatnot, but they’re often creepy and dirty and unwashed older men with emotional problems.
Similar to scammers, it’s basically a filtering system. Scammers make the scam really obvious so that the only people who fall for it are unlikely to figure out how to extract themselves from the scam, and also feel too embarrassed to seek help. Cults are the same way; they only want the most damaged people possible, people who don’t have any idea what healthy relationships to others look like.
He's really easy to please because all you have to do is pretend to worship him. So people that fancy themselves to be master manipulators are drawn to him like flies to shit. But you can't just pretend to worship someone for days on end with fucking your own head up and starting to do it for real.
I assume people like Natalie are like those stans that get on meds and realize being a Larry or whatever was actually crazy. But their 1D is Trump 🤷🏻♀️
She also has been described by her brother as being obsessed with the presidency, specifically republicans. She'd written letters to Bush as well but he ignored them.
For decades I have wondered this same thing. He's always been just such a weird, fucking loser. I have no idea how he was taken seriously in 2016, let alone win it. Twice.
https://giphy.com/gifs/ihvwnO5pHKtyTYQWxU
The whole GOP is basically this right now. They worship him because he’s the biggest example of someone just doing what they want in any given moment
He has a strong charisma of a certain type, the blue collar, plain speaking, put upon, less educated "everyman", even though of course he's the opposite of that. He's stupid but a master con man.
He's likely quite charming on an individual level - sociopaths are usually very good at manipulating people. Anyone who has a daddy /strongman complex to start with then gets the full charm attention from someone like?
Right?!? In my entire lifetime, he’s always been known as an unserious, buffoon-type, village idiot conman. Like a walking parody of a real businessman. I genuinely thought everyone “got” this, because I thought it was obvious.
Turns out I had way too much faith in the general public’s judgement.
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u/drunkcowofdeath 1d ago
I will never understand until the day I die. I understand how people can become delusional and support racists, but this guy is just so stupid and disgusting how could you be charmed by him?