A Case Study in Life: Donald Trump

Yesterday was like a breath of fresh air. It’s hard to imagine that negativity has just been felt on one side of the political spectrum, because for the last 4 years we’ve had a bellowing, uncouth, and negative person dominating the attention of the nation.

On a personal level, I’m feeling less cynical today than yesterday. That really speaks to the power of politics — it seeps into our day to day lives and impacts how we feel about the general state of affairs. I didn’t realize how noticeable the presidency could be — even though I largely unplugged from political conversation during the Trump era. To me, Trump doesn’t represent a tax plan, a position on guns, or a set of budgetary priorities. No, he represents a personality type — confident to a flaw, close minded, Machiavellian, anti-nuance, anti-group, pro-individual. It’s no surprise that ‘strong’ media personalities — e.g., Kanye West — flocked to Trump. He didn’t appeal to people’s passion for deregulation, but rather for unilateral action, braggadocio, and an embrace of chaos and discord for the sake individual priorities and preferences.

Trump represents a bigger lesson than we’ve ever seen in politics. His personality serves as a case study in how some people live life. If you were to ruthlessly value your own priorities and ideas over others, would you live a happy life? Would your community be happy? If we look closely at Trump’s life, I think we would find that the answer is there. No, life would suck. The community would not thrive. You might have lots of money, and some cynical friends, but you would have scorned the beauty of life.